Want to know what those weird linguistic symbols were? Find out in older Language Files videos on the playlist: ruclips.net/p/PL96C35uN7xGLDEnHuhD7CTZES3KXFnwm0
That'd depend on when it came up in the curriculum - and I for one would love the contrast of kids excitedly talking about how they learned about how to properly brush their teeth and why clitics only sometimes work.
Everyone's already said as much, but I want to add a second confirmation that those words being said fast enough to functionally be contracted is very common in the US Midwest.
Adding on to the midwest validation stack, I was a little confused when he said it didn't work because it very much did to my ears, I've probably said that exact contraction in the past 24h to be honest
I have five children. My eldest contracted "I am not" as "I amn't" rather than "I'm not," and its usage accidentally became so common that it carried through to his younger siblings.
Then you did your child a mild disservice, like those parents who don't teach their kids the right pronunciation of basic things. The kids turn up at school and they're behind their peers in class because they can't speak properly.
It's funny how that stuff happens. My fist son mispronounced "ground pound" as "bound cround" when playing Mario, and both his younger siblings and cousins all say it now too
I’ve always found it fascinating how in British English people commonly say “I’ve not__” while American English is usually “I haven’t___” with the difference being which two words are contracted for “I have not.”
Is it similar with "it's not" and "it isn't"? For what it's worth, as a Brit I believe I do use both versions of each, but probably use "I've not" and "it's not" more often. Although, this is one of those things that's so subconscious, I'm not entirely certain even of my own normal usage, now that I try to deliberately think about it.
American English is distinctly different from the King's English. Which is why I just say I speak American today. I can hardly understand British when they talk.
@@AJChamDamn, it seems like I, being a non-native English speaker preferring some kind of British English over American, have been unconsciously using the more British variants of those contractions, nice 😄
@@AJCham I’m American, and it’s not similar. “It’s not” and “it isn’t” are both common in American English but most contractions where “have” is reduced sound distinctly British. The only exception I can think of is when “have” comes before something that can’t be contracted like “got”
@@teho1536 What do you mean? It's exactly an example of why a clitic wouldn't stand on its own. There isn t a typo like that in the rest of the subtitles. So yes, it is brilliant!
yes, it is a great example of how a clitic wouldn’t work on its own. but that’s not what tom’s describing at the time. he’s describing how clitics attach to whole phrases (the dog from the park’s collar) and not individual words (the dog’s from the park collar). he’s not saying anything about how clitics can’t go on their own.
If we had collectively embraced linguistic complexity and innovation, there’dn’t’ve been any concern about future generations understanding the word there’dn’t’ve.
After my six-year old spontaneously started saying "I amn't," instead of "I'm not," I wondered why English never adopted this perfectly reasonable alternative. I found that we had, and the modern-day descendant is "I ain't."
One time I typed *y’all’d’ve* to a group of friends from the midwest in a group text (I’m from the South) and they thought I was insane. “You all would have”, like “if y’all’d’ve gotten here on time, then…”. In my head it made perfect sense but to them it was so alien.
As a midwesterner, I would have definitely understood it, spoken or written, but the main "problem" I would have with the written form is that writing more than one contraction in the same word feels wrong.
@@0x1E4 I write out shouldn't've, wouldn't've and couldn't've every now and then, look at it and then consider whether or not I should actually do that for a moment.
I wondered why I never had the concept of "clitics" explained to me in school but then I realized by the time my classmates had developed the comprehension for them, none of them would have taken the phrase "clitic" seriously.
We looked it at at Uni in both my Bachelor's and my Masters in Linguistics and in both cases it still got the response it would have inspired at high school. "I can't find the clitic," became an injoke among us for a while. Until we realised that every group of Ling students that has ever covered this also made the exact same jokes.
@@1pcfred contractions are the whole word, clitics are the parts added to make them contractions. Isn't is a contraction, and the 't is the clitic in the contraction.
@@dragonluvver975technically, yes. In practice "y'all" is used as the second person plural pronoun, which English doesn't normally have. Yes, it's a contraction, but the meaning has become slightly different.
@@Syrange13 Sidenote: English used to have a second person plural pronoun (ye), but they dropped it. Southern USA has reintroduced it with y'all, and I love it so much that I use it even though I'm not even remotely from the USA.
I’m so glad you highlighted “couldn’t’ve” since it’s been one of my favorite double contractions for years. In grade school I remember writing it and wondering why there weren’t many other double contractions that sound correct when spoken but this has answered that question once and for all!
Huh, my teachers always counted double contractions as incorrect edit: guys i'm not saying he's wrong, i'm just saying it's interesting that his teachers counted it and not mine
@@ThomasTheThermonuclearBomb I do think they aren’t a part of formal or academic writing. But they’re a good way to represent the way a large portion of English speakers *actually* talk colloquially.
@@ThomasTheThermonuclearBombIt's wrong to spell it "shouldn't of" which is what you see far too often. I very much like using shouldn't've and similar.
@@ThomasTheThermonuclearBomb A lot of people, teachers especially, are really anal about clinging to by the book grammar rules and stubbornly refuse to accept that language changes over time. So here's one thing you're smarter than them about.
I'm going to be honest, "there’dn’t’ve" didn't sound necessarily wrong as compared to the other examples given. I feel as if I've heard it before in an American southern dialect.
Southerner here. I definitely use "there'dn't've" and I know many others who do, too. There's also "y'all'd've" (usually pronounced, "yalldah") or the negative, "y'all'dn't've" (usually pronounced, "yalldnah"). Examples: If y'all'd been outside last night, y'all'd've seen that eclipse. Y'all wouldn't've missed it if y'all'dn't've been so lazy. Then there'dn't've been anything to complain about.
I'm from california, and I've said there'dn't've in spoken language before, and i know for a fact that I've written it within the last year because there'dn't've is in my phone's dictionary. i can type it without changing pages for apostrophe by just typing the letters out without apostrophes and then tapping the top-middle option.
@@silverwriter6739I think there might be some misunderstanding here. I think the point tom is trying to make is that in order to use clitics, you need to have something following for example, in your example you said "if yall'd been outside last night, yall'd've seen that eclipse" which is perfectly grammatical. But, (please forgive me if I'm wrong) I believe if you were to say "did you see the eclipse last night? if yall'd been outside, yall'd've." this would be ungrammatical and sound odd now as to whether or not it actually is ungrammatical I'm not really sure, but I think that's the issue tom is trying to tackle in the video, not necessarily whether or not it's impossible to use terms like those in any circumstance
I've been really obsessed with mentally replacing "shouldn't" with "shannot" after someone quoted original Shakespeare lines at me a couple months back. It's amazing how quickly languages change, even seeing the new slang words of the year makes me feel like I can barely keep up anymore.
