Language!

Hi all,

All my life, I've use the word happened, happening, if something is going on/happening, but over the last couple of years, I've noticed that people now say 'occurring'. so, where I say, 'what's happening/what's happened?', most now say 'what's occurring/what's occurred?

Also, 'we've learned this today', rather than what I was taught - 'we've learnt this today'.

Am I wrong with carrying on with what I've always known or are the above examples now a more correct version?

It just doesn't look or sound right to me, to say occurred or learned, but would be nice to know what's changed/happened

Cheers

North Wales = England

South Wales = Wales (Gavin and Stacey)

No, no wrong or right - language has always been fluid. Words are added, others fall into disuse. Exposure to new generations of public figures for example who may have been brought up in different parts of the country can be an influence. The beauty - and the difficulty in learning for foreigners - of English is its diversity, spawned from several waves of invaders who all brought their own language.

So-called "standard" English was not much more than a fashion dating from Victorian times, admittedly having a certain value in that implied control and it could be understood anywhere in their Empire, but at the same time appearing exclusive to those who spoke with a different accent or dialect.

As long as one can be understood, weigh up the circumstances and go for it

Now then?

To be fair, listening to youngsters now, I'm not sure English is the national language anymore. I think I get what my dad meant 40+ years ago (when he was actually a lot younger than I am now) about my generation bastardising English.

Had to think about that for a bit, Joe

I've always had a fascination for our language & the use of words, I'm fine when full words are used, but when shorting or silly pronunciations are used it does irritate me. Gunna/wunna/evva/everthingk are just a few that grind my gears. Of course on a slightly different slant, vocal fry REALLY winds me up.

I agree with you Jim.

My gears get ground when I hear (bad) fake Jamaican accents being used by kids who were born in this country and probably their parents were too.
There is one website hosting ad on TV at the moment which really winds me up for this reason.

My paternal family roots are in the West Indies but I speak English with a southern accent tempered with an odd bit of Derbyshire from my mother. Never felt the need to change.

Happen is equivalent to Occur - a matter of fashion, whichever you prefer.

Learned/learnt (and any of the other similar irregular verbs like spelt/spelled) - the 't' endings are an older use in verbs which are becoming regularised with modern usage. Personally, I prefer the 't' endings but (a) I am an old fogey and (b) my Masters' thesis was on how to spell words that don't exist

(see also ised/ized; originally ize endings were UKian, and the ise came about as Noah Webster's attempts to simplify US spelling. Over time the usage has changed and so now ise is seen as English and ize as American. But common spelling checkers and autocorrectors prefer the ize ending if UK English is selected, so maybe it'll change back again. Personally I prefer ise...)