I think what I like about the English language is that it’s just so ridiculously difficult. For example, did you know that the word “set” has 430 definitions which take 60,000 words to detail in the full Oxford English Dictionary? I mean, that’s just silly. It’s amazing to me that languages like Cantonese or Mandarin, with thousands of characters representing individual words and single words with multiple meanings depending on emphasis and nuance, are still generally considered easier to learn than English. Take your two parts English history, with it’s Germanic and Norman influences, grind in your Greek and Roman roots, and then mix in the Empire’s habit of usurping words as well as territory along its travels, and you’ve got yourself one tasty language cocktail. Of course, as far as I’m concerned (not all that far really), the same aspects that make English so difficult to deal with are what makes it such a versatile, beautiful and fun language.
Take this fun little tidbit that a friend of mine (the intrepid Doggy, I believe) had as his email signature a while back:
Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo.
Surprisingly, that works out as a grammatically correct, albeit baffling, English sentence. Let’s dig in:
You have to start with the plural of Buffalo being the same as the singular, the benefit being that you don’t need an article (a/an/the) to introduce a plural.
Then you’ve got three definitions of buffalo:
1) Buffalo – the city in New York state, famous for its wings, and probably other stuff as well.
2) buffalo – the largest North American land mammal.
3) buffalo – a verb, meaning to bully or intimidate, as in “The USA buffalo developing countries with the IMF and the World Bank.”
So, if we take the original sentence:
Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo.
Let’s break it down, add some articles, change plural forms and rearrange things a bit, to translate it as, “Buffaloes from Buffalo, who are buffaloed by other buffaloes from Buffalo, also buffalo other Buffalo buffaloes.” What does that tell you? You definitely don’t want to be a buffalo in upper New York, because that social scene is a real bitch.
Basically, you can run with weird sentences like this whenever you have a word that is both a noun and verb. Another easy example would be “police.” Who polices the police? Why, it must be the police police. But then, who would police the police police? I suppose it would be the police police police. So, in no time flat, you can put together something along the lines of: Police police police police police police.
Of course, my personal favourite has to be:
Malkovich malkovich malkovich Malkovich malkovich malkovich.
You know I have tried but have been unable to figure out how that is a sentence. Problems like these keep me awake at night. Kidding.
Hmmm, I was thinking that it might be easier to think of it like this:
(Buffalo buffalo) (Buffalo buffalo buffalo) (buffalo Buffalo buffalo).
(Buffalo from Buffalo) (that buffalo from Buffalo bully) (also bully buffalo from Buffalo).
Or wait, maybe that’s not easier at all. You have to remember that it would be massively easier with a couple commas in there.