Ooh, that is really cool! I am not a native speaker myself, and my writing style is quite odd from seldom speaking English and mostly reading old books in the language, so maybe I'll start using "shannot" now
books from the 1800’s used «I shan’t» which I assume to be shortened from «shannot». Wonder how we got back to «shouldn’t», a longer and more difficult word
@@blindleader42 Genuine question, why? Many languages (zh, ja, ko, and probably most Indo-European languages) are much more difficult than English, in one aspect or another. As a non-native English speaker I'm glad that the global lingua franca today is not French or German.
@@jacquelineliu2641 I would say that English (especially in the written form) is an inconsistency queen. I am saying that as a person who studied other Indo-European languages and my native language is not Indo-European. What made English the lingua franca is that English-speakers were not grammar nazis throughout the history. Even to this day, if you spend years learning French and make a single mistake, most of native French speakers will not be nice about it. I remember getting some hostility from two french "hippies" because I used the word "ridicule" instead of "bizarre" in French. They did not stop to think that maybe I meant "bizarre," instead they chose look at me very seriously and kind of got angry. I mean, if hippies are like that, I cannot imagine what a teacher would do.
@@echorises actually what made english the current lingua franca is mostly colonialism the list of countries england hasn't tried to invade and/or subjugate at some point is very very small
@@jacquelineliu2641 I totally understand you on French. It's such a trouble to have to learn a language for the written and one for the spoken variant! But German? Only German can has the Sesame Street Song going Der, die, das. Wer, wie, was? Wieso, weshalb, warum? Wer nicht fragt bleibt dumm! 🙂🙃🙂😊😉😇
I was such a stickler about proper English when I was younger. Then I learned how much language changes, not only over time but also even short distances. Now I believe if your audience can understand you, you are doing it right.
I'm glad to hear someone express this view. I feel similarly. I retain my interest in mostly trying to 'communicate properly', but I'm also aware of just how dynamic and restless language is, especially as we see new terms enter the lexicon during our own lifetimes as new concepts emerge. Anyone being a stickler for pronunciation or spelling need only look to written works from the 18th century or prior to see just how much the language of English has differed over time.
I go a step further and speculate that the inefficiency of human language as a means of communication makes true 1:1 understanding essentially impossible.
@@CookiesRiot I think that’s not just because of the inefficiency of language; it’s also that different people’s prior knowledge and experiences vary so wildly that 100% 1:1 understanding would be impossible anyway, regardless of the communication method.
@@MartijnCoppoolse It's fun to speculate, in sci-fi especially, a society that can transmit information to each other without distortion of meaning. Hive mind societies are especially popular thought experiments. One that I find particularly compelling is the Geth from Mass Effect, who are explicitly in constant communication such that each individual unit is compared to a set of eyes looking at the universe from a different angle. Essentially, they all receive and understand information identically. Despite that, though, individual units have extra software installed which causes them to process the information into a different conclusion, and so a huge schism happened. They are fully aware of the thoughts and processes that the opposite faction experienced, but computationally are obligated to choose differently. They have identical understanding of the opponent's view and simultaneously agree to be different. There are two fun contrasts of speech versus a more efficient system in NieR: Automata and The Three-Body Problem. In NieR, there are robotic units which pause a huge conversation with human language to switch to a more efficient protocol, at which point the rest of the conversation is blurted out in a computer language. In the Cixin Liu book trilogy, on the other hand, there is a civilization which can physically see the interior thoughts of other individuals, so they immediately have a 1:1 snapshot of a thought that exists the exact way that they think. Deception is not a concept they really comprehend.
As a non-native speaker who has been teaching English for 10+ years, I find your videos really insightous on how I can teach how these things happen. Thanks Tom.
@@elysiumsexsmith i say "there shouldn't've", "there couldn't've" etc. instead of contracting the should/could/would, and it's perfectly fine to use "there'dn't've" in my dialect. i tend to say the "could/should/would" very quickly though.
Multi contractions work fine in some dialects. Like "ain't gonna" 'I am not going to'. "a'st" 'have you had?' "Bin't" 'have you not been?' And my personal favourite"May's'n't" meaning 'may I not as well'
@@Wolfie-Dovei live in the rocky mountain region of the US and I have a bunch of friends from the more southern part of the states. Every now and again I'll say something like "y'all've a great day."
I thought this video was 10 years old then I looked at when it was posted. You haven’t changed at all! And that really isn’t a bad thing, you’re awesome!
years ago I had fun chatting with a coworker who'd just moved to seattle from alabama about this sort of stuff. I told him that "y'all'd've" is something he's absolutely learned to say and understand and it kinda blew his mind because he'd never considered that before
I'm from Kentucky and I've never heard this. Of course this is the north of the south, perhaps it didn't make it this far but I am curious how you use that in a sentence.
@@randomhuman3883 Thank you. Can't disagree either, this state is in an undefinable geographic location. Its not southern, not mid west, not east coast nor southeast. Call it mid east? Anyways thanks!
As a Swede... We salute you on making a harder language(written) than us..... But then we have our neighbours.. the Finns... You will always have a special place on the podium ...
Everyone's pitching all these "bad written languages," but completely ignoring the abomination that is written Tibetan. Ah, yes, I'd like a language whose spelling hasn't been updated since the Vikings were out raiding England.
@AndersBergh It took me an embarrassingly long time to realize "Glass" meant "Ice Cream." ...There's only so many common noises a human will make, and there'll always be some overlap.
Fun fact: Despite everything Tom does, including the computer science stuff His degree is in linguistics and i love that he occasionally shows us interesting things about it!
As a kid, I reduced ‘What happens if’ to ‘Whoppens if’ or ‘Whappens if’ interchangeably. My parents thought it was hilarious. I’d like to coin the term; W’happens 😁
@@liadeindadani6913 according to how I understood the explanation isn't that a clitic? Is leaves a 's, while op's example are n't, It's confusing anyway.
A couple years ago finding the language files woke up an intense love for language, etymology, etc, so it makes me so happy that Tom is giving us more episodes, even if only a few. Thank you Tom for always making such amazing videos, never stop learning
I love how different your videos can be from each other. We'll miss you after the new year. Enjoy having time to yourself to do the things you've missed out on. We'll look forward to having you back.
What's really mindblowing is how this is all entirely intuitive and not actually taught. My parents and teachers never taught me any of this, but I know it without even having to think about it, because humans are so good at recognizing patterns.
According to the anecdotal stories of a couple of other commenters, it isn't entirely intuitive though, given that there are kids running around saying "I amn't" instead of "I'm not". I'm thinking it is partially learned behavior from listening to how adults and peers are using the language.
@@therubberducktube i mean, the implication of the op was that it's intuitive in the sense that it's intuitively _learned,_ rather than explicitly taught. hence the mention of pattern recognition, which wouldn't be relevant if the contractions were instinctive instead of intuited hell, amn't over ain't would count as intuitive, too, it's just a phenomenon that i imagine pops up in regions were a kid ain't likely to be exposed to ain't and thus would have to contract "am not" on their own
Thank you! I have never been able to properly explain to my Croatian girlfriend why the phrase "Yes, I'm" is not a grammatically correct response to a question. This is the perfect explanation.
