Is English a bastardised German?

<<Why even bother writing in english?? You should all just go ahead and write in french, and save yourself the trouble.>>

I agree. Theres an ingrained self-loathing in most english speaking academic settings, that makes people go out of their way to use non-Anglosaxon origin words when writing or speaking to sound more "educated". Anglo-saxon words are stigmatized as "dumb" or simple, but french, latin, and greek origin words, are considered "sophisticated"....and like you said, that kind of writing is almost always vauge and devoid of any substance.

These assholes should just go ahead and write in latin, or french, instead of polluting the english language with so many unnecessary foreign words and phrases.

<<I have 14 publications to my name, and I have composed several tomes, so I do consider my linguistic habits will be quite influential, and I always use Latinates.>>

I'm sure they're all terrible....pretentious writing usually is.

I am surprised that you persons consider those linguistic units to be pretentious and excessively flowery when you yourselves know perfectly what they mean and use them daily yourselves. So, provided the text is comprehensible, why do you make ridiculous proclamations?

<<You should all just go ahead and write in french, and save yourself the trouble. >>

Why use French for your academic publications , when you can write in the real McCoy -- Latin itself?

Are there any scholarly journals that accept papers in Latin (other than journals about Latin)?

Why not use French, you question? Well, my response to that is extremely simple. The reason I do not use French for my publications is that my native language is English, and in fact I am not even acquainted with French beyond the intermediate stage. No, English is my native language, and in honesty I experience significantly amorous sentiments toward it, so it would by no means please me to use a different language. I do not consider that it would be more "pure" to use Latin, because there is nothing impure about the English I employ presently. That view is only maintained by those persons who consider purging English of Latinisms a noble terminus toward which to strive.

Correspondence of a legal nature to the Vatican has to be in Latin even today.

<<OH, like "TELEPHONE"?

or perhaps like "UNIT"?

it's English. it's called "A NEOLOGISM" hmMM??>>

Neologisms are useful when they fill a void not covered by any existing words, but they're pointless they're nothing but synonyms of perfectly good words already in widespread use.

*they're pointless when they're nothing but synonyms of perfectly good words already in widespread use

<<*they're pointless when they're nothing but synonyms of perfectly good words already in widespread use >>

This is true of 80% of latinate words that are currently part of the english vocabulary.

For example:

Nobody should ever say "in lieu of" when you can easily say INSTEAD of.

Nobody should ever "pose" any questions, when its perfectly fine to just ASK the goddamn question.

etc...

What's wrong with linguistic richness? So we must use one word and only one word? Then where is the expression?

Unless there are any subtle nuances to the alternative words, what purpose do they serve? It would be best to expunge them from our language.

<<Unless there are any subtle nuances to the alternative words, what purpose do they serve? It would be best to expunge them from our language.>>

Аfter you hahahah. Look at your own post.

And yes, there are subtle nuances. There is a difference between posing a question and asking one.

Yes, I would agree that there is a difference in that case. I'm not the one who gave that example. However, you have to admit that there are many superfluous words in English.

Yep, like the word "superfluous" is definitely superfluous.

***polluting the english language with so many unnecessary foreign words and phrases***

Have you never heard of linguistic enrichment?

Many words in the English Language are derived from Latin as well as from many other "unnecessary foreign words", and as for the phrases, well they are in fairly common use as a standard form of expression, so don't be so parochial and narrow minded.

If you feel so strongly about this then why not take issue with the many of your compatriots who insist on using the phrase "per se" - ad infinitum! It's used far more often by American journalistic correspondents, for example, than by their British colleagues.