I know that I will be slated for this but I do have some words that I just get fascinated with. Whey-Weigh-Way In a television programme Michael Wood gave out the history of the word and it has stuck with me as a piece of useless knowledge. The gap between plots of land was where the waste stones and rubble got put and when you traveled along them you where on the "way". Whey is the waste from milk, weight was measured in stones and the stones where from the whey of the land. ****ing dull ****, but it keeps me happy!
There was a programme called Broaden Your Mind featuring the three who became the Goodies which had a sketch about explaining English to a foreigner. It featured one bit about a man who took a bow to the crowd, took his bow and fired an arrow into the bough of a tree.
Couldn't resist it I suppose we're all guilty of repeated imperfections in spelling and syntax about which we have a blind spot, while at the same time being acutely aware of those of others. We have to start towing the line and reigning in our intolerance of what we should of known already
Essentially grammar is of a fundamental importance because, regardless of language, it is the linguistic glue which bonds together the universality of the structuralism which lies behind the metacognative framework of communication. It may or may not be an innate universal ability which genetically mutated in our ancestors. It certainly seems to be a cognitive structure which other lifeforms high on our branch of the phylogenetic tree lack. As Chomsky said, our ability to apply a universal grammar, separate to language, may well be innate. Our language is involving, so usage regularly changes. Our need of grammatical structures however remains a constant. Hopefully I've cleared a few things up for you folks and you can all now sleep peacefully in your beds.
It's pretty minor in the grand scheme of things but one that really does my head in is when people say that "If you watch Steve Bruce's press conference he inferred that..." No he ****ing didn't. He may have IMPLIED that, but you bloody well inferred it from what he was saying.
QUOTE="Happy Tiger, post: 7854884, member: 1000515"]What are you suggesting by that?[/QUOTE] See, "suggesting", that's fine. No ambiguity there. What I'm sort of suggesting is: "Language is a cracked kettle on which we beat out tunes for bears to dance to, while all the time we long to move the stars to pity." Except it might have been Gustave Flaubert that said that first. But he probably said it in French, or summat.
Inferred, can't be right when there are only two teams. Surely you have to draw, come in first or in second?