It mightn't be grammatically correct to say "yes I'm" or "yes it's" (or simply answering a question with "it's" or "i'm") but its part of US southern English to say things like that.
@@matthewjbauer1990I'm not a linguist nor a native English speaker but I even find it hard to believe that saying I'm as a response is wrong. Because in principal it isn't. I think people simply confuse grammar with customs and habits. And language changes all the time. Like Tom said, English used to say 'tis instead of it's. In Dutch we still do that. "It is" in Dutch would be "het is". Saying het's in Dutch would be the perfect analog for it's but it feels wrong to native speakers. 'tis the way it is. ;)
I'm a word nerd and I approve this message. A while ago I spent a bit of time talking to a young man in the UK. He kept typing "should of" and "could of" rather than should've or could've. The he argued with me when I mentioned the word was have and not of. Ah, well. Thanks, Tom!
The problem with English being allergic to ending words in v: the word is 'ov', contracts to 'v' same as 'have' does, but it's written 'of'... forcing the word that's Actualy said as 'of' to be written as 'off' insted... blech.
tbf, that _is_ how we say those contractions. This feels like the kind of 'mistake' that could easily become a variant form -- or even standard practice -- if repeated enough. 🙂
That thumbnail is brilliant, it bent my brain trying to sort it out! I find your language files playlist very enjoyable, additions to it always make me happy.😀
As someone living in the Southern US, several southern dialects around me (both Appalachian and Piedmont) have "there'd'nt've" and "y'all'd'nt've" as valid contractions, though not common.
When I lived in Texas I heard y'all'd'nt've all the time. Like, "y'all'd'nt've done that." I don't know if it's the same where you're from, but it sounded like "yallininuh done that"
@@dougthayer5829No, I think what you heard was a pronunciation of “you oughtn’ve done that”, which is a contraction of “you ought not to have done that”. Some southern US speakers might not even know the full phrase, they’re just repeating the sound “yalltnuv” that they picked up from others doing the same.
I think the message of this video is that, just like everything else in life, you have to learn to handle cliticism - so long as it's constructive cliticism.
I critiqued a story, written by a European, which included a conversation ("Is it?" "Yes, it's.") that was clearly not idiomatic, even though it didn't break any of the usual "rules." I scratched my head and finally came up with "Don't end a sentence (or clause) with a (pro)noun-verb contraction." Thanks to you, I now know the official word for that!
@@genghisdingus *"You think you can't end a sentence with a contraction but I don't."* Your effort at humor fails. His direction was not against ending a sentence with a contraction --- it was against ending a sentence with a _(pro)noun-verb_ contraction.
@@hypehuman You make a point. I didn't notice the fact that the original post was edited. If the OP _did_ edit it specifically in response to the following posts, that would indicate dishonesty. As it stands, I will hold off for a bit. I may need to offer an apology to *@genghisdingus* at some point, though.
Stuff like this is why I can see how non-native English speakers have so much trouble getting used to the language. I don’t even know how we all learned this, we just… figured it out on our own somehow
To be fair that seems to be a common issue with languages, at least any language I've come across. I'd say English is even a bit more intuitive than some others
@@leogiri2863 Perhaps the main issue with English is that it's relatively inconsistent sometimes. Pronunciation is a prime example, with vowels being all over the place. Compare that to (standard) Japanese, for example. Grammatical rules tend to have lots of exceptions too. Though it's mainly a consequence of English being affected by or being a combination of several languages over time (e.g., it's a Germanic language heavily influenced by French and the Nords)
As someone who studied English at school for ca. six years before letting it improve by reading books and watching films and later using RUclips: School doesn't focus on the best things about English.
As a Dutch Dude who learned English in school and from video games at like 10-14, English is really intuitive and easy, "they're their and there" and "then/than" are the only slight confusing things. But even that comes quite easy with a bit of practice, "They're doing their things there"
Imagine if we had videos like this from a century ago, hearing people talk about language. Them saying phrases or words we find completely normal now, in the same way that people in the future might think the strange parts of this video are unremarkable. Language is fascinating.
There are sources like that, just not videos or movies, but books. I've read something of that kind in my native Russian, writers in the 1920s complaining about newfangled things that have now become the norm.
readily sirrah, I doth find myself musing much the same of late ,in so much as our native tongue has so oft been besmirched with newly coined verbiage of late that I do find my wits quite awry at the grasping of such.
But this video.. one of the main thing is you can t really cut of much from the word you're emphasing.. So you never see, i think so i'm. If the clic bit has the main attention.. you just need to spell it out again..
I've occasionally used "I'm gonna bed" as a substitute for the usual "goodnight" and enjoyed pointing out to very little acknowledgement that by all accounts it should be correct because "gonna" means "going to," therefore the phrase translates literally to "I'm going to bed." I mostly did this because using "bed" as a verb amuses me greatly. I now feel validated.
Now that is an interesting one. I'd never had reason to notice before that "gonna" requires a verb to follow, even though "going to" allows either a verb or noun.
You'd want to be careful with who you say that around though, as "bed" is actually a valid verb that means "to have sex with someone". It used to be a lot more common before the word "sex" became part of common speech. Back in the day, it was very possible to bed someone
@@killerbee.13 It has something to do with it being a prepositional verb AND a phrasal verb. If "going to" is treated like a phrasal verb, a synonym to "about to", then the implication would become the following subject is X or do X, a verb. Otherwise, if "going to" is treated like a prepositional verb, the present participle of "go to", then X would be a location. "Gonna" will always be about the phrasal verb, but indeed it's funny when it replaces the prepositional verb.
3:17 I contest there's other ways around this. "I'm GOING to do it" has more emphasis rather than I'M going to do it" so I mean it is possible, you just have to switch where the emphasis goes.
i'm a western american english (pacific coast) speaker as a primary language. i wouldn't say "there'dn't've", but i would say "there wouldna" (something like /ðɛr wʊdnnə/), as in, "there wouldna been a problem, if i hadn't said something"
The Language Files series got me interested in linguistics and I'm having so much fun in my Intro to Linguistics class right now, so thank you for that! :DD
Me, a non-native english speaker: "Finally, after years of studying, no one will stop me from speaking and understanding english" Tom Scott: "Hold my beer".
Want to know what those weird linguistic symbols were? Find out in older Language Files videos on the playlist: ruclips.net/p/PL96C35uN7xGLDEnHuhD7CTZES3KXFnwm0
hi
Hi
One month ago ??
1 month?
a solid month ago
Feels like we are back to our true Tom Scott roots with this one.
old fans are getting fed well today
because it literally is an old video
A thematical blast from the past
Degree in linguistics
I thoght this was old
Every time Tom does a linguistics video in front of a piece of lined paper the world heals just a little bit more.
