English Language of the Future

[rippingtons_fan]

Are there any theories as to what the English language (written and spoken) may be like in the future, (say in a hundred years or so?) How about similar possible future changes in other languages besides English?

[ultrafilter]

The invention of the printing press slowed down the rate of change of written language a lot, so there's a theory that the invention of multimedia recordings will have a similar effect on the rate of change of spoken language. Time will tell.

[jawdirk]

Originally Posted by rippingtons_fan

Are there any theories as to what the English language (written and spoken) may be like in the future, (say in a hundred years or so?) How about similar possible future changes in other languages besides English?

I heard in an undergraduate linguistics course at UCSC that languages typically evolve through social innovation. In the class, the professor said that typically women speak a language closer to how it will be spoken, and children learn language more from their mothers. Typically, he said, men are more conservative in their use of the language -- not so much on the cusp. I have no idea whether what this guy said was supported by credible research.

[Spectre of Pithecanthropus]

I think English may experience further simplification, such as the elimination of irregular past participles. People will say "have went", "have came", "have ran", and so on. The use of Britishisms on the Internet, by misguided Americans who want to look sophisticated, may well lead to American and British English becoming more similar, and some Americanisms may be lost.

I think German will stay much the same, but may see further use of the dative case for those few prepositions that now govern the genitive. These usages are already typical in everyday speech.

[bordelond]

Originally Posted by ultrafilter

... there's a theory that the invention of multimedia recordings will have a similar effect on the rate of change of spoken language.

Radio, film, and television have already an enourmous braking effect.

[Acsenray]

Everything will be initialisms and acronyms.

[carnivorousplant]

"As Chaucer is, shall Dryden be."

[Rodgers01]

Originally Posted by Spectre of Pithecanthropus

The use of Britishisms on the Internet, by misguided Americans who want to look sophisticated, may well lead to American and British English becoming more similar, and some Americanisms may be lost.

I kinda doubt it -- from what I've heard, it's British English that has moved closer to American English in the post-War years. (Already, for example, Brits generally understand American accents much more easily than Americans understand British accents, at least in my experience.) I think the number of Americans using British expressions in order to sound sophisticated will always be a pretty minor thing -- not enough to swing the language of the masses in that direction.

I think the subjunctive might be scheduled to disappear in the not-so-distant future. Using the term "they" as a neutral singular pronoun rather than the awkward "he/she" is already widespread, and will probably gain wider acceptance. Regional accents will continue to disappear with the ever-increasing reach of mass communication.

[Elendil's Heir]

"Alright" and "alnight" will become commonly accepted. ::shudder::

[Rodgers01]

Originally Posted by William V.

"alnight"

Really? As in "alnight diner"? I've never seen that.

[Alan Smithee]

The use of third person plural pronouns as third person singular pronouns of unspecified or indeterminate gender will be formally accepted. An English teacher might object, but they will be wrong.

Shall will continue to be used as it is today in those dialects and cunstructions which do so.

Same for whom.

Question: Will the use of the objective case continue to expand? If so, how? What causes this? Is it me?

[Quartz]

Originally Posted by Alan Smithee

The use of third person plural pronouns as third person singular pronouns of unspecified or indeterminate gender will be formally accepted. An English teacher might object, but they will be wrong.

Somewhat related, but IIRC it comes from the Attic Greek that plurals of neuter nouns (of Greek and Latin origin) take a singular verb q.v. data, agenda (although that's a gerund).

[yBeayf]

An interesting speculation.

[Excalibre]

Originally Posted by Quartz

Somewhat related, but IIRC it comes from the Attic Greek that plurals of neuter nouns (of Greek and Latin origin) take a singular verb q.v. data, agenda (although that's a gerund).

Huh?

It's quite understandable that Latin plurals would be reanalyzed as singular collective nouns in English, given that they have no overt plural morphology that English speakers recognize. Hell, the same happened, in a way, with some second declension Latin neuters in the Romance languages. For instance, OVUM, 'egg', plural OVA, was reanalyzed by speakers of Romance (a.k.a. Late Vulgar Latin) as two separate words. The final -M being lost with subsequent alteration to the final vowels, the Romance forms would have been OVO and OVA in the singular and plural respectively. Well, those were reanalyzed as two separate words - one understood as a masculine singular referring to a single egg - Italian uovo, Spanish huevo - and the other was understood as a feminine singular describing eggs collectively: i.e. roe or caviar - Italian uova, Spanish hueva.

