MLP: Don your napron

Sigh. Your Mrs. Language Person, poor lamenting soul, is a dying breed. A horse beaten to a lifeless carcass, a discarded skin of a self-satisfied, slithering nadder.

No, Dear Reader (and Dear Editor), that was no spelling error, was "nadder." 'Tis a snake. A Rowan Atkinson character attired in black, lovingly known to we aficionados of British comedy. Adder of yore.

That shifting n.

Called "rebracketing," "juncture loss," and sometimes, "reanalysis" by linguists, the loss of the devalued "n" from the snake's original name of "nadder" has much company. Where did the "n" go, you may ask? Just next door: "a napron," became "an apron;" a numpire," "an umpire." Our misuse of names fell into this terrible trap, too. It is said "my Ned and Nellie" were once, "mine Ed" and "mine Ellie."

Errors in pronunciation, given enough time, become acceptable. MLP may call it mere laziness and disrespect, but she is outnumbered, bereft and lonely. Proponents call these lazy acceptance of the once unacceptable simply "part of the living language." Yet where does it end, Dear Reader; where does it end?

Sound swaps.

Consider metathesis - the swapping of sounds. Long ago summer's buzzing provocateurs were known as "waps." A horse was a "hros," and a clasp was "claps," as those odd lovers of Old and Middle English may know. One of your MLP's pet peeves is to hear "nu-cu-lar," when the spelling makes it so clear the word is, "new-clee-er." Is that next? How about "ree-la-tor" or (may the grammar god forbid) "aks?"

Disappearances.

Worse than sounds' swaps are their disappearances - syncope. Case in point for the faithful is Chris(t)mas. Does anyone say the "t"? Of course not, you say. Why not, when for centuries it was not Chris's mass, but Christ's mass? Your MLP hopes she is resting wearily in her grave when "because" is finally buried alongside, in favor of 'cos. That alone would be cause for her exit.

Mispronunciation.

As quickly as one generation to the next (and as your MLP frequently laments, more rapidly with this one) do certain mangled sounds go the way of the Velveteen Rabbit - their wear and tear transforming carelessness to viability. Affrication it's called, when Grandma would have called a tune a "tyoon" and a duke, a "dyuke," her grandson now says "choon" and "dook." Conversely, by the way, Castro's country is commonly mispronounced "kyooba" while its citizens call it "kooba."

Where does it all end, Dear Reader? Yes, English is a difficult language, with its mish-mash of etymologies, influences, and melting pot history. "Give it up, you Snitty Old Bitty," you say, "and just spell it the way it sounds."

There's the rub. If we allow all to fall to faulty phonetics, language will become unteachable - shifting as violently as a stormy sea. Will communication be effective with Future's schoolchildren, all thinking of the same concept, but speaking and spelling a word in different ways? How will they understand one another, with added or missing syllables and sounds willy nillly?

Don't know what's meant by willy nilly? Is that the same as willnilly, wilynil, and wheelie? Too bad, Dear Reader. Who knows and anything goes.

Yes, Man has always had his accents, dialects, and brogue. He always will as he should; these differences are part of our heritage and culture, to be preserved and cherished by layman and linguist alike. It is spelling and grammar which keep us communicating effectively, despite our myriad habits. Language, like children and all things living, needs structure to thrive.

MLP and Sholeh Patrick are columnists for the Hagadone News Network. Contact one at Sholeh@cdapress.com. The other is too depressed about communication to communicate.