why is english?

Question

why is it that writers write but fingers don't fing, grocers don't groce and hammers don't ham? If the plural of tooth is teeth, why isn't the plural of booth beeth? One goose, 2 geese. So one moose, 2 meese? One index, 2 indices?

Answer 1

reminds me when i was in junior school, i thought the plural of tooth was toothies! English eh hare, hair

Answer 2

English is a complete mixture, taking its words from Anglo Saxon (which gave us words like finger, hammer, teeth and goose, before the moose had ever been discovered) and Greek and Latin, via Norman French. Index is a Latin word and we still use the Latin plural, indices. You complain that grocers don't groce, but they often deal by the gross, particularly when they are wholesalers. You must not look for logicality. English takes its plurals where it finds them and the richness and diversity of its roots is a matter of pride. If you want a nice logical language, try Esperanto, an invented language which keeps its rules simple. If you want to have the excitement of speaking a language full of surprises and subtleties, then indulge in English.

Answer 3

1. It has to do with English being a fusion of two main languages - Anglo-Saxon (a Germanic language), and Norman French (a Romance language).

2. Then there are words taken directly from classical languages like Latin, Greek and Hebrew.

3. However the language continually evolves. For example "die" used to be the singular of dice, but nowadays dice tends to be used for the singular form also [the only remnant of the archaic form is in the expression "the die is cast"]. Similarly, "cactuses" is increasingly being used instead of "cacti" as the plural of cactus.

4. This webpage has a listing of dozens of iregular plurals. http://www2.gsu.edu/~wwwesl/egw/crump.htm#ListFive

5. By the way, some people say that fish does have "fishes" as a plural. The idea is that only when fish is used as a collective noun (like sugar, flour, bread, coffee etc.) should it be used to describe more than one fish. I guess this is still word evolution in progress!

Answer 4

Powerpuff had it right. As if our bad manners weren't enough, we give the tourists a language barrier to cope with, too!!! The word "fish" is a singular AND a plural. AND a noun, by the way. Just to confuse things even more!!!

Answer 5

I'm proud to be British, but OMG, it has to be one of the hardest languages to learn. Silent letters- no F in Photograph, Read a book & have Read that book, spelt the same, but different meanings. Do understand where you're coming from though

Answer 6

LOL. I have made similar complaints about the rules of French where words that sound exactly the same have entirely different meanings depending on the context, you pronounce the consonant in this case, but not in others, etc. etc. etc.

Languages are just quirky.

Answer 7

Yep like the plural of goose is geese, but the plural of Mongoose is Mongooses not Mongreese!

Answer 8

If you were on diet would you eat only one spaggettus instead of a plate of spaggetti ? Try this:
one rolex > two roleces
one house > two Hice
Two fleece > one flice
a family of hippopotommi
one monologue > Two dialogue
one referee > two referum
one fly > Two flee
If I ask the barman for only one martinus , would it be half the price of martini

Answer 9

However a word entered English, the first (sometimes called the archaic) spelling was kept. the only real purpose it serves is that it tells you something of where the word came from, and it gives English many cognates in other languages.

Answer 10

That's just the way it is. Aren't most languages the same. I remember in German (and French) the verbs all changed depending on who was doing an action.