Mar 1 2024 - Secret Code Languages

 

There are common code languages that are considered secret languages - morse code, pigpen, phonetic alphabet, tap code, substitution ciphers, letters for numbers, American sign language. .  I wouldn't call these secret. Mostly one retrieves secret codes are fun for the kids.  That's a reflection of our times right now to ignore real topic in favour of sponsored ones.   Scroll down through the retrieval. - way down.  Secret societies, cults and other groups have always had secret language systems to communicate.  Every once in a while I bump into something like this with an innocent-seeming word.  Usually one I've made up and think would be fun, and find out how immensely wrong that is.  I went to Wikipedia's topic of secret language.  It is a reference entry and the main entry seems to be Cant - the jargon or language of a group often employed to exclude or mislead people outside the group.  That's the name for secret languages. It is interesting in itself. Then I find out there is such as thing as anti-language.  I've never heard of this - it is a language created and used by an anti-society - a small, separate community intentionally created within a larger society as an alternative to or resistance of it.  The two examples are Polish prisoners and criminals in Calcutta.  The other groups are homosexuals and teenagers.  Who would have thought that teenagers are equivalent to prisoners and criminals.  We understand homosexuals in the group as they have been viewed as criminals and potential prisoners historically in the larger society.   But for teenagers to be in the prisoner and criminal catchment group, now that's an interesting sociological idea of our times.  And then I realize it isn't new.  Think of this movie: "A Clockwork Orange is a popular example of a novel where the main character is a teenage boy who speaks an anti-language called Nadsat. This language is often referred to as an argot, but it has been argued that it is an anti-language because of the social structure it maintains through the social class of the droogs." Returning to Cant - it is used as a suffix - for example medicant - the language of the medical profession that is largely unintelligible to lay people.

Isn't this a beautiful tree - a headstone carving from the Mount Pleasant Cemetery.  I've turned it into graphic sort if image.  Maybe a celebration of life for Brian Mulroney who died yesterday.  When I look at the articles on him, the pictures show him to be a smiling, confident and outgoing person.  He laughed a lot - that had to be true for there to be so many pictures of him with a big small or a laugh.  What would the alternative be?  He was so admired and appreciated by the photographic press that these are the pictures they would submit for publication.  What a great legacy. Read more daily posts here: marilyncornwellblogspot.com Purchase works here: Fine Art America- marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.ca

Sep 29 2021 - The Decline and Fall of the English Language

 

These are the introduction sentences on the topic of the decline of English:  "Do you weep for the decline of the English language? Do people’s grammatical aberrations on social media fill you with horror?" I can respond that I don't go so far as to weep, but do get irritated.  "I use to" is normal now. I don't want to  get "used to" this.   What's the answer? Let's find out what the experts have to say. "When we think about the future of language – in this case, the English language – we have a tendency to bemoan its demise. The casual language used daily on social networks and in newspaper comment sections delivers a host of typos and misused words. Even capital letters and full stops are left by the wayside by some of those sharing their opinions, something that I personally find almost painful to witness." The article goes on to tell me the English language is evolving.   I am concerned because there are times when I don't understand what the written sentence means.  I will have to go back to school to learn the "New English". Most of the articles are opinion pieces.  I checked out the Linguistic Society of America's article: "Is English Changing?" Here's what the article says: "What's important to realize is that there's no such thing as a 'sloppy' or 'lazy' dialect. Every dialect of every language has rules - not 'schoolroom' rules, like 'don't split your infinitives', but rather the sorts of rules that tell us that the cat slept is a sentence of English, but slept cat the isn't. These rules tell us what language is like rather than what it should be like." That is excellent theory, but often I experience a failure on the the writer's part to communicate their point.  Alternately, I might be far behind on the New English. What got me thinking is the article's "Karen example".  Here it is: (4) So Karen goes, "Wow - I wish I'd been there!" (5) So Karen is like, "Wow - I wish I'd been there!" (6) So Karen is all, "Wow - I wish I'd been there!" The article explains the different meanings of each of these. There are subtle nuances.   I wavered for a moment, thinking I should start a search to learn the new English.  Instead, I found this 'joke' as a possible alternative to going back to school.   The montage picture seems a good representation of the decline of spoken and written language - a story of deterioration and disintegration rather than evolution.

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