Calling Matt H

[C Moore]

I did not want to derail the New York post.....
Seems you have some Linguistic Education.....100% than I do anyway.
I wish I had the link, but alas, I do not.
Concerns a "guy" with a letter from his Grandfather to his (the "guy") Grandmother.
Was written during WWII. The Grandfather was a German soldier.
This guy (I think) spoke German, but he said he could not read his Grandfathers letter, because it was written in some type of German that quickly faded after WWII.
Does this sound "right" to you.?
Did the German Language go through a big change...post WWII.?
Thank You
BTW...one of the best people in the world (Noam Chomsky) is a linguist.

[matt h]

(deleted)

[C Moore]

I was afraid of this response.
But yes...I get what you are saying.
I really wish I had a link...I think the guy showed a copy of the letter...and, of course, the style of German it was written in. Let me do some digging.
Interesting none-the-less.
Thank You

[matt h]

(deleted)

[C Moore]

YOU, my friend, are correct.
Christ...!!...I had ALL of the details wrong...
But, indeed, it was The Script that had become obsolete...NOT the language/dialect.
My Apologies Matt...forgive me.
Here is the link.....
http://www.thegearpage.net/board/showth ... light=wwii

[Leo_Gnardo]

But, indeed, it was The Script that had become obsolete...NOT the language/dialect.

I was gonna say . . . the usual typeface for German printing was a sort of "Olde English" dense medieval looking font, which gave way to more "normal" looking printing post WWII. Nonetheless my first German-English dictionary is crammed with it, printed 1969. And my German teachers made sure the class saw plenty of it, and could read it. As printing goes, so script follows. There's been a rush to undo the umlaut (two dots over a vowel) and excommunicate the ess-zet, which for all the world looks like a capital B, but means sz, usually seen at the end of a word.

FWIW when I tried learning Russian, it was reading handwriting that threw me completely. Signs in cap letters, OK, I can read that all day. But a hand written grocery list, no.

Current complaint in Germany, amongst the grey hair crowd, is how the younger generation is doing away with the formal case. "I walk into the store, all these young salespeople are talking to me like they've known me all my life, I don't get no respect..." Auf wiedersehn to "Sie" and expect to hear "du this du that" all the time. Du du du du . . . DUDE!

[matt h]

(deleted)

[C Moore]

Well...funny you should mention.
I was born in 1960.
I can no longer (not for 30 years now) write cursive. I can read most of it... IF it is written in a real legible hand, if you know what I mean. It takes me a while to decipher it.
But like I say, if the letters start to vary from a "text book" style of font, there is no way I can read it.
Suffice it to say, I would not be able to read a letter written by most people.

I was in The Painters Union for 25 years, and it was never an issue. Do not let me create a stereotype. Every tradesmen I ever worked with could read cursive, as far as I know.

Not blaming anybody but myself, but going back to middle school.....any "report" of any length was..... "Please type or print".
I never HAD (had...not Howard Alexander Dumble) to write anything really, printing was always OK. The skill just gradually faded away.

I took a night class for a while to relearn it.....but I gave up.
What can I say .....

[eniam rognab]

my cursive is HORRIBLE and completely illegible even to me sometimes i hated learning it in school and dropped it as soon as i could, developing my own 'script' of all caps, i form most of my letters differently than i was taught to as well. except my signature, which could easily pass for a doctors prescription

i recently read somewhere about how many injuries/deaths were attributed to bad handwriting on prescriptions on the part of the doctor, it was a scary big number i noticed that my GP writes very clearly, he's great

forgive my blather, i'm a little delirious, busting my knuckles all day at work, cut one down to the bone, or fat, something white and bloody... my co-worker asked if i wanted a bandaid, i said "you mean a bitch sticker? gimme that super-glue and call me SRV" she thought it was funny anyway...

[M Fowler]

My brother-in-law is from Germany and the last time we got together we were discussing the barking German accent of Arnold Schwarzenegger.

[matt h]

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[roberto]

Yes, Italy has many different dialects, mainly because it has been divided until 1861, and latin was one of the most commonly used lenguage for official communications.

In the north west we speak a sort of french (my grandfather told crayon to say pencil, et argent to say money, just to name two french words), just because we always had alot of commercial interests in France, and of course because of Napoleon's permanence.
In some parts of the north they speak mainly german (more than italian), while in the south there are some influencies of arab, and it's not difficult to find Normans-like people, due to the wars that happened during the centuries.

Back to the variation of dialects, of course the harder the possibility to communicate with the surrounding people, the highest the differencies between the dialects.
It happens often that a word is different within 20 miles, just because of high hills or mountains that didn't permit a constant communication.

Starting from North to middle to south of Italy, we find totally different dialects.

[roberto]

About cursive, in Italy we currently teach to write in cursive.
I always write in cursive, and find it faster and easier to be read.

[matt h]

Roberto--thanks for chiming in about Italy and "Italian". I really don't know much about Italian dialects, but it seems as though to get a sense of "just how different they are"--a good analogy is to look at the local cuisines. Food is very culturally important, truly central to civilization--that it isn't really a surprise to see how food and dialect are interrelated. But I can't really think of a better example. Italy isn't a very big country (geographically), but it's very, very diverse in its local cuisines--as much as it is with its local dialects.

[cbass]

I took a class learning Cherokee I don't remeber none of it.
I feel like I bring the IQ down a lot in this bunch yalls some smart fellars hell I can barely read much less read other languages