Friday, February 21, 2020

12,575. RUDIMENTS, pt 970

RUDIMENTS, pt. 970
(what did you say?)
'Candasmoor, abirto pirada foir,
metala on non-distact furtna dey.'
Yes, that's the truth. Can you
believe there really was a time
when I was trying to make up
my own language. It was an
urge I'd always had. Failed
completely, and that's way to
the good, believe me. That
sentence there was sort of
meant to say 'The farther
you go, the more it is seen,
harshly, that you have not
traveled from your fortune,'
(or fate, it also was meaning).
Now, how my pathetic brain
made the leap, say, of using
'furtna' instead of 'fortuna'
for 'fortune', is still beyond
me  -  it would seem far more
obvious, sensible, similar -  
but in doing all this I was more
taking a message in words
from beyond than anything
else. It showed me any
number of things, as lessons,
that remained important to me.
Even the little axioms I was
coming up with (like this one
shown) weren't mine. I had no
idea what it all was, nor do I
still know where much of this
stuff comes from  -  which I
receive, take down, toy with,
and develop. It's all very strange.
I'd heard of other languages of
this sort, a kind of dictated, alien
voice, from another realm, one
of them was called, the language,
'Sumerian.' Or 'Silurian.' I forget;
but if it was based, say, out of
ancient Sumer, this seemed far
too Latinate for that. It showed
me, oddly, and as well, a contrast
between say dictated 'language,
which was kind of just crap,
from wherever it came, and the
long, cultural and developmental
time that civilized 'real' language
demands  -  and that necessary
'Ralph needs a shovel, now, and
quickly' sort of command language
of tribes and groups. That's all
cultural and developmental, and
takes a long time. Mine was, well,
I never knew. Instant? Random?
Just crazy.
-
Yet, it was the sort of stuff I was
often bedeviled with. And it was
all pretty clear to me. Listen up,
and take it down. But think of how
dumb it all was too  -  each of those
words would have needed variations,
for tense and use, verbal, nominal,
subjective, objective, and I was
getting none of that. It was bogus;
had to be, or, like some weird
Bible story, some twisted vine
out of Babel's tower. Meanings,
as well, are contextual and most
certainly don't just come out of
nowhere. I was 'fractious.' Or
was that 'fractured'?
-
So that all led me, no surprise,
into all sorts of other discoveries.
The English language, at basic,
has been determined to have about
a million words, of which now
47,000 are considered obsolete.
170,000 are in current use, and
the general individual, in steady,
daily use, probably touches upon
20,000 to 30,000. Yet, by the era
of 1900, the new science of
'linguistics' had, with much hubris,
been studying 'primitive,' and
Amer-Indian' languages, which
were basically oral, mostly
non-written and without
grammar structures, etc. In
those studies, there were able
to determine, at most, 25,000
'words' in these languages. Of
course, without a social context
what did these foolish scientists
know or come up with? Nothing
of value except stupid American
generalizations  -  like Eskimos
having 80 words for snow. What
sort of info is that? Of course
they would, if that's their 
environment. How many freaking 
words for potato chips do we have?
Intensifcation is what happens
as a language grows  -  it rolls and
alters as the social context it's
part of evolves. There's just NO
imposition of a language. It's
a live being, in its way  -  or 
at least a glowing, large, rolling
orb. (If you listen to political
types, all those campaigners and
supposed 'debaters' you can see
(hear) easily how it's devolved
too, wrecked. If you watch a 
'candidates' face while they 
talk, I swear it's saying more 
than their words ever do.
That's both interesting,
and pretty chilling too). 
-
An interesting corollary to 
this is Chinatown NY. At 
least when I lived there; for 
'now' I have to wonder  -  why 
would anyone go to Chinatown 
now anyway? A zillion swarmy 
creatures with a zillion swarmy
travel viruses around and reams
of filth, rats, and open-air food?
That's the way we view things
today; it never used to be that
way. Anyhow, 30 years ago,
at any place in Chinatown, there
were restaurants. Hundreds.
The touristy ones were obvious,
with their lights and little fountains
and even lobbies and some marble;
a royal turn for up-classing that
went nowhere. The word for the
non-Chinese locals was 'Don't go
there, only go to the Chinatown
restaurants where you see Chinese
people, locals too, dining.' Which
places, of course, were usually at
best, tacky, small, cramped, busy,
and running heavy with the
intermingling of food, people,
waiters and refuse. Fifteen
dialects of the Chinese language
could be heard at any moment,
bouncing off each other, rising 
and falling in that sing-song 
manner they had. We use 'words'
for things, only, and plainly.
But in the Chinese tongue, they
use inflections, to mean different
things. A sound with the high
upswing means one thing, said
in a descending manner it means
another; and spoken flatly or
tired to another word, it all
means something else. So,
how do you count that? What
do English speakers really know?
-
In Chinatown, in this small-bore
local restaurants where Chinese
locals go, the walls were covered
with paper sheets, with characters
and brushstrokes written on them.
Unlike the tourist places  -  no scenes
of the countryside, pagodas, or,
again fountains. This was brash 
and ruddy, all these Chinese
home places. What was actually
on the walls were menus for
locals. The menu the 'outside'
diners got was one thing; these
signs and character were prices
and dishes for locals, who could,
of course, read all this. The tourist
menu dumplings, at 2 for 6 dollars,
were, for the locals, probably 70
cents each. The platter of 8.95
lo mein, back then, was probably
2 bucks for the locals. For all
I or anyone ever knew, maybe
even the ingredients were
different. The language and
the locals covet their own. 
American language is mostly 
dead, used now only to relate 
the most'pathetic of emotions 
or outlandish comment or 
evasion. There's no life
left in it. It's been squeezed 
and dry-rotted to  nothing.
What's the use of having
45,000 words at your 
'command,' if they're
all otherwise dead.
-- PART ONE
pt. two follows






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