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cosmolinguistI mean, other countries have had mean, nasty agents of government. But (and I think I picked this up from ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
comradexavier, who once said he was "not the grammar Reichsfuehrer, though, more like the grammar Parteigenosse") I'm used to the phrase "Grammar Nazi."
It seemed all the more appropriate today when I realized that my study of German taught me a lot of stuff that's useful now in thinking about English grammar. I can diagram things, I can deal with prepositions, I stop only to smell the adjectives and kick some ass. I figured out the dative case; English holds no horrors for me now!
I even got a compliment on my "Stein auf!" t-shirt from the boy who sat next to me in class today. Hooray for German!
The best part about class, though, was when Janet told us that "to be" verbs (or was it linking verbs? some kind of verb) "are called the copula. As in ... " she trailed off, and thirty college students laughed. Then she went on to tell us about some guy whose name I forgot who wrote about how grammar was like sex. More laughter. "And I bet you can guess which gender a 12th-cenury Frenchman thought a verb was," she said, "and which gender a noun was." I thought about verbs, the action words, and nouns, the things acted upon by the verbs, and laughed.
I don't know if this means language is sexy, or grammarians aren't getting laid enough.
comradexavier, who once said he was "not the grammar Reichsfuehrer, though, more like the grammar Parteigenosse") I'm used to the phrase "Grammar Nazi." It seemed all the more appropriate today when I realized that my study of German taught me a lot of stuff that's useful now in thinking about English grammar. I can diagram things, I can deal with prepositions, I stop only to smell the adjectives and kick some ass. I figured out the dative case; English holds no horrors for me now!
I even got a compliment on my "Stein auf!" t-shirt from the boy who sat next to me in class today. Hooray for German!
The best part about class, though, was when Janet told us that "to be" verbs (or was it linking verbs? some kind of verb) "are called the copula. As in ... " she trailed off, and thirty college students laughed. Then she went on to tell us about some guy whose name I forgot who wrote about how grammar was like sex. More laughter. "And I bet you can guess which gender a 12th-cenury Frenchman thought a verb was," she said, "and which gender a noun was." I thought about verbs, the action words, and nouns, the things acted upon by the verbs, and laughed.
I don't know if this means language is sexy, or grammarians aren't getting laid enough.
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(no subject)
Date: 2003-09-03 11:38 am (UTC)I maen, other countries have had mean...
Sorry :)
(no subject)
Date: 2003-09-03 11:49 am (UTC)RAUBUBERFALL. Dunno what to use for the umlaut key, oh well.
RAUBUBERFALL. I love it.
(no subject)
Date: 2003-09-03 12:00 pm (UTC)I did have 5 years of French, including one quarter my sophomore year to fulfill the requirements for a foreign language. those people are the REAL grammar nazis. I liked German because there were rules and they were adhered to for the most part (at least as far as we got, which was admittedly not that far as it was a 101 class)...French shouldn't even bother having "rules," because it never fails there are more exceptions to the damn thing than there are applications.
(no subject)
Date: 2003-09-03 12:13 pm (UTC)Unsolicited additional information
Date: 2003-09-03 12:20 pm (UTC)Re: Unsolicited additional information
Date: 2003-09-03 12:21 pm (UTC)Machts nichts!
(no subject)
Date: 2003-09-03 12:24 pm (UTC)The rest of my comment didn't post!
Date: 2003-09-03 12:33 pm (UTC)I took my year of German not because I needed it, but because I have an easy major, needed other classes to take, and have a lot of friends who randomly speak German since so many of them took it in high school and apparently found it fun. I found it easier to converse with them after learning a litle myself (though of course they'd taught me some before, so I could say "you are a goat!" and knew the word for "potato" and stuff before I had any formal knowledge of the language). Besides, I loved the structure of German, and now it's making English easier for me.
As for your comments about French and German, all I can say is THANK YOU! One of my best friends is a major Francophile. She spent last semester in France and thus has been much worse since then. I admire her knowledge of the culture and her relative fluency in the language ... but I've always told her French doesn't make any sense. She doesn't really believe this, of course. Since I know little about French and she knows little abuot German, our argument would seem to be at a stalemate. That's why I'm so happy that someone with knowledge of both agrees with me!
Re: Unsolicited additional information
Date: 2003-09-03 12:35 pm (UTC)P.S.
Date: 2003-09-03 02:38 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2003-09-03 02:54 pm (UTC)All I know how to say is:
Hello, Goodbye, My name is... (the really easy stuff).
Insolence.
And, "I am a whore. Are you a customer?"
But I've never had the opportunity to use that one. ;-)
(no subject)
Date: 2003-09-03 05:13 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2003-09-03 05:22 pm (UTC)Re: The rest of my comment didn't post!
Date: 2003-09-03 06:29 pm (UTC)I work with this guy who's a total Francophile. he's a loon and his name is Perry. me and this other dude I work with (his name is Mirza...he's from Bosnia) both had French in high school and hated it...we call him Monsieur Pear-eee, like how they french pronounce paris. it started out as a pretty in-joke, but now it's slowly spreading throughout the workplace. we're so proud.
and French is one of the most random languages in the world. probably second only to English, heh.
(no subject)
Date: 2003-09-03 09:26 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2003-09-04 06:40 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2003-09-10 08:08 pm (UTC)