Reanalysis of plural forms as collective singulars is a quite natural and normal process, and one can expect that "data" will go that route in English just as OVA did in the Romance languages. I'm not sure what Attic Greek has to do with any of this.

[alterego]

Originally Posted by Spectre of Pithecanthropus

The use of Britishisms on the Internet, by misguided Americans who want to look sophisticated, may well lead to American and British English becoming more similar, and some Americanisms may be lost.

you must have been away with the faeries when you posted that..or maybe you're just barking mad. if you ask me, these so-called sophisticated britishisms make you sound queer as a nine-bob note and are about as useful as a wet fart in a thunderstorm.

[John Mace]

I gotta wonder whether spoken language will simply drift further from the written form so that we have, essentially, two languages. That's already true, of course, for many speakers of English today. But will it be true for all but a very few of the educated elite?

[Push You Down]

I don't know much... but I do know I hate it when someone says "axe" instead of "ask"... Sigh.

[chaoticbear]

Originally Posted by Push You Down

I don't know much... but I do know I hate it when someone says "axe" instead of "ask"... Sigh.

Noooo! That one was mine. (They do it on Futurama, so it's destined to happen.)

[Excalibre]

Originally Posted by John Mace

I gotta wonder whether spoken language will simply drift further from the written form so that we have, essentially, two languages. That's already true, of course, for many speakers of English today. But will it be true for all but a very few of the educated elite?

I doubt it. I think if anything reading and writing are becoming and will continue to become more critical for the average person, not less. Which means I think the written language will be modified to accommodate how people actually speak. I don't know about spelling reforms, since we English speakers really seem to hate the idea (even though it's not all that uncommon in many other language communities) but I suspect that many of the more formal constructions we tend to use in writing will eventually fade away, as they have done from the spoken language, since it seems like we have less and less use nowadays for a formal writing or speaking style.

Originally Posted by Push You Down

I don't know much... but I do know I hate it when someone says "axe" instead of "ask"... Sigh.

Bad news. We've been talking about this in another thread lately . . . short explanation is that "axe" is actually probably just as old as "ask"; Chaucer, for instance, used the two interchangeably. It's only a historical accident that we've decided one is preferred and the other is stigmatized; but since "axe" has survived since at least the middle ages, I don't see it going away any time soon.

[Left Hand of Dorkness]

"Y'all" will become standard form, eventually drifting into usage for both singular and plural second person. To compensate, Southerners will say, "Y'alluns" to refer to the second-person plural, and will be widely mocked for this construction by grammarians who insist that only "y'all" may be used for second-person singular or plural.

Daniel

[Smeghead]

u wul b lik ths!!!111lol

[Rico]

Sports teams will loose all their games.

_{That's my pet peeve}

In other words, we'll all be pwned!

[DarrenS]

This is really more IMHO territory.

IMHO: much great incorporation of ebonics / hip-hop culture and references.

Simplification - use of many simple words instead of one more obscure word. (insufficient -> "not enough". )

Dilution of language - words used less carefully. "literally" means "figuratively"

[Rico]

oh yes, and I forgot to mention...

<mod>

Off to IMHO with you!

</mod>

[carnivorousplant]

Originally Posted by Left Hand of Dorkness

only "y'all" may be used for second-person singular or plural.

Daniel

That's "All ya'll.".

The cop stops the car. He looks at the driver. "Ya'll been drinkin'."
He looks at the passengers in the back. "All y'all been drinkin'."

[robardin]

Now that is is finally OK to boldly split infinitives, I'm hoping that grammarians will soon sign off on English having "disjunctive" pronouns like French does. In other words, just as in French one says "c'est moi" and not "C'est je", it should be considered correct to say "it's me" in English. Nobody says "It's I" without feeling very forced. "Just you and me" or "us and them" will be judged correct, and "Just we and they" archaic or affected.

