[Wikipedia-l] Edits by project and country of origin

[Ray Saintonge]

David Gerard wrote:

>On 04/09/06, Francis Tyers <spectre at ivixor.net> wrote:
>  
>
>>On Mon, 2006-09-04 at 10:42 -0700, Ray Saintonge wrote:
>>    
>>
>>>It depends on what you mean by a simple language.  English is second
>>>only to Chinese in its simplicity.
>>>      
>>>
>>How would you define "simple" -- Personally I'm not sure that I'd say
>>that any natural language is simple.
>>    
>>
>[greatly oversimplified history]
>
>For a long while, English was the language of the lower classes, and
>its grammar simplified greatly because it wasn't used to say much more
>complicated than "Hey, Joe, where do we plant the turnips?" When it
>came back into fashion with the middle to upper classes, there were
>more complicated things to say (the sort of things you have time to
>worry about when you're not spending all your time on subsistence), so
>it started taking vocabulary on from elsewhere, and hasn't stopped.
>The vocabulary of English is *ridiculously* large compared to other
>European languages. The grammar is somewhat simpler. Pity about the
>spelling.
>
Perhaps, as you say, oversimplified but the important points are there.  
It's the grammar that I consider most important, particularly the lack 
of complicated inflections.  Joe wasn't worried about finding the 
correct accusative plural for "turnip" which the corresponding Latin 
sentence would require.  This makes syntax and word order more 
important.  English forms new words easily, and does not worry about an 
Académie Anglaise to debate and dictatate what those words will mean or 
whether they will be words.  The new words are often easier to 
understand than the old ones, and can be context driven.  Having 
Britannia rule the waves for a couple centuries was also an effective 
marketting tool for the language, as has the more recent dominance of a 
country with a similar language. 

The spelling has lagged behind, and there is a continuing effort by some 
to fix that, but that's just a matter of time.

>I don't know anything about Chinese (any of the spoken languages) to compare.
>  
>
Chinese has even less inflection than English, and has retained its 
stability for a very long time.  Very old texts are still readable.  Of 
course the script is a deterent to many outsiders, but there is a 
peculiar logical structure to the traditional Chinese characters that 
has contributed to the stability.

Ec