(no subject)
Speaking of languages that I think sound beautiful but can't be bothered to learn:
Did whoever came up with written Irish do what he did out of spite? Because there aren't many languages that are spelled in a way that's as different to how they're spoken. Like, as if someone wanted it to make it an unintelligible code that'd make whoever tried to speak it on the basis of the written words look like a complete idiot. I am imagining some medieval Bernard Black weaving in drunken megalomania and going "Ha, this'll confuse the English bastards!"
OTOH, Welsh is another, so I am suspecting a pan-Celtic conspiracy. I don't really envy the kids who have to try and learn to write either. (Do any Welsh kids have to, BTW? I understood it wasn't compulsory in most Welsh schools and the main language was English? Do only the really nationally/historically conscious parents force their kids to take it at school?)
And apologies to any Irish/Welsh people reading this! I do love both languages but what the *hell* is it up with that the written versions being so WTFy? Like, when it happens in English, I can sort of see how the word's spelling has come about and how it's changed through all kinds of influences over the centuries, but in Irish and Welsh I am just "WHAT" even when I know the accent the words are to be pronounced in. (I mean, everything in Welsh involves "hgwthh" sounds somewhere; it's just a matter of guessing whether they're transliterated "ll" or "gw" or "h" or "f".) It makes English sound consistent, FFS...
Again, I only say this because I think both languages are beautiful, and that's exactly why I'm so WTF.
Did whoever came up with written Irish do what he did out of spite? Because there aren't many languages that are spelled in a way that's as different to how they're spoken. Like, as if someone wanted it to make it an unintelligible code that'd make whoever tried to speak it on the basis of the written words look like a complete idiot. I am imagining some medieval Bernard Black weaving in drunken megalomania and going "Ha, this'll confuse the English bastards!"
OTOH, Welsh is another, so I am suspecting a pan-Celtic conspiracy. I don't really envy the kids who have to try and learn to write either. (Do any Welsh kids have to, BTW? I understood it wasn't compulsory in most Welsh schools and the main language was English? Do only the really nationally/historically conscious parents force their kids to take it at school?)
And apologies to any Irish/Welsh people reading this! I do love both languages but what the *hell* is it up with that the written versions being so WTFy? Like, when it happens in English, I can sort of see how the word's spelling has come about and how it's changed through all kinds of influences over the centuries, but in Irish and Welsh I am just "WHAT" even when I know the accent the words are to be pronounced in. (I mean, everything in Welsh involves "hgwthh" sounds somewhere; it's just a matter of guessing whether they're transliterated "ll" or "gw" or "h" or "f".) It makes English sound consistent, FFS...
Again, I only say this because I think both languages are beautiful, and that's exactly why I'm so WTF.