It’s official: English is silly

A whole new list of proofs are hereby provided

THE PHONE OF my friend Lift Lurker trilled. A caller from India asked him to confirm the spelling of a name, asking: "Is it S for Surat, M for Mumbai, I for Ichalkaranji, T for Tiruchirappalli and H for Hinjilicut?"

Liftie was baffled.

He commented later: “Maybe it is better if they have standard phonetics.”

But then he realized that it could be tricky spelling things in English now that it is a globalized language, as you’d end up saying things like: “Q is for qing, as in Ching Dynasty”.

I had to agree with Liftie. Even without the Asian elements, English is fundamentally a silly language.

I’ll never forget trying to teach my daughter that the word right has a g in the middle.

HER: “Why? That’s dumb.”

ME: “There’s a good reason for it.”

HER: “Like what?”

ME: “Er, I’ll tell you later.”

HER: “You don’t know, do you?”

ME: “I DO know.”

HER: “Tell me then.”

ME: “I can’t. It’s a secret.”

HER: “IT’S NOT A SECRET.”
*

A particular problem when spelling things out loud is that English words often don’t start with the sounds they sound like they start with.

Here are a dozen phrases which sound right but are wrong, and when you explain to children/ non-English speakers that they are wrong, you get bafflement.

1) A is for Eh?

2) C is for See.

3) G is for Jeep.

4) I is for Eye.

5) K is for Cayman.

6) L is for Elephant.

7) M is for Eminent.

8) N is for Enlist.

9) Q is for Cue.

10) R is for Ah.

11) S is for Esteem, and

12) U is for You.
*
Who made up this dumb language anyway?

Probably Shakespeare or someone like that who rarely received calls from phone centers in India.
*
My rant was interrupted by someone sitting nearby.

“Words are spelled with the right letters if you are a rap singer,” said a nearby youth, who shall go unnamed, as she was skipping school that day.

She pointed out that people who made pop songs would spell Esteem as S-Teem, Eminent as M-inent and so on.

A music fan, she claimed that the trend started with Coz I Luv You by Slade in 1971 but was now widespread among music people.

But even pop stars sometimes embarrass themselves.

“Jessie J had a line from one of her songs tattooed on her hip and spelled it wrong,” she said. The British singer wrote: “Don’t loose who you are in the blur of stars”, misspelling the world “lose”.

She now has to look silly the rest of her life or cut off a buttock.

*
This leads me to an observation. People who write nice letters to columnists can usually spell. But the ones who write abusive letters can’t.

Yesterday I got a message saying: “Your gay.”

I wrote back asking: “My gay what?”
*
So let’s make it official. Your columnist, who has had research papers published in top academic journals of language, and thus can claim to speak with modicum of authority, hereby declares that English is officially silly.

So we may as well have fun with it.

I told Otis that if his caller from India rings again, he could have some fun by giving him a list of words with silent first letters.

A is for aisle;

B is for bdellium;

C is for czar;

D is for djinn;

E is for Euphrates;

G is for gnome; H is for hour;

K is for knee;

M is for mnemonic;

O is for Ouija;

P is for pneumonia; and, most appropriate of all,

W is for wrong.

Mwah ha ha ha ha.
*
*
*
 
 
 

Technorati Tags: English,funny,broken English,World Englishes,globalized English,wordplay,word play,spelling on the phone

Comments

[Baby Tori]

Hong Kong people has a unique way to clarify English letters:
I got a call from a local guy saying he is looking for "See why Ar Lo You Er See", then I start looking for my colleague Cyrus.
I called to order takeaway from a local fast food, and I am living at Flat C. She asked if it is the "C" in "ABC". Yes, it is not the "C" in "DEF"
But for my 4.5-year-old niece (she will get mad if I say she's only four), all letters stand for a Disney character:
A for Aurora (in Sleeping Beauty)
B for Bell (in Beauty and the Beast)
C for Cinderella etc.

[grandpa]

It is definitely a silly language, putting adjectives if front of names, unlike the rest of the world.
Imagine a cart with the ox in the back
a car with the steering wheel in the back
an airplane with the pilot seating on the tail
an elevator with its cables underneath

what do you read there : ghost ?