So true, in comparison all my English teachers in school were ... sub-par, to put it politely.
Old school!
yes
hell, he does it and ends up on the Trending page, he is currently #20
But then he doesn't stick to the lines... 😂
I feel like the reason we didn't learn this in school is because they knew the lesson would grind to a halt the moment the teacher said "clitic".
That'd depend on when it came up in the curriculum - and I for one would love the contrast of kids excitedly talking about how they learned about how to properly brush their teeth and why clitics only sometimes work.
hehe
If you taught them before the age of 10 it wouldn't go so poorly, however it might be to complex for kids of that age to understand.
HA
@@Autoskipno the class would’ve auto skipped to laughter regardless of age
But you said "there'd'nt've" so smoothly and confidently that it actually made me feel like there'd'nt've been any problems with it!
there'sn't
I mean, it, or something like it, could pop up in regular, if rushed, speech, from saying “there wouldn’t have” really fast.
It’s a very common word in the Midwest.
Everyone's already said as much, but I want to add a second confirmation that those words being said fast enough to functionally be contracted is very common in the US Midwest.
Adding on to the midwest validation stack, I was a little confused when he said it didn't work because it very much did to my ears, I've probably said that exact contraction in the past 24h to be honest
As an American Southerner, they’d’nt’ve and y’all’d’nt’ve are both perfectly normal parts of speech
Exactly. Ya'll'nt try'n hard'nough.
Also would’nt’ve
In my dialect (Yorkshire-ish, middle class), "wouldn't've" can be shortened right down to "wou'n'a".
@@wellthatwasdaftit’d be wouldn’ta or wou’n’a as well here in the South of the US
Y'all'dn't've immediately came to mind. Use it all the time
I have five children. My eldest contracted "I am not" as "I amn't" rather than "I'm not," and its usage accidentally became so common that it carried through to his younger siblings.
If you arent and it isnt make perfect sense, theres no reason why i amnt shouldnt work
‘I amn’t’ is often used in Ireland as the usual way to contract ‘I am not’, funnily enough (although ‘I’m not’ is still common of course).
That's what ain't is originally for, as a contraction of am not.
Then you did your child a mild disservice, like those parents who don't teach their kids the right pronunciation of basic things. The kids turn up at school and they're behind their peers in class because they can't speak properly.
It's funny how that stuff happens. My fist son mispronounced "ground pound" as "bound cround" when playing Mario, and both his younger siblings and cousins all say it now too
I’ve always found it fascinating how in British English people commonly say “I’ve not__” while American English is usually “I haven’t___” with the difference being which two words are contracted for “I have not.”
Is it similar with "it's not" and "it isn't"? For what it's worth, as a Brit I believe I do use both versions of each, but probably use "I've not" and "it's not" more often.
Although, this is one of those things that's so subconscious, I'm not entirely certain even of my own normal usage, now that I try to deliberately think about it.
American English is distinctly different from the King's English. Which is why I just say I speak American today. I can hardly understand British when they talk.
Does this mean I'm from the middle of the Atlantic with my I'ven't?
@@AJChamDamn, it seems like I, being a non-native English speaker preferring some kind of British English over American, have been unconsciously using the more British variants of those contractions, nice 😄
@@AJCham I’m American, and it’s not similar. “It’s not” and “it isn’t” are both common in American English but most contractions where “have” is reduced sound distinctly British. The only exception I can think of is when “have” comes before something that can’t be contracted like “got”
@ 1:04 The subtitles explaining that
"we know that because it doesn
t attach to individual words"
is just BRILLIANT!!
I feel like that was just a typo. It doesn't actually demonstrate what Tom is explaining at the time at all...
@@teho1536 What do you mean? It's exactly an example of why a clitic wouldn't stand on its own. There isn
t a typo like that in the rest of the subtitles.
So yes, it is brilliant!
yes, it is a great example of how a clitic wouldn’t work on its own. but that’s not what tom’s describing at the time. he’s describing how clitics attach to whole phrases (the dog from the park’s collar) and not individual words (the dog’s from the park collar). he’s not saying anything about how clitics can’t go on their own.
nah it was not a typo that
s briliant
O
Brb, using there’dn’t’ve in my next script
Oh so you follow Tom for grammar lessons 👀
Someone please @ me when it comes out?
Hello, checkmark person! You guys are hard to find these days.
im going to use it on my masters thesis, wish me luck
Tell Nero I said "pspspsps!" and give him a pet for me.
If we had collectively embraced linguistic complexity and innovation, there’dn’t’ve been any concern about future generations understanding the word there’dn’t’ve.
It's what it's.
Yes, if only we'd.
It's there didn't have not there would hsve that it expands to
@@hippocraticly6167 Felt like I was having a stroke trying to read this
@@AvsJoe 'Tis what 'tis.
Tom is performing a vital public service teaching viewers about finding the clitic.
That's soooo 70's.
These days we're all about the G.
@@pd4165 The G... 🤔 - the Grammar? 😃
Maybe the real clitic is the friends we made all along
Wild
@@Aceptron I, too, have found many clitics.
I absolutly love that when you watch a tom scott video you dont know if it was from 10 days ago or 10 years ago, keep up the good work king!
After my six-year old spontaneously started saying "I amn't," instead of "I'm not," I wondered why English never adopted this perfectly reasonable alternative. I found that we had, and the modern-day descendant is "I ain't."
"How are you?"
"I amn't doing bad."
why do i imagine this being real
ok im doing it now irl
You hear it occasionally in some Scottish dialects.
I'mn't?
Even shorter but neglecting the intended negation
@@heliofaros1344 I'n't
Team amn't represent :D
One time I typed *y’all’d’ve* to a group of friends from the midwest in a group text (I’m from the South) and they thought I was insane. “You all would have”, like “if y’all’d’ve gotten here on time, then…”. In my head it made perfect sense but to them it was so alien.
Because you added an unnecessary "have". "If you all would have have"?
I understand that perfectly when spoken out loud but through text it just doesnt make sense
@@nobodyburgen4594 edited the extra “have” out, didn’t mean to do that
As a midwesterner, I would have definitely understood it, spoken or written, but the main "problem" I would have with the written form is that writing more than one contraction in the same word feels wrong.
@@-aexc-I noticed that when Tom's contractions were perfectly comprehensible but I legitimately thought the title was meaningless when I read it
"Mustn't've" is one that I use regularly in speech but the second it's written down it looks bonkers
Mustn’t’ve is easy to follow, that’s why it’s more acceptable, though is a bit unusual in casual English
Kabonka.
@@0x1E4 I write out shouldn't've, wouldn't've and couldn't've every now and then, look at it and then consider whether or not I should actually do that for a moment.
I use them too, my brain just never realized that it was contracting the 'have'
It just kind of contracts itself
I love people who explain why things are, and not just that they are
I love that the examples Tom and the other writers for this video decided to use for the concept of prefixes were "protodog" and "antidog"
There was definitely a "yep, let's roll with it!"
