Is language very static-very black and white- especially when we write it down?
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Are you making a reference to sarcasm?
Language is much more static when it comes to the written word, but even then you have room to toy with ideas, structures, etc. When I say it is more static in writing, I mean that punctuation, spelling, etc. rarely change and that there are basic rules to writing such that you might have to explain yourself if you don’t follow convention.
With speaking, there are accents and other things that preclude a spoken Standard English. In Boston, “car” might sound more like “cah” but the idea is still the same and 99.9% of people are likely to know what the speaker is talking about. You also can’t really speak with punctuation. You can change your voice to add excitement (!), end a thought (.), take a breath (,), ask a question (?) and so on. However, if most people were to write how they spoke, they would find it nearly impossible to do it exactly, or the writing may be muddled…look at text messaging and other areas where shorthand is used – if you didn’t know what certain things meant, you’d have trouble understanding. Plus a lot of acronyms (LOL, LMAO) are used in this form of writing – people usually don’t speak in acronyms.
Language is never 100% static. As we become more technological and can standardize things across the entire nation in mere seconds, language does become more standard and is less likely to experience broad changes (like no longer capitalizing the first letter of all nouns, or rendering words archaic like “thee”). But people toy with language all the time (people create slang and later Webster adopts it into his dictionary…or technology causes new words…or English takes on words of influencing cultures).
To conclude: Language is most static in written form; standards actually exist (in a rational way) when it comes to written language. Spoken language is not as rigid, though it is loosely guided by the guidelines of written language. We generally accept a more Midwestern, or Californian accent as “Standard Spoken English”, but this is more a model for news programs. When I say Midwestern, I’m not talking about your Minnesota accent, but like Ohio, etc.
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