Three Friends, One Language, Three Heritages

Left to right: Alex A., friend whose name I forgot, Me; outside Alex's home, 1980's

Language:

the method of human communication, either spoken or written, consisting of the use of words in a structured and conventional way

Dialect:

a particular form of a language that is peculiar to a specific region or social group

Last night while out for dinner with my queen / wife, I could hear the family to our left speaking English from England.

The two men to our right speaking German, from which most of the English language is derived.

This morning on the train, I can hear south-central Los Angeles English.

The English in New England ( south Boston, for example ) is distinctly different from the English in a suburb of Montgomery, Alabama.

The English throughout all of England varies in word choice, inflection, slang and even palate placement and nasal resonance.

One could hear the distinctive English spoken along the coast in southern California being quite different than the English being spoken in, say east Los Angeles, or the variety of west Los Angeles internal immigrants ( immigrants from other parts of the United States, besides the many accents of external immigrants ).

The coastal English of the entirety of the United States alone is varied considerably.

And this may sound nerdy and possibly ridiculous, but I find this fascinating and reflective of the past.

Language is fluid.

Not only fluid as it is being spoken, but in how it changes in a very slow motion.

New words are adopted while others are forever archived.

New meanings are attached to current words, while previous meanings are somehow forgotten.

Couple this with the English origin and local meanings within slang, we can see how easily two people may at times miscommunicate using the same words while communicating.

For communities which seem to be closed off or unique in their development ( ultra wealthy and dismally poor communities, as two extreme examples ), a particularly different languages develops and continues in its unique direction.

Perhaps the more financially affluent community may use words from a century ago ( perhaps according to heritage ), words with several vowels and syllables, while perhaps the less affluent community may reuse simpler words, attaching with varied intentions and newer meanings that depend on where in a sentence they are placed.

This is quite phenomenal and revealing of how, in due time, new languages are always appearing, despite “English” being the category the words are derived.

But the most unique and phenomenal thing I've realized in terms of language... is how the language of love transcends all miscommunication, all dialects and all intentions and varying meaningful use of words.

Love's language transcends the side effects of Babel, for we are reaching for the oneness of Love's language; bringing all things into one, towards speaking the language of love, not hampered by dialect and language's confusion.

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