Words from Obama's Libya speech. Some people think the only good linguist is a descriptive linguist, but they are probably wrong. There should be an official Academy of the English Language The failure to regulate language is abdication, because to ignore what we consciously think and know about the structure of words - to ignore our attitudes to them, is wrong. We can mould language, just as we can alter our DNA. For example: Conflicted is a horrible borrowing into British English, d econstruct is a vacuous term, quantum is not understood and misapplied, doors are never alarmed , blogs sounds shitty, Shiites are actually Shias , quality time and me time are shoddy, selfish concepts, substantive is rather insubstantial and the focus group should be penned up in marketing, not left to roam free. An academy could rule out the stupid and influential jargon of the half educated young invented on the bus on the way home from school. I'm going gym. They say. The young
Left wing commentary from the heart and the head