I wondered why I never had the concept of "clitics" explained to me in school but then I realized by the time my classmates had developed the comprehension for them, none of them would have taken the phrase "clitic" seriously.
We looked it at at Uni in both my Bachelor's and my Masters in Linguistics and in both cases it still got the response it would have inspired at high school. "I can't find the clitic," became an injoke among us for a while. Until we realised that every group of Ling students that has ever covered this also made the exact same jokes.
I've always heard them called contractions.
@@1pcfredThen you missed the point of the video. “Can’t” is a contraction of “can not”. In “can’t”, the can is the root and the ‘t is the clitic.
@@1pcfred contractions are the whole word, clitics are the parts added to make them contractions. Isn't is a contraction, and the 't is the clitic in the contraction.
@@arcanics1971even the most cunning linguist can struggle allegedly
I’m really going to miss these linguistics videos, Tom. Thanks for the existing treasure trove you’ve already made!
Videos'll keep on coming, just not regularly. He didn't say he'll stop making videos altogether, just that there won't be a weekly schedule to follow.
There are lots of channels that do similar stuff on a regular basis, like K Klein and LingoLizard.
@@PlatinumAltaria agwa schwa!
RIP
@@ssj3gohan456don't you schwa us!
4:17 Petition for more people to use “there’dn’t’ve”
Signed.
There'dn't've been enough chances to use it if it was popular
You could just say therdna
@philiplathrop9250 That's just "There would not". Doesn't get the past tense across
As an English teacher, I found this most edifying. Thanks Tom.
stop.
start.
stop.
start.
stop.
I'll never forget my college professor claiming "y'all'll all fail" to a hypothetical question about plagiarism.
You all will all?
yes
@@dragonluvver975technically, yes. In practice "y'all" is used as the second person plural pronoun, which English doesn't normally have. Yes, it's a contraction, but the meaning has become slightly different.
pronounced "Yarlalarl"
@@Syrange13 Sidenote: English used to have a second person plural pronoun (ye), but they dropped it. Southern USA has reintroduced it with y'all, and I love it so much that I use it even though I'm not even remotely from the USA.
I’m so glad you highlighted “couldn’t’ve” since it’s been one of my favorite double contractions for years. In grade school I remember writing it and wondering why there weren’t many other double contractions that sound correct when spoken but this has answered that question once and for all!
Once'nf'rall
Huh, my teachers always counted double contractions as incorrect
edit: guys i'm not saying he's wrong, i'm just saying it's interesting that his teachers counted it and not mine
@@ThomasTheThermonuclearBomb I do think they aren’t a part of formal or academic writing. But they’re a good way to represent the way a large portion of English speakers *actually* talk colloquially.
@@ThomasTheThermonuclearBombIt's wrong to spell it "shouldn't of" which is what you see far too often. I very much like using shouldn't've and similar.
@@ThomasTheThermonuclearBomb A lot of people, teachers especially, are really anal about clinging to by the book grammar rules and stubbornly refuse to accept that language changes over time. So here's one thing you're smarter than them about.
I'm going to be honest, "there’dn’t’ve" didn't sound necessarily wrong as compared to the other examples given. I feel as if I've heard it before in an American southern dialect.
It’s the same as “shouldn’t’ve”. I regularly say it and a lot of other people i know do
Southerner here. I definitely use "there'dn't've" and I know many others who do, too. There's also "y'all'd've" (usually pronounced, "yalldah") or the negative, "y'all'dn't've" (usually pronounced, "yalldnah"). Examples: If y'all'd been outside last night, y'all'd've seen that eclipse. Y'all wouldn't've missed it if y'all'dn't've been so lazy. Then there'dn't've been anything to complain about.
@@silverwriter6739 ah, yes. the good old triple and quadruple contractions.
I'm from california, and I've said there'dn't've in spoken language before, and i know for a fact that I've written it within the last year because there'dn't've is in my phone's dictionary.
i can type it without changing pages for apostrophe by just typing the letters out without apostrophes and then tapping the top-middle option.
@@silverwriter6739I think there might be some misunderstanding here. I think the point tom is trying to make is that in order to use clitics, you need to have something following
for example, in your example you said "if yall'd been outside last night, yall'd've seen that eclipse" which is perfectly grammatical. But, (please forgive me if I'm wrong) I believe if you were to say "did you see the eclipse last night? if yall'd been outside, yall'd've." this would be ungrammatical and sound odd
now as to whether or not it actually is ungrammatical I'm not really sure, but I think that's the issue tom is trying to tackle in the video, not necessarily whether or not it's impossible to use terms like those in any circumstance
I've been really obsessed with mentally replacing "shouldn't" with "shannot" after someone quoted original Shakespeare lines at me a couple months back. It's amazing how quickly languages change, even seeing the new slang words of the year makes me feel like I can barely keep up anymore.
Ooh, that is really cool! I am not a native speaker myself, and my writing style is quite odd from seldom speaking English and mostly reading old books in the language, so maybe I'll start using "shannot" now
books from the 1800’s used «I shan’t» which I assume to be shortened from «shannot». Wonder how we got back to «shouldn’t», a longer and more difficult word
@@CestLimee "Shan't" and "shannot" most likely come from "shall not".
I thought a shannot was a kind of unian.
@@CestLimee "shouldn't" is the past tense of "shan't" which is more "nuanced" just like may/might or can/could
As a non-native english writer, this video makes my blood boil.
_...for all the right reasons! Keep it up Tom!_
If i'd the misfortune of having to learn English as a second language, all of my blood would've boiled away, long ago.
@@blindleader42 Genuine question, why? Many languages (zh, ja, ko, and probably most Indo-European languages) are much more difficult than English, in one aspect or another. As a non-native English speaker I'm glad that the global lingua franca today is not French or German.
@@jacquelineliu2641 I would say that English (especially in the written form) is an inconsistency queen. I am saying that as a person who studied other Indo-European languages and my native language is not Indo-European.
What made English the lingua franca is that English-speakers were not grammar nazis throughout the history. Even to this day, if you spend years learning French and make a single mistake, most of native French speakers will not be nice about it. I remember getting some hostility from two french "hippies" because I used the word "ridicule" instead of "bizarre" in French. They did not stop to think that maybe I meant "bizarre," instead they chose look at me very seriously and kind of got angry. I mean, if hippies are like that, I cannot imagine what a teacher would do.
@@echorises actually what made english the current lingua franca is mostly colonialism
the list of countries england hasn't tried to invade and/or subjugate at some point is very very small
@@jacquelineliu2641 I totally understand you on French. It's such a trouble to have to learn a language for the written and one for the spoken variant!
But German? Only German can has the Sesame Street Song going
Der, die, das.
Wer, wie, was?
Wieso, weshalb, warum?
Wer nicht fragt bleibt dumm!
