Been listening fastidiously to last week's The Brian Lehrer Show
On WNYC, the Radio 4 of the east coast by comparison, and his show "Global English"
Leslie Dunton-Downer, author of The English is Coming!: How One Language is Sweeping the World, explores some of the words and phrases from other languages picked up by the world's current lingua franca.
Discussed in the first episode is the word 'hellow', which I thought was a primarily English world, dtaing back to before the Victorian times- however, it appears, it has 'roots' in the American mishearing and mutation. And not just that, but also via the medium or remidiation of technology- as a result of technological progress and invention. Language being invented as a consequence of othe rinvention.
hello
Much of all this research befits my current theories and thesis into the parallels and comparisonsof the Twin Towers and NYC as the new city and tower of Babel- and the resulting consequence of 9/11 mirroring that of the fall of Babel and the division of tongues and the beginning fo new languages. However, in the late 20th Century this division was subject to a remediation and mutation through the use of telephone communication via the production and widespread use of mobile phones for both those in the towers, in the planes and on the ground to communicate through. The problem was not one of evberyone spekaing a new language or a different tongue, but rather that the single medium of communication at the time, the mobile one, crashed collapsed and became overload as soon as everyone attempted to use it at the same time to speak all their varfious languages. New York City is a city built post-Babel, where the myriad of languages prevail influencing the mutation tranformation and translation of English into it's eventual Otherness, it's future 'new' existence.
How apt it is then that the very beginning of a conversation, a word shared by millions aroudn the world helping to spread the rise of this so-called 'One World Language' as a globalized totalitarian language, was the byproduct almost, of a mishearing through the technology that also seeks to dominate, mobile telecommunication.
On WNYC, the Radio 4 of the east coast by comparison, and his show "Global English"
Leslie Dunton-Downer, author of The English is Coming!: How One Language is Sweeping the World, explores some of the words and phrases from other languages picked up by the world's current lingua franca.
Discussed in the first episode is the word 'hellow', which I thought was a primarily English world, dtaing back to before the Victorian times- however, it appears, it has 'roots' in the American mishearing and mutation. And not just that, but also via the medium or remidiation of technology- as a result of technological progress and invention. Language being invented as a consequence of othe rinvention.
Word Origin & History
hello
1883, alt. of hallo (1840), itself an alt. of holla, hollo, a shout to attract attention, first recorded 1588. Perhaps from holla! "stop, cease." Popularity as a greeting coincides with use of the telephone, where it won out over Alexander Graham Bell's suggestion, ahoy. Central telephone exchange operators were known as hello-girls (1889).
"Hello, formerly an Americanism, is now nearly as common as hullo in Britain (Say who you are; do not just say 'hello' is the warning given in our telephone directories) and the Englishman cannot be expected to give up the right to say hello if he likes it better than his native hullo. [H.W. Fowler, "A Dictionary of Modern English Usage," 1926]
{...}the National Convention of Telephone Companies. The first one was held at Niagara Falls, NY, from Sept. 7 - 10, 1880. And there, nearly at the very beginning, the newly elected president, George L. Phillips of Dayton, Ohio, spoke (somewhat awkwardly) to the delegates: "I haven't any speech to make to you. We are all in the telephone business. I can make a short speech to you which would express a great deal. The shortest speech that I could make to you and that would express a great deal to you, probably would be the one that is on all of your badges - 'Hello!' [Applause] ... We ... will present statistics showing the use the telephone is put to; showing how it has entered into the life of the public in such a way that if we are wise in the management of our exchanges nothing can drive it out."
Edison had written a short note on August 15, 1877 to T.B.A. David, president of the Central District and Printing Telegraph Company of Pittsburg, Pa., who was preparing to introduce the telephone into that city shortly after Edison had invented the carbon button transmitter. The brief - and now historic letter - which refers to a model Edison was making for him, reads as follows:
"Friend David, I do not think we shall need a call bell as Hello! can be heard 10 to 20 feet away. What you think? Edison - P.S. first cost of sender & receiver to manufacture is only $7.00."
Extracted from http://www.collectorcafe.com/article_archive.asp?article=800&id=1507
How apt it is then that the very beginning of a conversation, a word shared by millions aroudn the world helping to spread the rise of this so-called 'One World Language' as a globalized totalitarian language, was the byproduct almost, of a mishearing through the technology that also seeks to dominate, mobile telecommunication.
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