🚀 go-pugleaf

markd@csl.sj.nec.com (Mark Dyer) writes:

>In article <2050@aegis.or.jp> davidg@aegis.or.jp (Dave McLane) writes:

>   Hmmm, my dictionary (Random House College Dictionary, 1982) has both:
>   'complement' is something that completes or makes perfect. 'compliment'
>   is an expression of praise, commendation, or admiration.

>   So which do you mean to say: it completes you? or praises you?

>Was there one for "confuses?" Sometimes I really hate English.

>I wonder what our Japanese participants think about all this confusion.
>Maybe they feel better about their own English abilities. Or maybe they
>just blame it on that monkey who keeps falling out of the tree... :-)

Yeah. And this stuff has been edited! If you've ever been in a
real-time chat ... ohhh, very terrible! 

But speaking of confusing, a English friend of mine was over the
other day talking about whether it was 'enquiry' or 'inquiry'. My
Random House College Dictionary says 'equire' is the same as
'inquire' but what they don't say is the while in the U.S. you see
many signboards for 'Information' in England you see signboards for
'Enquiry' (Osaka station says 'Information').

On the other hand, there *are* differences between 'assure' 'ensure'
and 'insure'. Here I use Longman's Dictionary of Contemporary
English as there are differences between U.S. and British usage: 1.
You usually *insure* against future disaster by paying money to an
*insurance* company: fire *insurance*. But it is possible to
*insure/assure* against death (BrE): life *assurance*. 2. *Ensure*
meant "to make sure that something happens": Please *ensure* that
the lights are switched off before leaving the building. 3. If you
*assure* a person of something, then you promise them or tell them
something that will happen: The doctor *assured* me that I would get
better. 

My point is not to digress into a technical discussion of English
but to tell non-native speakers that *everybody* has trouble with
this language. IMHO, many/most speakers work out conventions within
the group of people they communicate with to avoid the confusion.
For example, don't think I've every said/written 'ensure'. 

While these conventions are definitely English, they aren't *all* of
English and unless you've had the opportunity to speak with people
in various places (who use various conventions) then you're all too
eager to believe that your (subset of) English is the whole thing! 

Now it might seem that having one fixed English might be useful, but
the English that is in common use today is only maybe 25% original
Anglo-Saxon English. The rest is loan words. And I myself suspect
that one of the reasons English is used by so many people all over
the world is that it is flexible enough to allow constant additions
of new words and phrases. 

Before I get down from my soapbox (how did I get here anyway? :-)
I'd like to imagine Japan about 50 or 100 years from now. How will
they explain to other people that "Japanese" is a collection of
original Japanese sounds written in kanji based upon Chinese or
hiragana, and a zillion words from English and other European
languages written in katakana? Perhaps the only difference will be
that English is written in one alphabet instead of various symbologies. 

Hope that wasn't too boring, it's a subject which interests me
greatly.... 

Dave

--
Dave McLane                                       davidg@aegis.or.jp
You're free to copy/quote/translate this as long as credit is given. 
Nagaokakyoshi, Kyoto Japan Tel: +81-75-951-1168 Fax: +81-75-957-1087