Post by Odysseus on Aug 8, 2020 4:26:28 GMT
Oh, wait, I guess my verbal diarrhea continues.
IMHO, the biggest flaw in the English language is in its spelling. Much of this seems to be traceable to the fact that it is an amalgamation of different languages: Celtic/Saxon/Scandinavian/French, mostly. Unlike the French, who managed to clean up their language and spelling with official rules etc, English spelling is all over the place. French, by dint of its ability to say much but communicate little of threatening substance, is the language of diplomacy. English, with its Byzantine collection of words, grammar, and spelling, is the language of commerce, where misunderstandings can result in important profit margins, and of war, where misunderstandings can result in colonial expansion.
And of course, for Brits, as Pygmalion illustrated, language can be the great un-equalizer, where people are kept in their place by not knowing the right way to say this or that.
Cheerio and all that.