Today, we had a Zoom session with Prof. James Berry on our changing language. He said that English can be thought of as emerging in 449 AD as the Romans withdrew from Britain and Angles, Saxons, Jutes and Fresians started living more or less together and more or less developed a unified or semi-unified language.
He mentioned euphemisms and said that sometimes the substitute for a "bad" word becomes itself "bad". As I have written, once I was trying to warn a large auditorium of college students to watch their words when working with children in the lower grades. I told them I had recently seen a college student with shoelaces that said "bullshit" over and over again along them. No reaction from the group. I knew they used the word often. I said the children had not become used to the word and thought of the brown, creamy stuff that comes out of bottoms when they heard the word. The whole room erupted in "Ewwww!" as mental and repulsive pictures formed.
Prof. Berry also said that February was losing its first r, that English speakers don't like that initial r right after a b. His comment reminded me of the janitor and the janitor's aide in Scrubs who proudly informed the main character that they had indeed been to the "libary". The janitor corrected his aide's pronunciation: "libRary". The aide learned fast and in a sentence or two later, said, "You must be angry. Your face is almost strawbRerry."
