the

[jer0en]

english language basicly is a mixture of 60% dutch and 30% german, and to a
lesser extent scandinavian, latin and french, which are prodominantly used
in formal speech.

the clue of it is, that english isn't actually a new language, but a mixture
of genuine dutch and german vernacular. english for 60% basicly is pure
dutch, and for 30% basicly pure german.

the mix of vernacular was at least initially pronounced perfectly
recognizable as the original language.

the main characteristic of the vernacular was that the ending "G" was
pronounced as a pefectly soft "J", so all -IG suffixes were pronounced
as -IJ.

for the rest original english was perfectly recognizable as largely a dutch
vernacular, and would probably have been understood as such by the dutch.

and then came the age of literacy.

and though the english were pronouncing their dutch vernacular perfectly
correctly, they didn't have an idea how to spell it.

and so they spelled all their words different than the dutch and the german
did, trying to somehow make sense of the different vernaculars' vocal vowels
into spelled vowels.

and later when dutch and german people were reading back english spelling
they misinterpreted the written as having to be pronounced different to
basicly their own languages.

and so the english did.

this largely led to an massive egalization of the english vowels, the tend
to pronounce every original dutch and german Os en As as Uhs.

it is defensible that future english only has one vowel, namely the Uh.

and therefore today the english language is only pronounced correctly in the
remotest parts of the UK, in which it is still recognizable as plain dutch
and german, if you forget the spelling and simply listen to what people are
actually speaking.

[jer0en]

the main mistake the english made when starting to spell their own language
was that they thought english to be different from dutch and german.

if they would have spelled it the way the dutch and the german did, they
felt they had to pronounce it the way the dutch and german did.

which they already did, only in a vernacular.

so the english language problem is how do you spell a mix of vernacular?

what they should have done of course is spell their dutch and german words
the way the dutch and the german did, but keep pronouncing it the way they
did.

Which is what all dutch and german vernaculars do, except that they aren't
mixed.

[jer0en]

don't ask me what people in groningen, assen, zwolle, antwerpen or brussel
are saying, because I can listen to it for hours, but I won't have a clue.

but they spell it exactly the way I do.

[jer0en]

of course when they read it back, trouble starts again.

and that is basicly what the english failed to accomplish

[jer0en]

exampeltje?

the dutch sej klei weil the englisch sej clay

wrong

they say klei
they write clay

[jer0en]

the notion that they would say "clay" is a fine example of pure 100%
unadulterated projection of a different spelling on exactly the same word.

the english don't say "another", they say "unather", they just leave out the
N in "ander".

they only say "another" in RP because the dutch and german say they are
supposed to

[jer0en]

today of course, RP has actually become a different language.

it has become a product of its own illiteracy

[jer0en]

heilig boontje is basicly the metaphore of the comic figure with the drawn
aureola, looking perpendicularly upward with folded hands in immaculate, but
pretended innocence.

[jer0en]

the R in Nederland is uvular. of course there are a few that use the lingual
R but that is usually a speech impediment

[jer0en]

is dit nl.tandbederf? o neem me niet kwalijk dan moet ik in een andere
newsgroup zijn

[Max Magister]

Interesting theory. I understand English to have a somewhat different
history. Going back to the original inhabitants and languages of the
British Isles we find first of all a Saxon invasion from the mainland of
Europe. We see Sussex, Wessex, for example. Then around 800 AD we had the
Danish invasions. At this time another Germanic language came into close
contact with the local Saxon and as a result many of the cases disappeared
and genders became natural gender only. Words from both languages had
similarities and often they were given different meanings over time as both
were retained. For example, shirt and skirt were originally the same
garment. Also egg and eye were the same word in two related languages.
Interestingly, when English settled on eye to see with and egg to cook, the
other Germanic languages had settled on the opposite meanings and sounds.
By the time the Norman French arrived in 1066, the Anglo-Saxon of the
English natives had lost many of its earlier grammatical categories and
forms and the noun endings in particular were simplified. Now we have an
overlay of French which gave English an much larger vocabulary, with both
peasant words and nobility words for essentially the same thing: sheep &
mutton, cow & veal, and hundreds of others. Throughout the centuries the
sounds of the language changed, as they do in all languages, so that there
really is never a "correct" pronunciation, just a "current" one. Deviations
are just that until they become the way of the majority. Unfortunately,
when the printing press arrived in England, the spelling was petrified and
while the pronunciation continued to change, the spellings were cast in lead
and remained in their old form. So while in Scottish the "night" sounds
very close to the Dutch "nacht" in standard English there is only a slight
connection between the spelling of the word and the current pronunciation.

Just think of around, through, though, trough, enough and you have to marvel
that anyone can actually spell in English. Apparently dyslexia is a very
common problem for young people learning to read and write in English while
in Italian, for example, where the pronunciation and spelling are relatively
close, dyslexia is very rare.

I suggest that English is definitely a new language, just as Afrikaans is
now a language of its own and no longer just a variant of Dutch. English
has much in common with Dutch, to be sure, since Dutch is the closest
relative to English today but to say that English is 50% Dutch is to ignore
the history.

Max

Post by jer0en
english language basicly is a mixture of 60% dutch and 30% german, and to a
lesser extent scandinavian, latin and french, which are prodominantly used
in formal speech.
the clue of it is, that english isn't actually a new language, but a mixture
of genuine dutch and german vernacular. english for 60% basicly is pure
dutch, and for 30% basicly pure german.
the mix of vernacular was at least initially pronounced perfectly
recognizable as the original language.
the main characteristic of the vernacular was that the ending "G" was
pronounced as a pefectly soft "J", so all -IG suffixes were pronounced
as -IJ.
for the rest original english was perfectly recognizable as largely a dutch
vernacular, and would probably have been understood as such by the dutch.
and then came the age of literacy.
and though the english were pronouncing their dutch vernacular perfectly
correctly, they didn't have an idea how to spell it.
and so they spelled all their words different than the dutch and the german
did, trying to somehow make sense of the different vernaculars' vocal vowels
into spelled vowels.
and later when dutch and german people were reading back english spelling
they misinterpreted the written as having to be pronounced different to
basicly their own languages.
and so the english did.
this largely led to an massive egalization of the english vowels, the tend
to pronounce every original dutch and german Os en As as Uhs.
it is defensible that future english only has one vowel, namely the Uh.
and therefore today the english language is only pronounced correctly in the
remotest parts of the UK, in which it is still recognizable as plain dutch
and german, if you forget the spelling and simply listen to what people are
actually speaking.