Deadlines dictated I write this column before viewing last night’s latest JRR Tolkein romp, The Rings of Power, on TV. But I’m expecting to have enjoyed it.
One reason I like Tolkein is that he was a philologist who invented languages. Indeed, he has said he structured languages before creating characters to speak them. He designed Numenorean for men, Sindarin and Quenya for Elves, Khuzdul for Dwarves, and Black Speech for Orcs. Clever stuff.
But his characters also spoke “the common tongue” (he named it Westron) so they could understand each other. Every book needs dialogue, after all.
The concept of Westron appeals to me. It is how I view English.
I am often accused of prescriptivism, the belief that one type of language is superior to others. There are many who will wisely assure you this is foolish. No variety is better or worse than any other.
And they assure me that languages change rapidly. Always have, always will. How can one variety be judged better than another?
These people look down on me because they seem to think I somehow didn’t know this. They see me as backward-looking, unsophisticated.
In truth, I don’t believe in prescriptivism. And I fully accept language is ever-changing. The evidence is rather apparent.
But I point out that English is changing at a more rapid pace than at any point in history, thanks to the great digital everywhere.
No Canute can hold back this tide. A Californian kid coins a word, next day it is heard on the streets of Canberra, Clacton, and Carnoustie. Another modification is made to standard English, another step towards English becoming several different languages. I already sometimes don’t understand people interviewed on TV.
Despite the neologisms, word shortenings, slang, phonetic spellings, and emojis avalanching into our vocabularies we shouldn’t lose sight of the common tongue.
Good written English should be celebrated, taught properly, and valued to a greater degree than it is now. I often despair that so few seem to care about this.
There can be still be varieties, newspeak, dialects, pidgins, creoles, local accents, anything. But a properly spelled and punctuated language, with consistent rules, is a great thing, an essential thing. We should be unwilling to let go of old meanings for words, idioms, metaphors, and similes.
That’s all I’m asking. It’s all I ever ask for in this column: that the importance of good, plain English (our Westron) is appreciated.
We need a core English everyone can use and understand. Because if some demigod happens along and forges a ring of power, Hobbits like me will have to communicate to organise the resistance.
Word of the week
Fissile (adjective)
Capable of being split. EG: “History shows us that languages are highly fissile, quite often splitting off into separate entities.”
Read the latest Oh my word! every Saturday in The Courier. Contact me at sfinan@dctmedia.co.uk