🙂🙃🙂😊😉😇
I was such a stickler about proper English when I was younger. Then I learned how much language changes, not only over time but also even short distances. Now I believe if your audience can understand you, you are doing it right.
I'm glad to hear someone express this view. I feel similarly. I retain my interest in mostly trying to 'communicate properly', but I'm also aware of just how dynamic and restless language is, especially as we see new terms enter the lexicon during our own lifetimes as new concepts emerge. Anyone being a stickler for pronunciation or spelling need only look to written works from the 18th century or prior to see just how much the language of English has differed over time.
I go a step further and speculate that the inefficiency of human language as a means of communication makes true 1:1 understanding essentially impossible.
virgin language purist vs chad descriptive linguist
@@CookiesRiot I think that’s not just because of the inefficiency of language; it’s also that different people’s prior knowledge and experiences vary so wildly that 100% 1:1 understanding would be impossible anyway, regardless of the communication method.
@@MartijnCoppoolse It's fun to speculate, in sci-fi especially, a society that can transmit information to each other without distortion of meaning.
Hive mind societies are especially popular thought experiments. One that I find particularly compelling is the Geth from Mass Effect, who are explicitly in constant communication such that each individual unit is compared to a set of eyes looking at the universe from a different angle.
Essentially, they all receive and understand information identically. Despite that, though, individual units have extra software installed which causes them to process the information into a different conclusion, and so a huge schism happened. They are fully aware of the thoughts and processes that the opposite faction experienced, but computationally are obligated to choose differently. They have identical understanding of the opponent's view and simultaneously agree to be different.
There are two fun contrasts of speech versus a more efficient system in NieR: Automata and The Three-Body Problem.
In NieR, there are robotic units which pause a huge conversation with human language to switch to a more efficient protocol, at which point the rest of the conversation is blurted out in a computer language.
In the Cixin Liu book trilogy, on the other hand, there is a civilization which can physically see the interior thoughts of other individuals, so they immediately have a 1:1 snapshot of a thought that exists the exact way that they think. Deception is not a concept they really comprehend.
0:50 I thought that didn’t exist
propaganda, don't listen to him
Okay. I’ll admit that was funny.
Yes lad
As a non-native speaker who has been teaching English for 10+ years, I find your videos really insightous on how I can teach how these things happen. Thanks Tom.
insightful*
Practice makes perfect! Don't forget that even us native speakers make mistakes sometimes! (;
😂😂 insightous
beautiful word
@@pandakicker1 we does?
@eric-qr7of yes my fried weed does
I find it kinda funny that hearing "there'dn't've" actually worked completely fine for me, but reading it is a nightmare.
I'm almost certain "there'd'n't've", "there'c'n't've", "there'sh'n't've" and "there'w'n't've" are used within certain regional English dialects.
@@elysiumsexsmith Yes! I use all of those all the time! I even sometimes write them!
@@elysiumsexsmith i say "there shouldn't've", "there couldn't've" etc. instead of contracting the should/could/would, and it's perfectly fine to use "there'dn't've" in my dialect. i tend to say the "could/should/would" very quickly though.
Yes, came here to write exactly that!
I find it kind of sad.
there'dn't've sounded completely natural when you said it out loud
Same.
Multi contractions work fine in some dialects. Like "ain't gonna" 'I am not going to'. "a'st" 'have you had?' "Bin't" 'have you not been?' And my personal favourite"May's'n't" meaning 'may I not as well'
I'm sat here wondering if that's just a Northern English thing
I don't believe it would have stood out in the northern Lincolnshire dialect of my childhood.
I just can't get myself to use it. I always do shouldn't have.
0:13 I had to go back a few times and it still didn’t sound weird. Come down to the US south, we do make concractions like that.
Doesn't sound right to me
@@Genericmug Ok?
@@Wolfie-Dovei live in the rocky mountain region of the US and I have a bunch of friends from the more southern part of the states. Every now and again I'll say something like "y'all've a great day."
@@quagsire2007 Yep, and it only gets more and more condensed.
I thought this video was 10 years old then I looked at when it was posted. You haven’t changed at all! And that really isn’t a bad thing, you’re awesome!
my thoughts exactly!!
Maybe this is a Cryo-frozen instance of Tom Scott, periodically revived to give Tom 1.0 a break.
@@DanielVerberne that's true
Tom Scott has masters in linguistics
years ago I had fun chatting with a coworker who'd just moved to seattle from alabama about this sort of stuff. I told him that "y'all'd've" is something he's absolutely learned to say and understand and it kinda blew his mind because he'd never considered that before
I say this a lot! I didn't even grow up in the South, either!
I'm from Kentucky and I've never heard this. Of course this is the north of the south, perhaps it didn't make it this far but I am curious how you use that in a sentence.
Funny thing, I'm entirely west coast, living in the greater Seattle area, and y'all'd've is perfectly natural to me
@@Nefvilley'all'd've understood how to use the word properly if yous was really southern.
@@randomhuman3883 Thank you. Can't disagree either, this state is in an undefinable geographic location. Its not southern, not mid west, not east coast nor southeast. Call it mid east? Anyways thanks!
As a Swede... We salute you on making a harder language(written) than us..... But then we have our neighbours.. the Finns... You will always have a special place on the podium ...
Don’t forget Hungarian
If we talk about the hardest written language, Mandarin has got to win
Everyone's pitching all these "bad written languages," but completely ignoring the abomination that is written Tibetan. Ah, yes, I'd like a language whose spelling hasn't been updated since the Vikings were out raiding England.
@AndersBergh
It took me an embarrassingly long time to realize "Glass" meant "Ice Cream."
...There's only so many common noises a human will make, and there'll always be some overlap.
What's more interesting is that this usually isn't written! It's more often spoken
As Jon Bon Jovi once said, "'Tis my life; 'tis now orn't ever. I'mn't going t'live forever."
Fun fact:
Despite everything Tom does, including the computer science stuff
His degree is in linguistics and i love that he occasionally shows us interesting things about it!
Do you mean despite? Cause if so, you might wanna change that from what you have now.
@@Arcessitor
fk
fixed
Only i could misspell despite to despise
Shouldn't've done that 😂
I recommend the podcast he mentioned at the end- it's called Lingthusiasm. It's similar to this episode. I even have one of their t-shirts.
In a way computer science is just another form of linguistics
As a kid, I reduced ‘What happens if’ to ‘Whoppens if’ or ‘Whappens if’ interchangeably. My parents thought it was hilarious. I’d like to coin the term; W’happens 😁
W'happens'f
Go ahead, ses w'happens!
@@monkeybusiness673 w'happens'f I're t'say "there'dn'tve"
@@softlysnowing3959 I love how stupid the English language is.
@@softlysnowing3959at this point why don’t we write everything in IPA?
Food for thought: ending a sentence with “can’t,” “don’t,” “shouldn’t” or “won’t” is acceptable.
