Re: [Corpora-List] 'Standard European English' ?

From: Diana Maynard (d.maynard@dcs.shef.ac.uk)
Date: Fri Mar 03 2006 - 11:26:12 MET

  • Next message: Lou Burnard: "Re: [Corpora-List] 'Standard European English' ?"

    Yes, surely the crunch comes when *native* English speakers start using such
    terms?
    Isn't that the point at which a word or usage stops being an error by a
    non-native speaker and starts becoming acceptable usage?
    I've never yet heard a native English speaker talking about "sheepmeat"
    although it's bound to happen sooner or later (maybe you have though Yorick?)
    Although I've begun to find myself (as a native English speaker) using the
    adjective "performant" (meaning "performing well") because I see it so often
    in academic papers. We have so much exposure these days to non-native English
    that one soon begins to forget which usages are correct and which are just
    very common errors.
    Diana

    TadPiotr wrote:
    > I have also thought that we are an international list, using a sort of
    > international English, which is quite similar to native English ?
    > But: I do not think that anyone suggests that a non-German using his/her
    > flawed German is actually using an nternational variety of German. My
    > impression is that the number of native speakers of German (yes, I know,
    > let's not talk about the varieties and dialects of German...) exceeds that
    > of non-native speakers of German, while with English it is the other way
    > round.
    > Tadeusz Piotrowski
    >
    >
    >



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