Nowadays almost every English speaker answers the telephone by saying “Hello.”

However, before the telephone was invented by Scottish scientist Alexander Graham Bell, saying hello was used to express surprise or to bring notice to something.

People would simply say “Good morning, good day, or goodnight” when meeting someone.

Telephone companies gave birth to the greeting “hello” by publishing books on correct language for phone usage.

I discovered this fun fact (along with many others!) last week, when I received an email from Shane Whelan who works for the ULearn English language school.

Shane created a timeline detailing the influence of technology on the English language to celebrate World English Language Day which is today!

I’ll leave you now with the content of his email which is very thorough and informative. Scroll down to see the interactive timeline!

How Technology has shaped the English Language

World English language day has been celebrated on the 23^rd of April each year since 2010, in conjunction with the birthday anniversary of William Shakespeare. The history of the language can be dated as far back as the 5^th Century AD when three Germanic tribes, Angles, Saxons and Jutes came to England and displaced the Celtic language that was spoken. The invasion of the Vikings, as well as the influence of Latin, caused the language to evolve further, and contributed a substantial amount of the vocabulary used today. This continued evolution has led to English being the second most used language in the world.

While the impact of invasions and the effect of other languages have had a significant influence on the language, it is without question that advancements in technology have played a vital role in the development of the language. The invention of the printing press led to greater availability of books, and allowed the public to experience newspapers and the timeless works of Daniel Defoe and William Shakespeare. Radio contributed to the spread of the language during wartimes, while it could be strongly argued that the invention of television was a major factor in the increased use of English as a second language in the 1950s.

In this interactive timeline we have sought to celebrate the development of the language through the influence of technology. There are some who argue that the more recent influence of social media and the internet has led to a “dumbing down” of the language, while others believe that they have helped to spread the language further across the globe. While there will always be contrasting opinion on the negatives and positives regarding the influence of technology, without it, English would not be as widely used and spoken as it is today.

Dig deeper:

• In honor of English Language Day, I’ve just launched a new initiative on Facebook which is called “Did You Know?”. This type of posts will uncover interesting historical, technical, and fun language-related facts. Join me to learn something new about languages!
• If you’re an English language learner, then now is the perfect time to read my article “Learn English with Ease” on Lindsay Does Languages.

The post The Influence of Technology on the English Language appeared first on Learn a new language while having fun and exploring the world | Runaway Daydreamer.

But “like” is more than a meaningless filler that indicates stupidity. In fact, the word “like” has evolved to take on a variety of uses that are not only useful, but also semantically rich. Moreover, the word “like” fills lexical gaps in the English language, conveying sentiments that its alternatives simply can’t express. Let’s review some of the uses of the word “like” to show that it’s not so bad after all.

The characters in the movie “Clueless” often use the word “like” to achieve a comical effect. Image via Mentalfloss

The Many Meanings of “Like”

1. I’m like, “It’s a really versatile way to quote people.”

One of the most common uses of the word “like” is a quotative: it can be used in lieu of words such as “say”. However, rather than indicating a direct quotation, “like” expresses the general feeling of something that was said. For example, in the following quote, we understand that the speaker is paraphrasing or summarizing:

– What’s that famous scene in Romeo & Juliet when Juliet leans out a window and is like, “Romeo, where did you go?”

This takes the pressure off the speaker to provide a word-for-word transliteration of what was said. It also allows us to editorialize: we can imbue our quotations with our own thoughts or feelings about a given situation, as in the following:

– I can’t believe I’m failing physics. I tried to talk to my professor about it but he just looked at me and was like, “I’m literally a demon and I feel no remorse for ruining your GPA.”

Finally, “like” is extremely versatile, and can be used outside of the realm of speech. It can express a variety of non-verbal situations, such as somebody’s internal, unspoken thoughts:

– It was so hard to keep quiet during his speech; the whole time, I was just like, “Are you kidding me?”

You can also use “like” to express gestures, or even sounds produced by non-human entities like animals or even inanimate objects:

– When she said that, I was just like [speaker rolls eyes].

– This random cat walked up to me and was like, “Meow!” so I decided to pet it.

– My friend’s car accelerates really fast — when I put my foot on the gas pedal, it was like, “Vroom!”

2. It’s used to indicate approximation, like, fifty percent of the time

Sometimes you want to convey a sentiment similar to the one expressed by the word “approximately”, but you want to avoid uttering a five-syllable word and sounding like a calculus textbook. In this case, “like” is a great option — it’s exceedingly common to use the word to offer some kind of approximation, as in the following examples:

– I think the library is, like, ten or fifteen miles from here.

– The Earth’s surface is, like, seventy percent water.

3. It’s, like, the best word ever to show exaggeration

Another popular use of the word “like” is to exaggerate. Speakers use “like” to indicate that what they’re about to say is going to be an exaggeration or a hyperbole, often for comedic or dramatic effect. Here are some examples:

– I would go to the party, but I have a paper due tomorrow and it has to be, like, fifty million pages.

– I want to buy my own apartment, but I have, like, no money at all.

– When he said that to me, I, like, died.

