Liguistics and the evolution of the English language

[emmbp]

Hey All, long time no see!  I've been on summer break without a 
decent internet connection for so long! Anyhow, just wanted to weigh 
in on the Linguistics discusion.

Jen:>  The percentage of 
> French in people's English gradually increases as they advance 
> through school... so the percentage of French in the English 
> language is actually dependant on your level of education.  
> In general, however, it's safe to say that English as it is 
> today is about 50% Germanic and 40% French/Latin, with the 
> remaining 10% made up of words from Celtic, various Native 
> American languages, Arabic, and others.

When I was in Speech and Debate, I read a very interesting article 
on Word usage as I was preparing a persuasive speech.  In this 
article it classified the English Language into three levels or 
classes.  The first level was what Jen calls the Germanic level: 
simple words like husband, cat and dog.  The second level was the 
Latinate words, not latin itself, but as Jen described, the 
Frenchified English.  These are the more complex words like spouse, 
feline, and such.  Many of these words are have cognates with 
Romance Languages, ie spouse/ esposo.  (That's why I love 
Spanish!!!!  It's so easy to understand if you have a large English 
Vocabulary)  The 3rd level were words that are mostly scientific in 
nature, latin and greek words, that usually only specialists would 
understand. 

Any way the article suggested that It was not wise to use just one 
level of words in a persuasive speech.  Even within sentences, you 
should use a wide variety of Level 1 and  Level 2 words, so that you 
could speak to a wider range of people.  As a persuasive speaker you 
want to appear educated, so it is imperative that you use Level 2 
words, but you don't want to lose your audience, so you can't use 
simply Level 2 words, you've got to use level 1 words as well. And 
it gives you a better rythem, because the Germanic words tend to be 
one or two syllables, while Level 2 words tend to have more. It also 
suggested that you capitalize on the vast variety of synonyms in the 
English Language, because most words have at least one synonym in 
each of the three levels.

On a side note, this summer of been working with a group of people 
whose first language is not english, but many have learned ESL, and 
it's kinda funny to hear them using more Level 2 words, because of 
they are cognates from their own language.

Have a great time!

Brady
May you live in interesting times!