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Did English ever have a formal version of "you"? (2011)

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Re: Did English ever have a formal version of "you"? (2011)

#221

Post by em-bee »

PaulDavisThe1st wrote: post #209
em-bee wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

ismo explains shit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=igh9iO5BxBo

he's wrong that "shit" is the most complicated word in english. That would be "jawn" - an adjective, noun, verb and more all in one little 4-letter package, which is also true of "shit", except that nobody not raised in Philadelphia knows the true scope of "jawn".

well i look forward to when ismo gets to philadelpia and learns about "yawn". i expect he'll start out saying something like "i thought when i learned about the word shit, it was the most complicated word in english, but i turns out i still didn't know shit ..."

Re: Did English ever have a formal version of "you"? (2011)

#222

Post by amadeuspagel »

mytailorisrich wrote: post #111
snidane wrote: post #109

As someone coming from a culture with T-V distinction [1], I always wished we dropped one of the branches like English did in the past. The informal T vs formal V causes confusion in conversation with semi-strangers. Eg. At work you never really know which way to speak to someone at a watercooler. If you choose the informal T you make them your equal. Ehich might be perceived as insulting to them, since they might wa…

English became the dominant business language for reasons unrelated to the English language itself but because of the relative power of the people who spoke the language.

The english people became powerful because english is such a good language.

Re: Did English ever have a formal version of "you"? (2011)

#223

Post by jmac01 »

snidane wrote: post #109

As someone coming from a culture with T-V distinction [1], I always wished we dropped one of the branches like English did in the past. The informal T vs formal V causes confusion in conversation with semi-strangers. Eg. At work you never really know which way to speak to someone at a watercooler. If you choose the informal T you make them your equal. Ehich might be perceived as insulting to them, since they might wa…

Is it culturally English speaking to think this just sounds like social anxiety rather than an expected norm? If someone thought they were superior than me and expected a particular greeting or whatever, I'd tell them where to shove it lol

We are all equal.

Re: Did English ever have a formal version of "you"? (2011)

#224

Post by ozim »

jmac01 wrote: post #223
snidane wrote: post #109

As someone coming from a culture with T-V distinction [1], I always wished we dropped one of the branches like English did in the past. The informal T vs formal V causes confusion in conversation with semi-strangers. Eg. At work you never really know which way to speak to someone at a watercooler. If you choose the informal T you make them your equal. Ehich might be perceived as insulting to them, since they might wa…

Is it culturally English speaking to think this just sounds like social anxiety rather than an expected norm? If someone thought they were superior than me and expected a particular greeting or whatever, I'd tell them where to shove it lol We are all equal.

Yeah until you have mortgage to pay, kids and asshole on receiving end can influence your job security then it quickly turns out who is „more equal”.

Re: Did English ever have a formal version of "you"? (2011)

#225

Post by amadeuspagel »

> This explains a peculiarity of traditional Quaker speech, which one often hears in films set in the early Americas. The Quakers opposed making any distinctions of rank, so they insisted on addressing everyone as thou, not as you. The irony is that today we perceive thou to be archaic and formal, while the original intent is to be more informal.

In german, the distinction between formal and informal address is disappearing into the informal address. It's interesting that the Quakers also tried this, but that in english (the first language were this distinction disappeared?) it ultimatly disappeared into the formal address.

Re: Did English ever have a formal version of "you"? (2011)

#226

Post by Longhanks »

jmac01 wrote: post #223
snidane wrote: post #109

As someone coming from a culture with T-V distinction [1], I always wished we dropped one of the branches like English did in the past. The informal T vs formal V causes confusion in conversation with semi-strangers. Eg. At work you never really know which way to speak to someone at a watercooler. If you choose the informal T you make them your equal. Ehich might be perceived as insulting to them, since they might wa…

Is it culturally English speaking to think this just sounds like social anxiety rather than an expected norm? If someone thought they were superior than me and expected a particular greeting or whatever, I'd tell them where to shove it lol We are all equal.

This is very ignorant towards many cultures and such behavior would be actively harming your career in most places I've got to know. You're lucky to be in a place where your lack of empathy towards local etiquette does not result in more peer pressure, for better or for worse.

We are not equal.

Re: Did English ever have a formal version of "you"? (2011)

#227

Post by nicole_express »

jjtheblunt wrote: post #159
nicole_express wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The eth/thorn distinction was fairly arbitrary in actual written Old English, with thorn being more common. The modern distinction between eth and thorn being based off of voice originated in Icelandic, I think? That's the only language that still uses them in its modern form, anyways.

Icelandic preserves old Norse so you’re accidentally implying Old Norse originated in its own derivative.

I admit I'm only going off of Wikipedia, but that claims (in the "Old Norse" article) that extant writings from that period used thorn exclusively, and again the use of thorn and eth as the unvoiced and voiced variants is a relatively modern convention.

Re: Did English ever have a formal version of "you"? (2011)

#228

Post by willsmith72 »

jmac01 wrote: post #223
snidane wrote: post #109

As someone coming from a culture with T-V distinction [1], I always wished we dropped one of the branches like English did in the past. The informal T vs formal V causes confusion in conversation with semi-strangers. Eg. At work you never really know which way to speak to someone at a watercooler. If you choose the informal T you make them your equal. Ehich might be perceived as insulting to them, since they might wa…

Is it culturally English speaking to think this just sounds like social anxiety rather than an expected norm? If someone thought they were superior than me and expected a particular greeting or whatever, I'd tell them where to shove it lol We are all equal.

In english workplaces there's still a "heirarchy" it's just not expressed with that one specific word.

If you'd phrase an email differently to a high-level exec vs your coworker, you've experienced it. Same with dressing differently to meet a new client vs an old friendly one. Both cases where you'd probably use the formal and informal depending on who you're talking to.

Re: Did English ever have a formal version of "you"? (2011)

#229

Post by batch12 »

F3nd0 wrote: post #193
softfalcon wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I feel like people forget about that whole British Imperialism thing too easily. We all speak English because at one point the English practically owned the entire planet.

Compare English with Esperanto, which, in spite of being much easier to learn than English, still hasn't become anywhere near as widespread (at least in terms of number of speakers). Ironically the one biggest thing which presents an ideological advantage for Esperanto is that it's native to no nation, so all the people who speak it are closer to being equals in that regard; yet it is the imperialism and a large numb…

English is neither morally superior nor morally inferior to Esperanto.

Re: Did English ever have a formal version of "you"? (2011)

#230

Post by api »

FromTheSteppe wrote: post #158
snidane wrote: post #109

As someone coming from a culture with T-V distinction [1], I always wished we dropped one of the branches like English did in the past. The informal T vs formal V causes confusion in conversation with semi-strangers. Eg. At work you never really know which way to speak to someone at a watercooler. If you choose the informal T you make them your equal. Ehich might be perceived as insulting to them, since they might wa…

Is speaking to someone formally considered ending up in an inferior position in all cultures? In Persian if someone expects to be spoken with formally, they have to speak formally themselves. So when you speak formally you're kinda bringing both parties up. You can even flirt by speaking formally.

That actually sounds really cool.
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