http://blog.xanthippas.com/2008/12/28/defining-some-more-terms/ A place for raw, uncensored ideas to be hurled about, recklessly... Wed, 08 Feb 2012 17:19:41 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.com/ http://blog.xanthippas.com/2008/12/28/defining-some-more-terms/#comment-636 Mon, 29 Dec 2008 17:29:53 +0000 http://xanthippaschamberpot.wordpress.com/?p=883#comment-636 Like Orwell said, thought corrupts language and language corrupts thought.

]]> http://blog.xanthippas.com/2008/12/28/defining-some-more-terms/#comment-635 Mon, 29 Dec 2008 14:49:17 +0000 http://xanthippaschamberpot.wordpress.com/?p=883#comment-635 Very interesting. I have an interest in how language changes over time. It fascinates me how meanings can change, how new words are added and older words slip from use. Pronunciation and style change to the point where old documents are barely readable – Chaucer, Milton, Shakespeare are beyond me; even standard English from the 19th century is stylistically very different from how we write and speak today, though it is still fairly easy to understand. It also boggles my mind how linguists can detect similar roots for words that to me seem very different, or whole languages that seem to be to be very different.

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