English is a crazy, mixed up
language; it’s a wonder that any of us have ever learned it! My students, who
were learning English as a second language, often commented to me how difficult
English is to learn because it doesn’t follow the rules a lot of the time.
English has words that are spelled the same and are pronounced differently, and
sometimes opposite terms mean the same thing, and many other odd constructions.
Consider a few of these oddities:
- Why are there no eggs in eggplant, nor ham in
hamburger, and neither apples nor pine in pineapple? English muffins
aren’t English, nor are French fries French.
- If the plural of tooth is teeth, shouldn’t the plural
of booth be beeth? One goose, two geese. So—one moose, two meese? One
mouse, two mice means one house, two hice?
- If teachers have taught, why haven’t preachers praught?
- How can people recite at a play and play at a recital?
- Why is a slim chance and a fat chance the same thing,
while a wise man and a wise guy are opposites?
- Why can a house burn up while it’s burning down? Forms
are filled out by being filled in. An alarm that has gone off is still
going on.
- People can sit on a bough and cough through the night
as they re-read a red book to say they’ve re-read it.
- Why, when stars are out, they are visible, but when the
lights are out, they are invisible?
- Why had the cops sought the sot?
The photographers knot all fought for the shot—and not just for
naught. Do the police think there was proof of blood on a wood
floor?
- Why doesn’t Buick rhyme with ‘quick’?
While all these irregularities may
confound those new to the language, and even some more proficient speakers at
times, at least it is easy to see that English was not invented by computers.
Because of the terms taken from other languages,and nonstandard adoption of
words into the lexicon, the language is sometimes confusing.
However, English still holds a certain, creative charm amid all its
idiosyncrasy.
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