The use of "ain't" should be legitimized as well. Heck, there ain't no ambiguity with double negatives, neither.

On the downside, b4 i 4get, very soon u will c lots of writing lk ths, especially in advertising. Apparently a new generation of children have already begun handing in schoolwork to perplexed teachers full of AOL/text messaging shorthands like this with absolutely no idea why this is considered unacceptable. (I woNDer hoW e.e. cummings w0uld have liKeD iT?)

[robardin]

As for "other languages", I have often wondered if the "one child" policy in Communist China might evfentually affect the rich vocabulary the Chinese language has in "ranking" family members by age and patrilineage/matrilineage. There are different appelations for every relation depending on whether the person is older or younger than you (or your "point of relation"), and on what side of the family the relation is. But with a "one child" policy, how long before a single term becomes used for "uncle" regardless of whether or not said uncle is older than your father?

[elmwood]

American English will continue to absorb words from the languages spoken by immigrant groups. I'd expect to see some more words of Spanish origin enter mainstream usage; not like Spanglish where speakers drift back and forth between languages while speaking, bur more like how certain Yiddish words got absorbed in the early 20th century. The words paseomight be used by English speakers to describe a leisurely walk in a busy area; a concept that really can't be described with a single English word. I think some Arabic might also be absorbed, but unfortunately they may be words that are related to war and aggression. I'm already seeing "jihad" is already being used to refer to a struggle, but not in the context of a holy war; "for instance "I'm on a jihad against the crabgrass on my lawn."

I've been witnessing marketing-speak crossing over into everyday language, especially the word solution to describe ... well, anything. I hope in 20 or 40 years, we won't be calling lamps lighting solutions or pens writing solutions, but I'm already hearing regular people call computer monitors display solutions and keyboards input solutions.

There might be some more spelling simplification. Some words ending in "-ight" may be spelled with "-ite", such as lite, brite, and rite. If this happens, it may still be several decades before fight, might and tight make the transition. Thru may become an acceptable spelling for what used to be through.

Special may evolve into a less-than-flattering term, thanks to its association with mental retardation. Kids in 2050 may jsnicker about Special K cereal just like they do with Ben Gay today.

A few more profanities may make the transition to respectability, or at least tolerance. Crap, fart and sucks were considered profane a couple of decades ago; now tney're in the same league as hell and damn. I think asshole and shit will be the next to cross over.

[Excalibre]

Originally Posted by robardin

Now that is is finally OK to boldly split infinitives, I'm hoping that grammarians will soon sign off on English having "disjunctive" pronouns like French does. In other words, just as in French one says "c'est moi" and not "C'est je", it should be considered correct to say "it's me" in English. Nobody says "It's I" without feeling very forced. "Just you and me" or "us and them" will be judged correct, and "Just we and they" archaic or affected.

I know this sort of thing gets some people's panties in a twist, but "It's me" has always been the grammatically correct form in English; "It's I" is inherently ungrammatical in English and has always been, no matter what a few stick-up-their-ass types may claim. "It's I" is based on a false equivalence with Latin, as in Latin the predicate of the copula was normally a nominative (and this wasn't a matter of prescriptive grammar, either. It was the only usage in existence, and many of the modern Romance languages continue in the same vein, e.g. Spanish "Soy yo". No native Spanish speaker would ever say "Soy mí".)

English, not being Latin, does not have grammar identical to that of Latin. It has always been false to claim that "It is I" is a grammatical English sentence. Wish luck, the few misguided souls who still insist on "It is I" will give up eventually, but this will have no structural implication for English as "It is I" never entered normal English usage.

[Clock]

Well if'n y'all axe me this is a load of doubleplus badthink ungood twaddle.

Room 101 NOW!

[Alan Smithee]

I forgot to mention--I wouldn't be surprised if adverbs lose their distinctiveness. At least in the States, we often drop the -ly ending, as a thread pointed out a few weeks ago.

[twickster]

Originally Posted by elmwood

I'm already hearing regular people call computer monitors display solutions and keyboards input solutions.

No you're not. No, really, please, you're not.

