Have we already discussed the way the elves speak? Unless awkward speech is part of the original Brownie myth, JKR seems to have chosen to make her elves sound uneducated -- especially since they don't all make the same grammatical errors. If they were raised and educated as humans, would they speak like humans?
Hmmm. Well, I've been discussing UG (Universal Grammar) lately in a number of contexts. Though I think most of the discussion of it in linguistics makes some fundamental errors in the mechanism by which UG arises, it's pretty clear that there's a lot about human language which is based heavily on patterns inborn in the human brain. So, it's not unreasonable that house elves are unable to master human language. Language is hard. It just happens that we're very good at it, and our languages are tailored for our brains.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2006-01-19 07:14 am (UTC)Hmmm. Well, I've been discussing UG (Universal Grammar) lately in a number of contexts. Though I think most of the discussion of it in linguistics makes some fundamental errors in the mechanism by which UG arises, it's pretty clear that there's a lot about human language which is based heavily on patterns inborn in the human brain. So, it's not unreasonable that house elves are unable to master human language. Language is hard. It just happens that we're very good at it, and our languages are tailored for our brains.