Nor it is not a ghost, it is a fish
gh , pronounce like in enough
o pronounce like in women
st pronouced F like in.... eerr
I forgot that one
Silly language, anyway

[Dul]

There's this one letter in the Sinhala language I couldn't figure out how to spell in English for the long time. Its the.. er..
Well, People who have names with it write their names as,
Gnanananda or Gnanasekara or Gnanawathi

If there was a letter that Sinhala language does not cover we would have had to invent a new letter. But english? Just invent a new combination with the existing letters!

Conclusion: Using the said silliness, users may use odd combinations of letters to "define" otherwise uncovered.. err.. sounds?

[Bianca Schlimm]

Putting adjectives in front of the word seems of rational and clear to me. Has it to do with the fact that Italians, Spanish and French take a looooooooooot of coffee breaks? dragging their adjectives behind them...sometimes forget them...in that careless nonchalant Roman way?

how do the Sinhalese treat their characteristics?
and the Chinese?

I wish I had a LL telephone, so nice to be able to put it under your ear. good old times!!

[Rory]

Come on Nuri you must know the English Music Hall alphabet -
A for orses
B for mutton
C for (sorry)
D for dumb
E for brick
F for vescent
G for crying out loud
H for ....
I for Novello
J for oranges
K for restaurant
L for leather
M for cream
N for mation
O for the wings of a dove
P for a penny
Q for the one and nines
R for mo
S for ...
T for two
U for ...
V for Las Vegas
W for ....
X for breakfast
Y for heaven's sake
Z for ....
As you can see I've forgotten a few, and I'm not sure that Las Vegas is original.

[Nury]

That's very clever, Rory. I hadn't seen that.
I can work out L for Leather (Hell for leather) and J for Oranges (Jaffa oranges) and X for breakfast (eggs for breakfast) but many of the others have me stumped.

Can anyone else work them out?

[Lift Lurker]

Next time they call I was ready. I got call from call center, but I think it was not from India this time.

CC: How do you spell your name Mr Smith sir?

LL: S for scintillating...

CC: Uh...scin....how do you spell that sir?

LL: S-C-I...

CC: C for 'see'?

LL: No, C as in catatonic

CC: Cata...how do you spell that sir?

LL: Catatonic....C-A-T-A...

CC: T as in dog sir?

LL: No, T as in...uh.. tandoori! (you must know that)

CC: Ah yes...CH as in Chowdhury..

LL: Ok, if you say so...

CC: So, Mr Chowdhury, thank you for your time we will ship the order. Can you spell your address?

[rafanjr]

...hmmmm talking about the alphabet

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K7e404n_ijA&feature=related

[grandpa]

Mr jam bloggers to the rescue
Angela
Bianca
Christy, chamin
Dancer
Ellen
Farah
Grandpa
He he he he
Isn't fun
Jason
Karuna
Lift lurker
Mahjuja
Nury
Otis
Paul
Q
Ram,RIKA
Sej
Ts, Tamanna
ULI
Vittachi
W
X
Yrun
Z

[TS]

When I have to resort to phonetics on the phone, it's usually around the same time where my patience have come to an end. The only words that come to mind is swear words or at best mildly rude.

A for Asshat
B for Bollocks
C for C...
D for Dumb
E for
F for Fornication (sometimes another word)
G for G-spot
H for Hell
I for Idiot
J for
K for
L for
M for Morron
N for No-brain
O for
P for
Q for
R for Root (mostly offensive in Australia)
S for Spunk
T for
U for Uranus
V for
W for Willie (as not in 'Willie Nelson')
X for
Y for
Z for

Don't think I couldn't find any blue words for the blanks. If I wrote them here, Uncle Nury would be banned in 192 countries.

[Chamin]

@Dul: I guess this one will be hard to spell with most languages

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yj-1kp777NM

Hm, what if I change my name to !Xamin?

[uggs.com]

It is already in my favourite list and i will try to follow it when possible . Thanks for the nice posts .

[David]

Read your article in The Sun on Monday. Quite a giggle.

Obviously a lot of people have not heard of the phonetic Alphabet as used in the airline , and other industries. The NATO Phonetic Alphabet. But I see that one of the major money transfer companies have their own example.

Well English ,like all languages , have it's own grammar etc. unless one is an Oxford Don or the like one would never learn all the reasons for spelling things as they are. A degree in English language would be just a start. It is of course an old language and made up with instance of , French, Roman, Latin, Greek, etc. So that would make it complicated wouldn't it.?

Then your articles are meant to be funny aren't they?

I will send you a file of the phonetic alphabet. Perhaps all call centres should learn this as part of the training.

Best wishes..