I agree, you shouldn't.
Isn't that because they're contractions, not clitics?
@@luipaardprintBut it's (it is), is also a contraction
@@liadeindadani6913 according to how I understood the explanation isn't that a clitic? Is leaves a 's, while op's example are n't,
It's confusing anyway.
@@liadeindadani6913 Not all contractions are clitics, but all clitics are contractions
A couple years ago finding the language files woke up an intense love for language, etymology, etc, so it makes me so happy that Tom is giving us more episodes, even if only a few. Thank you Tom for always making such amazing videos, never stop learning
Does the existance of a michigander imply the existance of a michigoose?
I love how in modern internet lingo, simply adding the suffix "-n't" has become a universal negation.
This is why the company “Thriven’t” is headed to ruin
yesn't
It needs to becomen't.
Negation't
I love how different your videos can be from each other. We'll miss you after the new year. Enjoy having time to yourself to do the things you've missed out on. We'll look forward to having you back.
It needn't've ended this way.
What's really mindblowing is how this is all entirely intuitive and not actually taught. My parents and teachers never taught me any of this, but I know it without even having to think about it, because humans are so good at recognizing patterns.
Such a good point. It's bizarre, really!
According to the anecdotal stories of a couple of other commenters, it isn't entirely intuitive though, given that there are kids running around saying "I amn't" instead of "I'm not". I'm thinking it is partially learned behavior from listening to how adults and peers are using the language.
Kind of like the rule of what order adjectives go in. It's so complex I've given up trying to memorize it, but I've never heard anyone break it.
@@therubberducktube i mean, the implication of the op was that it's intuitive in the sense that it's intuitively _learned,_ rather than explicitly taught. hence the mention of pattern recognition, which wouldn't be relevant if the contractions were instinctive instead of intuited
hell, amn't over ain't would count as intuitive, too, it's just a phenomenon that i imagine pops up in regions were a kid ain't likely to be exposed to ain't and thus would have to contract "am not" on their own
@@therubberducktube I more commonly hear people say "i'm'n't for that.
Tom has taught me more than all of my english teachers
Thank you! I have never been able to properly explain to my Croatian girlfriend why the phrase "Yes, I'm" is not a grammatically correct response to a question. This is the perfect explanation.
It mightn't be grammatically correct to say "yes I'm" or "yes it's" (or simply answering a question with "it's" or "i'm") but its part of US southern English to say things like that.
@@matthewjbauer1990I'm not a linguist nor a native English speaker but I even find it hard to believe that saying I'm as a response is wrong. Because in principal it isn't. I think people simply confuse grammar with customs and habits. And language changes all the time. Like Tom said, English used to say 'tis instead of it's. In Dutch we still do that. "It is" in Dutch would be "het is". Saying het's in Dutch would be the perfect analog for it's but it feels wrong to native speakers. 'tis the way it is. ;)
@@matthewjbauer1990 For sure. In this case I meant just in writing specifically
you just explained something so clearly and concisely in 3 examples that my linguistics textbook couldn't convey to me in 3 whole pages thank youuuu
I'm a word nerd and I approve this message. A while ago I spent a bit of time talking to a young man in the UK. He kept typing "should of" and "could of" rather than should've or could've. The he argued with me when I mentioned the word was have and not of. Ah, well. Thanks, Tom!
Oh dear, I knew somebody like that. Good bloke otherwise.
The problem with English being allergic to ending words in v: the word is 'ov', contracts to 'v' same as 'have' does, but it's written 'of'... forcing the word that's Actualy said as 'of' to be written as 'off' insted... blech.
Probably still traumatised from his English teachers telling him the same thing 🤭
tbf, that _is_ how we say those contractions. This feels like the kind of 'mistake' that could easily become a variant form -- or even standard practice -- if repeated enough. 🙂
that's a good example of people learning words by sound and figuring out how to write them, instead of learning words by sight.
That thumbnail is brilliant, it bent my brain trying to sort it out!
I find your language files playlist very enjoyable, additions to it always make me happy.😀
As a native English speaker with a degree in English, I’m not even sure I can speak in English after listening to this video.
I'm a linguistics student, and I like to joke that, as a linguist, the language I'm worst at speaking is my own (English).
I like saying "English is my only language, and it shows" when I stumble on words.
These videos are a bit like, "You're suddenly aware of the feeling of your tongue in your mouth."
Now I'm hyper-critical of my speech patterns.
Eallswa Ængliscan sprecan, ic gefele swa same þe.
whyn't
Honestly, the execution of there'dn't've in the intro made it feel so natural that I didn't really think it sounded strange!
Somebody might make that actual contraction without thinking about it (but not write it) and people would understand it just fine
There’d’n’t’ve feels like a thing a rushed person would say, so it feels more natural to say there’d’n’t’ve then to write there’d’n’t’ve.
@@smeezekitty debatable. Not least because it's almost impossible to say naturally without tripping over it and turning it into a jumbled mess.
@@laurencefraserit's a common word in the southern US.
i'm gonna start to use "there'dn't've" just to make people go crazy. Thanks for another banger Tom.
I'mma start to use it too.
Yes'nt = no is the best one to drive people crazy 🤣
A contraption made of contractions 😊
You bettern't.
Please gon't.
okay but "there'dn't've" worked perfectly at least in my ears
I love the way Tom has just picked up and continued an old form of video after sooo many years!
Thanks for explaining this, Tom. Now most guys can find the clitic.
I have been so shocked at how little clitic jokes I've seen?
@@zyaicob You and I both. I think I've seen 1 other that was after mine.
@@zyaicobare you saying they're hard to find?
It takes a cunning linguist to understand proper use of the clitic.
@@stevejakab274 but the rewards can be worth it
Your language productions have always been among my favorite RUclips videos. I'm going to miss them when they're gone.
My favorite example is: don’t you dare, becoming do not you dare
He did it, this man found the only reason to remember how to diagram a sentence.
This felt like the RUclips of years gone by. Thanks for the nostalgia trip Tom!
As someone living in the Southern US, several southern dialects around me (both Appalachian and Piedmont) have "there'd'nt've" and "y'all'd'nt've" as valid contractions, though not common.
It's common in speech, but it's never written down.
When I lived in Texas I heard y'all'd'nt've all the time. Like, "y'all'd'nt've done that." I don't know if it's the same where you're from, but it sounded like "yallininuh done that"
Those contractions aren't even that unusual in the pacific northwest, to say. You'd never seen them written that way though
@@dougthayer5829No, I think what you heard was a pronunciation of “you oughtn’ve done that”, which is a contraction of “you ought not to have done that”. Some southern US speakers might not even know the full phrase, they’re just repeating the sound “yalltnuv” that they picked up from others doing the same.
my favorite "southernism" remains, "Wh' y'all'd've seen't if'n y'all'd've been'ere!"
It feels like I’m going out of my way to write an apostrophe.
