Language and its abuse

[Wongo]

it's already been proven that 2 = 1 anyway.

of course if a = b then a-b equals zero and your proof falls down

It's been disproven now.

[Frank&Earnest]

But is it insultin' a sultan to say his unique eunuch is a relative?
Absolutely!

Maybe not, if that's what the sultan does to his poor relatives...

[pawnhead]

But if I say: "So far, the idea of mateship being a defining ethnic value is a concept unique relatively to Australia" I stand by my original point that here "relatively" is redundant and bad English but it is not an oximoron like "very unique", be this last expression now acceptable or not.

I'd agree with that. 'Superfluous' as I described it, but not an oxymoron such as "Military intelligence", "Government organization", or "Microsoft works".

BTW, the word oxymoron is itself an oxymoron. From Greek oxy ("sharp") and moros ("dull").

[Frank&Earnest]

Thanks for that, and for subtly correcting my spelling...

[JDarvall]

Bloody hell. And I thought I had problems. Your all a bunch of nutters. The lot of you.

[echnidna]

dey seem just like frustrated school marms A.T.

[pawnhead]

Bloody hell. And I thought I had problems. Your all a bunch of nutters. The lot of you.

[Frank&Earnest]

Where did you get my photograph?

[Frank&Earnest]

dey seem just like frustrated school marms A.T.

He who works with his head and not with his hands needs craftwork.

[JDarvall]

Thank god someone threw up a picture ! Much easier than having to type a thousand words I think.

[LGS]

He who works with his head and not with his hands needs craftwork.

Ahh.. Kraftwerk..excellent band! Was it Jan Akkerman who played a most brilliant guitar?

[JDarvall]

off we go again.........

[wheelinround]

The Adventure Of English

This episode begins In the Augustan Age - the first half of the18th century - where admiration for Latin literary models was at its height in England. Jonathan Swift, author of Gulliver's Travels, led a movement to fix and regulate the language on the model of Latin. Samuel Johnson produced the first great English dictionary; Robert Lowth and other grammarians imposed new rules on the language; and actor Thomas Sheridan took it upon himself to teach the whole country to speak properly. In the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, Robert Burns, William Wordsworth and Jane Austen all contributed to the story of the language. (From the UK, in English) (Documentary Series) (Part 6) (Rpt) PG CC

http://www.dymocks.com.au/ProductDet...=9322225058729

I have been watching this series on SBS quite interesting to see what and how Language has changed throughout time.