We tried to enroll him in Chinese - but there weren't enough contestants. We've heard it's a difficult language and being that he is quite young, we thought perhaps he might get a good start at it. We thought we were future thinking - if China is becoming this giant cloud in the sky, what better way to weather the storm than learn the culture and language, right? Well, apparently there weren't enough people thinking like us.
Its not like we settled for Spanish, right? There are how many different countries and parts of the world (even within the US) that speak this language? A lot. And in our city, there are probably more Spanish speaking opportunities around, which will be beneficial.
These days, as I read the headlines, I am confounded a bit. There seems to be a bit of confusion in my State (Vikings, taxes, gambling); in America (NBA, players, owners); and the World (bailouts, climate, population). There is a definite lack of clarity. Perhaps a lack of leadership (or is that what they want you to think?)
Anyway, I think I figured out why there is this lack of "order in the court" (at least in my local, English speaking enclave.) It all relates to language, jargon, lingo. As I was stumbling upon some grammar stuff, I came across this tidbit:
English
English does not have a dedicated future tense — that is, a grammatical form that, when used, always indicates futurity — nor does it have a form that is mandatory for the expression of futurity. However, some forms are often used to express futurity.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Future_tense
Huh? So what does this say about the English language? Where does it lead us? How do we talk about the future? How do we set goals and expectations and make change?
Oh and by the way, future tense is abbreviated FUT.
Now I know why I learned German, though due to my lack of regular usage, most of the der die das is not even but a memory.
Futurity?? I've been teaching English for more decades than I care to count and I've never heard the word.
ReplyDeleteEnglish does indeed have a future tense (or two) like many other languages -- expressed as "will be" -- but no language I know has an "absolute future" tense. Some clairvoyants may claim to know for certain what will happen in the future but does anyone truly know for certain? We can speak of the future; yet, we can never know for certain what will happen.
My Muslim friends say "Insallah" when speaking of the future. My southern friends and relatives say, "God willing and the creek don't rise." Clearly, across cultures, the future is not written. Remember Terminator 2? "No fate but what we make." What may come in the future is always in flux.
BTW: I see your source is wikipedia -- a notoriously unreliable source.
Yes, I hear you, this is all food for thought - and you have done an excellent job adding to the feast! Some of the bull I find at wiki cracks me up and this was used as an example.
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