Re: About linguistic (in)tolerance

On 3/26/99, Lars wrote: "let me get this straight: You get upset when
people use 'erroneous' forms in an attempt to speak in a pretentious way.
Does that mean that pretentious language does not upset you as long as only
'correct' forms are used?"

Ew no. It's the dragging-language-in-the-mud-of-primate-chestbeating that
drives me up the wall. It's taking language, a joy, and making it a dreary
tool of a person's dreary drive for societal power. It's taking fun play
and making it the tool of the Man.

"(Personally, I get irritated when Danes pepper their speech with English
terms and translation loans, when perfectly acceptable Danish words and
collocations exist. I see it as a form of intellectual bankruptcy when they
don't even try to remember what language they're speaking)."

Whereas I love to borrow words from other languages into English - here's
another example of how motive and history drive our prejudices!

BB

*********
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