4. Sometimes it just, like, fills the silence

So far, we’ve seen that “like” has a variety of semantically meaningful uses — it can be used as a quotative, it can express approximation, and it can indicate exaggeration. Alas, the people who lambast “like” for being a meaningless filler are at least partially correct. The word “like” can be used interchangeably with “um” or “uh”, as a mechanism for filling silence or buying time to plan your next words, like in the following examples:

– So, like, what do you think?

– Like … I don’t really know how to put it into words.

When did it all begin?

Strict grammarians may frown upon unconventional uses of the word “like”, but its popularity persists. Image via Pixabay

Grammar purists tend to dismiss these unconventional uses of the word “like” as a recent phenomenon, perpetuated by young, bubblegum-chewing whippersnappers intent on destroying the English language. However, it can be traced back almost one hundred years, when it appeared in Robert Louis Stevenson’s 1886 novel Kidnapped: ‘What’s like wrong with him?’ said she at last.

It was also prominently featured in a 1928 New Yorker cartoon, in which two women discuss a man’s workplace, accompanied by the following test: “What’s he got — an office?” “No, he’s got like a loft.” Thus, non-conventional uses of the word “like” have been around, like, forever.

Is “Like” Really So Bad?

Language is a touchy subject — when it comes to how we speak, humans have the tendency to be staunch traditionalists. Whether it’s the use of “impact” as a verb, the popularization of “legit” as an abbreviation of “legitimate”, or saying “literally” to mean exactly the opposite of “literal”, almost everyone has at least one qualm with the directions that the English language has been taking in recent years.

Unfortunately, our petty complaints don’t change the simple fact that language evolves, whether we like it or not. Indeed, the next generation of English-speakers will grow up to think that “literally” means “figuratively”, regardless of how harshly we criticize them for it. Similarly, English speakers will continue to use “like” in unconventional ways — even as a filler! — despite admonitions from their grandparents.

However, is that really so bad? I don’t think so. Of course, we should probably keep “like” out of formal writing, such as academic papers, lawmaking, or, like, directions for performing a surgery (indeed, instructions such as “Make an incision that’s, like, an inch deep” could result in some problems). But to those who condemn the use of the word “like” simply because it’s not traditional, I’m like, “Get used to it, because language evolves, and there’s nothing you can do about it.”

Paul writes on behalf of Language Trainers, a language tutoring service offering personalized course packages to individuals and groups. Try their free foreign-language level tests and check out their website for other language-learning resources. Visit their Facebook page or contact paul@languagetrainers.com with any questions.

The post In Defense of “Like”: It’s, Like, Actually a Pretty Great Word appeared first on Learn a new language while having fun and exploring the world | Runaway Daydreamer.

I’m pretty sure you’ll love this guest post, just like I did!

Over to you Francis!

I am a beginner in Italian, but I have a language partner on italki who is an expert in English. He does not think so, but I have yet to hear him make a major mistake. He keeps a notebook for writing down new English words, but in our first several conversations he only wrote one: fair. I found this interesting, because it is such a short and basic word that even young children know. But as I tried to define it, I realized how complicated it was, and how many meanings it had.

I used it to describe the current American economy. In this sense, “fair” means neither good nor bad. Many things can be described as fair with this meaning: athletic abilities, the condition of a comic book, the quality of an average meal.

But not the weather. “Fair” weather indicates an absence of precipitation and strong wind, and so really means good weather. A “fair weather friend” is a popular phrase meaning someone who is around only when times are good.

And not beauty. To be fair is to be beautiful, though this mainly is an old-fashioned usage and I think is conflated with yet another meaning of fair, which is light-colored, usually referring to skin or hair. Most English-speaking children have heard the wicked queen say “Mirror, mirror on the wall, who’s the fairest of them all?” (The answer being Snow White).

Then there is the widely used sense of fair to mean just. A fair coin is one equally likely to come up heads or tails. A fair election is one where all have the opportunity to vote and all votes are counted. A fair price is one close to what most others have paid. When a small child is upset about something, he might say, using this sense, “but it’s not fair!”. 

Finally, used as a noun, a fair is another name for a small carnival or festival. 

This can result in some ambiguity. If I say the economy is fair, I may mean that it is neither good nor bad, or I may mean that it provides opportunity for all. Of course, it would never mean that the economy is beautiful or light-colored or a small festival.

The following English sentence, therefore, is perfectly correct: “I had a fair time at the fair – the food prices were fair, even though the ring-toss game was unfair – but between the fair weather and my fair skin, I got sunburned”. (Another way to say this: “I had an ok time at the carnival – the food prices were reasonable, even though the ring-toss game was rigged – but between the sunny weather and my light skin, I got sunburned”). Though only someone fond of wordplay would say something like this, I think that native English speakers could easily understand each of these senses of fair without the slightest hesitation or confusion. I find it amazing that our brains can work this way.

I only hope there are not too many words like this in Italian!

Your turn!

I’m so glad that Francis decided to share this great piece of writing with us. I’d love  to know what you have to say, especially if you’re a native English speaker.

Share your thoughts in the comments below!

The post The English language is not fair! appeared first on Learn a new language while having fun and exploring the world | Runaway Daydreamer.