[jjimm]

Originally Posted by twickster

No you're not. No, really, please, you're not.

Doesn't it just make you want to proactively interface with the scruff of the head-support mechanism of the person who said that, and leverage your digit/palm interface into fist-space, to facilitate a lateral tooth-removal solution?

[PookahMacPhellimey]

Try reading Russell Hoban's novel Riddley Walker, written entirely in Post-Apocalyptic English. Very well done but it makes for a tough - if rewarding - reading experience.

[elmwood]

Originally Posted by twickster

No you're not. No, really, please, you're not.

I'm hoping the same thing. It's not very much, but still it's slipping out there. In fact, not too long ago, at the supermarket, I overheard a woman talking about "meal solutions" with her male companion.

[Tevildo]

If I had to make one prediction, it would be that the spellings "rediculous" and "alterior" (rather than "ulterior") will become standard. They're already in common use on the Internet by people who don't otherwise appear to be poor spellers, and I'm sure it won't be long before they become universal. "Then" for "than" might be my third choice, but the ambiguity introduced by the new spelling is probably going to hold it at bay.

[Max the Immortal]

Originally Posted by ultrafilter

The invention of the printing press slowed down the rate of change of written language a lot, so there's a theory that the invention of multimedia recordings will have a similar effect on the rate of change of spoken language.

Maybe not. Consider the following:

"Could you e-mail me the link to a webpage where I can download an mp3 of that track you mentioned on your blog? I want it for my iPod; I might even burn it onto a CD for my mom."

This is perfectly comprehensible to most people nowadays. Less than twenty years ago, it would have been gibberish.

I really, really, hope that English spelling remains the way it is. Traditional spelling is simply more beautiful than this newfangled text-message-Webster nonsense. It carries the history of the language, and helps an amateur linguist better understand the origins and sublteties of many words. Text-message spelling just looks retarded.

[twickster]

Originally Posted by Max the Immortal

Maybe not. Consider the following:

"Could you e-mail me the link to a webpage where I can download an mp3 of that track you mentioned on your blog? I want it for my iPod; I might even burn it onto a CD for my mom."

This is perfectly comprehensible to most people nowadays. Less than twenty years ago, it would have been gibberish.

True -- but it's all vocabulary, not any kind of fundamental change in how the grammar works or anything.

[Clothahump]

Originally Posted by Left Hand of Dorkness

"Y'all" will become standard form, eventually drifting into usage for both singular and plural second person. To compensate, Southerners will say, "Y'alluns" to refer to the second-person plural, and will be widely mocked for this construction by grammarians who insist that only "y'all" may be used for second-person singular or plural.

Daniel

No. The second person plural is already widely known. It's "all y'all".

[What Exit?]

Originally Posted by Max the Immortal

Maybe not. Consider the following:

"Could you e-mail me the link to a webpage where I can download an mp3 of that track you mentioned on your blog? I want it for my iPod; I might even burn it onto a CD for my mom."

This is perfectly comprehensible to most people nowadays. Less than twenty years ago, it would have been gibberish.

I really, really, hope that English spelling remains the way it is. Traditional spelling is simply more beautiful than this newfangled text-message-Webster nonsense. It carries the history of the language, and helps an amateur linguist better understand the origins and sublteties of many words. Text-message spelling just looks retarded.

Every Dad that has ever had to answer the question

Dad, why are there so many word in English that aren't spelled the way they sound?

Can tell language should be phonetic. Why not skool or skul instead of school? Nite instead of Knight and night?

Jim

[firespinner]

Languages change as different languages become assimilated. Here in Ireland, experts can identify Irish (Gailge) grammer in the spoken English. Another example is Anthony Burgess, A Clockwork Orange. You must take into account other languages

[robardin]

Originally Posted by Alan Smithee

I forgot to mention--I wouldn't be surprised if adverbs lose their distinctiveness. At least in the States, we often drop the -ly ending, as a thread pointed out a few weeks ago.

Yep. I seen and heared it happen alot.

(Note my careful avoision of "done seen it happen", which is clearly wrong.)

