Anglish - What if English Were 100% Germanic?

Follow Langfocus on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram! Hello everyone. Welcome to the Langfocus channel and my name is Paul. A couple of months back I made a video about whether English is really a Germanic language or not. And I made the rather controversial statement that in a sense, English is a hybrid language because so much of its vocabulary comes from the Romance languages and other languages. That statement was controversial because the core of English is indeed Germanic. And, it is actually possible to speak English with mostly or even entirely Germanic words. For example, instead of saying "literature" (which is a Romance word) you could say "bookcraft". Or, instead of saying "ancestor" you could say "forekind". It's not exactly easy to speak that way all the time but it is possible. There is actually a movement to create and to promote a new form of English like this that stripped off all of its non-Germanic influences so that English would basically became the language that it would have been if it had not been influenced by Romance languages and by Greek and others. Some people refer to this strictly-Germanic form of English as "Anglish" because it's supposed to take English back to its Anglo-Saxon roots. Anglish is a form of English "linguistic purism". Anglish seeks to achieve the Germanic "purity" of English in a few different ways: First, by choosing existing Germanic words rather than their Romance equivalents. Two; by reviving obsolete Germanic words. Three; by adopting words from Old English or other Germanic languages. Four; by creating new words based on Old English or other Germanic roots. So take this simple sentence: "The man forgot his rainshade at home." What do you think "rainshade" means? Something that provides shade from the rain. If you guessed "umbrella", that's right. "Rainshade" is a new word created from 'rain' and 'shade' and is based on the word 'sunshade'. "Umbrella" is a loanword from the Italian "ombrella". All of the other words in this sentence are regular English words of Germanic origin. And you probably noticed that the words are not changed into Old English - they're all in modern English just without the non-Germanic elements. Another example: "I onlook the man since he's very ithand." Now here's the original sentence I wrote in Standard English: "I respect the man because he's very industrious." "Onlook" comes from the Old English "anléc" - 'to observe' or 'to regard' - but it seems the sense has been extended to mean 'regard positively' or 'respect'. Now, why did I change the word 'because'? Well, because the 'cause' - part of 'because' - is of Romance origin. 'Since' is just a Germanic alternative to 'because'. "Ithand" is a real English word which is still used in some English dialects of Northern England and (I believe) also in Scotland. And, of course, when I speak of that man who's very ithand I'm referring to a nameknown showplayer I've seen on the farseeer. Hm, "a nameknown showplayer I've seen on the farseeer". Here's the original phrase in Standard English: "A famous actor I've seen on the television." "Nameknown" is a newly ashapen (created) word that comes from 'name' and 'known' - markedly. And "showplayer" is another melding (combination) of two bestanding (existing) words. And "farseeer" is a likeness of the German word "Fernseher". In everyday talk, we deal with a lot of Germanic words. But for some underwarps (topics) like witship (science) we deal with many more outland (foreign) words. In 1989, author Paul Anderson forlaid a well-known writ named "Uncleftish Beholding" - which means 'atomic theory' - in thoroughly Germanic English without any outland words. Let's take a look at some of that writ. *see text on screen* "Being" is used instead of 'existence'. "Worldken" means 'physics'. "Beholding" means 'theory', "stuff" (I believe) means 'matter' "work" (I think) means 'energy' and "workstead" means 'workplace'. *see text on screen* "Firststuffs" are elements. "Sundry" means 'various'. This is a regular English word, it's just less common than 'various'. "Waterstuff" means 'hydrogen', "barest" means 'simplest' and "ymirstuff" means 'Uranium'. In my wen (opinion), this seems like English, but somewhat weird English. Anglish is interesting because by trying to read it or use it, we get a sense of just how much we normally rely on non-Germanic vocabulary when we speak English. On the other hand, you learn that it is possible to speak English without any non-Germanic words if you're willing to use some archaic vocabulary or new vocabulary based on Germanic roots. The grammar is the same - so it's mainly a matter of consciously substituting different vocabulary. So, the question of the day: What do you thing of "linguistic purism" like Anglish? Do you think there's any REASON to remove foreign influences from a language? Or do you see those influences as just part of the language's development? Let us know in the comments down below! You can find more about Anglish at anglish.wikia.com Be sure to follow Langfocus on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram and I'd like to say thank you to all of my Patreon supporters - especially these ones right here for their monthly pledges. Thanks for watching and have a - lovely - day!

Channel: Langfocus

Views: 1,843,451

Rating: 4.9254756 out of 5

Keywords: language study, polyglot, foreign language, phrases, linguist, linguistics, vocabulary, grammar, anglish, english, linguistic purism, roots english, germanic, romance languages, germanic languages, loanwords, anglo, anglo-saxon, england, united kingdom, old english, coining, calques

Id: IIo-17SIkws

Length: 5min 32sec (332 seconds)

Published: Tue Dec 06 2016

Reddit Comments

[u/craig_hoxton]

There's even a whole subreddit for it.

[u/thekfish]

I would have read a lot more as a child if I knew I was reading "bookcraft."

[u/JuanaBump]

I'm a linguist and this doesn't appear to have any academic worth. Seems more like a particular fetishization or something. From the comments, I don't think it took an expert to point this out; doesn't look like any of you are buying it lol

[u/Ultach]

I'm absolutely baffled by the venom Anglish attracts whenever it gets brought up on Reddit. It's not supposed to be a serious movement, it's just about having fun and doing a little linguistic exploring. But in this thread alone there are people calling it "stupid" and "worthless" and "loathsome" and equating people who partake in it with Nazis. I don't understand it, it's just for fun.

[u/tanfj]

Google "An Uncleftish Beholding."

[u/kcasnar]

The word "America" is of Italian origin, being derived from the name of Amerigo Vespucci. So what do we replace that with?

[u/gokism]

I wonder what they'd call tiki torches?

[u/spaceace321]

I've actually heard of this!

[u/SamirCasino]

That's not that unique though. I know here in Romania there was a movement about 150 years ago to strip out all non-latin words and replace them with latin ones. It even had some succes, in some cases we still use the latin word introduced then instead of the old slavic one for example.

And i'm sure similar movements existed for other languages as well.

Hell, i seem to recall Iceland still preferes to invent new proper icelandic words instead of ever borrowing words from another language, in order to mantain it "pure".