David Worboys – Treacherous English

Once you know the rules, the languages of Spanish, Italian and German are logical in their spelling and pronunciation. French does have rules but they are inconsistent and complicated, whereas in English there are no rules at all.

There are hundreds of words used with two or more entirely different meanings. Stress, state, strike, stamp, stole, still, staff, stem, stuff, stern, stool, stick. And these are just a dozen of many examples beginning with ST….

We also have many cases where two words have the same pronunciation but different spellings and meanings. Stair/stare, steal/steel, sole/soul, son/sun, sail/sale, seam/seem, soar/sore (and saw). The words paw, poor, pore and pour are pronounced more or less the same, as are pair, pare and pear.

Others have the same spelling but the stress changes to give a different meaning, as in “entrance” and “content”. And the stress changes from interval to internment to interrupt.

Imagine English dictation going wrong: It was a bit Chile and I was suffering from Qatar. He had his Korea to think about, so I just wrote him a Czech. It was a close Finnish (almost a Thai) but Iran faster. Her baby Wales every time she feels Hungary. My hands were covered in Greece.

The letter R has a different sound in all five major European languages. R is especially difficult for the Japanese, most of whom cannot pronounce the letter L at all. Cockneys cannot manage the sound TH, using F for the soft (“through” becomes “froo”) and V for the hard (“weather” becomes “wevvah”). And how does “nothing last month” become “nuffink lars mumpf”? Likewise, most Northerners pronounce the word “but” to rhyme with “put” – with a silent T.

I sometimes wonder whether English is taught in English schools any more. I do know that today professional journalists, broadcasters and editors (let alone social media addicts) increasingly commit basic errors. It’s even worse in readers’ letters and advertisements. I also know that, at school in the late forties and the fifties, I was encouraged to understand my own language by learning grammar, vocabulary, spelling, pronunciation and punctation. This meant understanding the parts of speech and being familiarised with declensions, conjugations, cases, tenses, moods, active and passive voices, relative clauses, word order ….

Schooling was backed up by the availability of well-written novels, mature journalism and literate presenters on radio and television. There was, of course, no google; no Wikipedia; no social media platforms.

I suppose, if people understand each other, the main purpose of a language, i.e. as a means of communication, is fulfilled. But what about its artistic beauty – not only in great literature and speeches but also in expressing oneself clearly in everyday conversation.

Otherwise, it’s just another example of “can’t be bovvered”. Innit? I’m like: “We need to respect it and stuff”. I don’t do shoddy. Know wha’ I mean?