[robardin]

Originally Posted by jrfranchi

Every Dad ... can tell language should be phonetic. Why not skool or skul instead of school? Nite instead of Knight and night?

Meh. I agree that I like English spelling the way it is, with road signs for those who can see into the history of the language.

Pronunciation changes over time and by region; there cannot be any real "purely phonetic" spelling of a global language, such as English has become.

Ever read Mark Twain's (mock) proposal for phonetical English spelling?

A Plan for the Improvement of English Spelling, by Mark Twain

For example, in Year 1 that useless letter "c" would be dropped, to be replased either by "k" or "s", and likewise "x" would no longer be part of the alphabet. The only kase in which "c" would be retained would be the "ch" formation, which will be dealt with later. Year 2 might reform "w" spelling, so that "which" and "one" would take the same konsonant, wile Year 3 might well abolish "y" replasing it with "i" and Iear 4 might fiks the "g/j" anomali wonse and for all.

Jenerally, then, the improvement would kontinue iear bai iear with Iear 5 doing awai with useless double konsonants, and Iears 6-12 or so modifaiing vowlz and the rimeining voist and unvoist konsonants. Bai Iear 15 or sou, it wud fainali bi posibl tu meik ius ov thi ridandant letez "c", "y" and "x" -- bai now jast a memori in the maindz ov ould doderez -- tu riplais "ch", "sh", and "th" rispektivli.

Fainali, xen, aafte sam 20 iers ov orxogrefkl riform, wi wud hev a lojikl, kohirnt speling in ius xrewawt xe Ingliy-spiking werld.

[Polerius]

Originally Posted by jrfranchi

Can tell language should be phonetic. Why not skool or skul instead of school? Nite instead of Knight and night?

Ai think English will definetly becum fonetik

[DarrenS]

Originally Posted by jrfranchi

Every Dad that has ever had to answer the question

Can tell language should be phonetic. Why not skool or skul instead of school? Nite instead of Knight and night?

Jim

English used to be a lot more phonetic. "Knight" used to have the "k" and "g" pronounced.

[asterion]

Originally Posted by elmwood

American English will continue to absorb words from the languages spoken by immigrant groups. I'd expect to see some more words of Spanish origin enter mainstream usage; not like Spanglish where speakers drift back and forth between languages while speaking, bur more like how certain Yiddish words got absorbed in the early 20th century. The words paseomight be used by English speakers to describe a leisurely walk in a busy area; a concept that really can't be described with a single English word. I think some Arabic might also be absorbed, but unfortunately they may be words that are related to war and aggression. I'm already seeing "jihad" is already being used to refer to a struggle, but not in the context of a holy war; "for instance "I'm on a jihad against the crabgrass on my lawn."

I agree that more absorption will probably take place but I think that the pronounciations will become heavily Anglicized by people who normally use the absorbed vocabulary. For an amusing example, I spent some time in California with people from back East who had learned Spanish in school. I was raised in Albuquerque, so various Spanish nouns are common and sometimes even what I think of first when naming something. For example, it's not a ditch, it's an arroyo or it's not a plateau, it's a mesa. Anyway, anyone can tell you that the pronounciations have been heavily Anglicized by native English speakers. So this trip to southern California had this one woman sounding like Peggy Hill whenever a Spanish word came up. I never really liked King of the Hill, so I don't know if they still have the character talk like that, but what sticks out in my mind from that show is "Monterrrrrrey hack." Amusing while exasperating, because I did a double-take every time she did that and had to verify we were talking about the same thing. Her attempts at pronounciation when we went into a Cal-Mex place cracked me up.

[Wendell Wagner]

robardin writes:

> Ever read Mark Twain's (mock) proposal for phonetical English spelling?

This isn't by Mark Twain:

http://www.spellingsociety.org/journals/j31/satires.php

[What Exit?]

Originally Posted by DarrenS

English used to be a lot more phonetic. "Knight" used to have the "k" and "g" pronounced.

I often say "Ka nig it". Is that what you mean?

[Wendell Wagner]

No, it was pronounced more like kniXt, where it's one syllable, and the X stands for a sound that doesn't exist in English anymore but which is like the sound represented by ch at the end of German words..