From a video game to the Internet to the language you speak

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

Pwn, pwnage.  Wow!  That happened faster than any other funny word entering English than I ever recall in the past.  This typographic error by a programmer in a gaming shop (pwn == own) has actually entered the TV media in advertising for a new show to be debuted this week.  The show is advertised as pure pwnage.

Now we have seen coined words enter the language in the past, and often.  One of the most notable is chortle which entered the language in the poem Jabberwocky by C. L. Dodson sometime in the late 19th century.  Often, foreign words achieve full status in English, for example robot which is a word meaning servant in one of the Balkan languages courtesy of Karel Capec's play R.U.R. (Rossem's Universal Robots).

If there was ever a proof that English is a dynamic and living language, these examples surely show it.  I am sure many of you will add more.

[Crackdtoothgrin 0]

LOL/ROFL and all it's derivatives, obviously. Almost everyone I know turns them into:

I "lolled" or "Raw-ful" or "Raw-ful Copter"...

I also say "Bee Are Bee" for 'brb' when I temporarily leave somewhere.

[Easy Bakes 253]

MODEM

And RADAR

Are 2 older ones i remeber that were acronyms that became the discriptive term for the prosess or item.

[Muck308 55]

A language that doesn't adapt is useless as far as I am concerned. I also think that any means of communication that can be understood en masse (or nearly) is acceptable, it's just easier to follow when we all play by the same rules.

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

Originally posted by: Muck308

A language that doesn't adapt is useless as far as I am concerned. I also think that any means of communication that can be understood en masse (or nearly) is acceptable, it's just easier to follow when we all play by the same rules.quote>

The rules lag the development process, in this case by about ten years.  If we accept the OED, Fowler's English Usage, and Strunk and White as the rules, editions are few and far between.  These can be controversial, as well.  Recently, an edition of Duden, the standard for German, caused a great flap in Germany.

When it comes to adaptability, I think Italian is next to English in versatility.  When it doesn't have a word for something, it adopts one from another language.  e.g. Lo Sport was taken directly from English.  The Italians have it over most of us in that their language is entirely phonetic.  If you can say it, you can write it and vice versa.  Very few funny diphones, for example, gli which is pronounced "yee" but in the back of the throat.  Similar to the Greek gamma as in για ("gia") pronounced "yah" with glottal retention.

Another acronym that has entered English as a word, not often heard but there is: LIDAR which is the laser version of RADAR.  And of course, laser is itself an acronym.  And the beat goes on .....

[Meg 368]

Originally posted by: N_O_Body

Another acronym that has entered English as a word .....quote>

scuba:  self contained underwater breathing apparatus

But that obviously pre-dates the internet.

[Easy Bakes 253]

Originally posted by: Meg

Originally posted by: N_O_Body

Another acronym that has entered English as a word .....quote>

scuba:  self contained underwater breathing apparatus

But that obviously pre-dates the internet.

quote>

Thank you Jacques-Yves Cousteau. who made them comercialy viable.

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

And, of course, the last few decades have seen new words like "Internet", "ARPAnet", "Milnet" and other computer and communications related things.  Maybe this is the era of quick communications sometimes called the "global village".

How ya gonna keep 'em down on the farm?  You give 'em the Internet.

[Z77 3]

Lets see.....Just about anything computer/internet related has changed the English language extensively. Even text messaging (which BTW, i do type things such as lol, or rofl, but i absolutely hate when people actually speak it...> ) My favorite word now that has come about from internet is 'Googling' everyone uses it, and its not even an acronym. Its a company name. But then again, not too many people go around saying, 'I need to blow my nose with a tissue.' Its usually 'I need a Kleenex'

I also fear though, that the computer has brought an end to proper grammar. Its funny yet frightening when i go around and fix all of my manager's grammatical mistakes, such as they're instead of their, etc.

But then again, The internet is bringing around new words from other languages that may not have reached certain populations.

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

Agreed. Some of the newspeak we are hearing is carrying thing too far. There is all too much lol(ly) gagging to suit me.

[Rymac91 15]

Light Amplification by Stimulated Emission of Radiation

RAdio Detection And Ranging

Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks

Need I go on? 

English is pretty quirky because it's not as tightly regulated like other languages which allows for so many strange words and acronyms to become normal. 

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

Originally posted by: Rymac91

English is pretty quirky because it's not as tightly regulated like other languages which allows for so many strange words and acronyms to become normal. quote>

This is an experession of the freedom among the English speaking peoples.  We don't need an outfit like L'Acadamie Français to tell us how to read and write our language.  Governments that support language standards in this manner sure waste a lot of money.