I'm going to miss these videos the most. The language breakdowns over note card slide frames. I'm so glad we're getting a few more of these
Is he retiring?
@@spudsbuchlawhe intends to greatly reduce his output.
The most common lesson I've encountered when trying to learn a second language is that I haven't actually learned English.
It's so much pain learning this
@@ThatGuy-c Ya, sure, ya betcha. Uff dah, some dat talking folks be doing, dontcha know?
I think a good example of how language changes in regards to this is that "it'sn't" isn't a thing, but tisn't is an archaic version of exactly that
T'was always thus.
Oh it's a thing, we just pronounce it "t'ain't" now. Which is criminally underrepresented in the New England-focused comedy world, let me tell you.
'tis! 'tisn't!
In some Northern English dialects like mine, you can have '' t'int ''
'snot can also be used
I think the message of this video is that, just like everything else in life, you have to learn to handle cliticism - so long as it's constructive cliticism.
I critiqued a story, written by a European, which included a conversation ("Is it?" "Yes, it's.") that was clearly not idiomatic, even though it didn't break any of the usual "rules." I scratched my head and finally came up with "Don't end a sentence (or clause) with a (pro)noun-verb contraction." Thanks to you, I now know the official word for that!
You think you can't end a sentence with a contraction but I don't.
@@genghisdingus "Let's make that a rule!" "Yes, let's!"
@@genghisdingus *"You think you can't end a sentence with a contraction but I don't."*
Your effort at humor fails. His direction was not against ending a sentence with a contraction --- it was against ending a sentence with a _(pro)noun-verb_ contraction.
@@bricaaron3978Maybe "pronoun-verb" was edited in?
@@hypehuman You make a point. I didn't notice the fact that the original post was edited.
If the OP _did_ edit it specifically in response to the following posts, that would indicate dishonesty. As it stands, I will hold off for a bit. I may need to offer an apology to *@genghisdingus* at some point, though.
Tom= Why don't those contractions work?
Also Tom= That took me about 17 takes to get right
As an US southerner... don't underestimate what we'll blend together 😂
As words or in a stew.
@@krashd Both
@@mr.stargazer9835 As my grandpa used to say, "It all goes to the same place anyways."
y'all'dn't've'ta say that
Cousins
0:44 the term for it is WHAT
It’s “clitic.”
Love to see Language Files making a comeback.
Stuff like this is why I can see how non-native English speakers have so much trouble getting used to the language. I don’t even know how we all learned this, we just… figured it out on our own somehow
To be fair that seems to be a common issue with languages, at least any language I've come across. I'd say English is even a bit more intuitive than some others
@@leogiri2863 Perhaps the main issue with English is that it's relatively inconsistent sometimes. Pronunciation is a prime example, with vowels being all over the place. Compare that to (standard) Japanese, for example. Grammatical rules tend to have lots of exceptions too. Though it's mainly a consequence of English being affected by or being a combination of several languages over time (e.g., it's a Germanic language heavily influenced by French and the Nords)
@@hayden.A0Pronunciation isn't the problem it's the orthography
As someone who studied English at school for ca. six years before letting it improve by reading books and watching films and later using RUclips: School doesn't focus on the best things about English.
As a Dutch Dude who learned English in school and from video games at like 10-14, English is really intuitive and easy, "they're their and there" and "then/than" are the only slight confusing things. But even that comes quite easy with a bit of practice, "They're doing their things there"
Imagine if we had videos like this from a century ago, hearing people talk about language. Them saying phrases or words we find completely normal now, in the same way that people in the future might think the strange parts of this video are unremarkable. Language is fascinating.
Agreed! I imagine studying historical language will be a completely different beast in the future now that we're recording ourselves so freely.
There are sources like that, just not videos or movies, but books.
I've read something of that kind in my native Russian, writers in the 1920s complaining about newfangled things that have now become the norm.
readily sirrah, I doth find myself musing much the same of late ,in so much as our native tongue has so oft been besmirched with newly coined verbiage of late that I do find my wits quite awry at the grasping of such.
But this video.. one of the main thing is you can t really cut of much from the word you're emphasing..
So you never see, i think so i'm.
If the clic bit has the main attention.. you just need to spell it out again..
Anybody else been typing sentences with "there'dnt've" and realising that it actually reads quite naturally after watching this? 😂
I've occasionally used "I'm gonna bed" as a substitute for the usual "goodnight" and enjoyed pointing out to very little acknowledgement that by all accounts it should be correct because "gonna" means "going to," therefore the phrase translates literally to "I'm going to bed." I mostly did this because using "bed" as a verb amuses me greatly. I now feel validated.
Weirdly, I feel it works just fine if you pronounce it differently.
"I'm gonna do that" would be gənnə, but "I'm gonna bed" would be gōnnə.
Now that is an interesting one. I'd never had reason to notice before that "gonna" requires a verb to follow, even though "going to" allows either a verb or noun.
You'd want to be careful with who you say that around though, as "bed" is actually a valid verb that means "to have sex with someone".
It used to be a lot more common before the word "sex" became part of common speech.
Back in the day, it was very possible to bed someone
@@killerbee.13 It has something to do with it being a prepositional verb AND a phrasal verb. If "going to" is treated like a phrasal verb, a synonym to "about to", then the implication would become the following subject is X or do X, a verb. Otherwise, if "going to" is treated like a prepositional verb, the present participle of "go to", then X would be a location.
"Gonna" will always be about the phrasal verb, but indeed it's funny when it replaces the prepositional verb.
@@mattm7220 it's possible to bed a person, but it's impossible to just bed, so I think they're fine.
As a large language model I found this very informative.
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nice one
who'd'ya think y'are?
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@dontgotomypage4072your dad's trip to get the milk isn't
Clitic is another good word for all us cunning linguists out there
Spit-take all over my phone. Thank you. 😅
Ok good one
indeed
We are unsure if anyone has ever found a clitic.
Show me your it's.
to be fair there’dn’t’ve was suprisingly understandable
Thanks, Tom and team! I love these linguistics videos. I don't know anyone else who provides such clear, concise explanations.
In the American midwest and south, you’d sound perfectly coherent saying those contractions at 0:11
Floridian here, thought the joke was just the spelling, didn't even notice he was saying it "oddly"
Linguistics Tom is back! You and Xidnaf fueled my interest when I was younger! We want more Linguistic videos!
My broken humor ass giggled when i read the title
Yay! More language lessons from Tom
The one I always think of is: Y'all'dn't've, as in "You all would not have"
just add "had us" to the end :D "Ya'll'nt've'ad's"
Love these language videos, how English has evolved is so fascinating! Great job as always Tom!
I love how every once in a while, he does this type of video
As a non-native english speaker this is very informative and Tom is such a good teacher, love it! 😍
3:17 I contest there's other ways around this. "I'm GOING to do it" has more emphasis rather than I'M going to do it" so I mean it is possible, you just have to switch where the emphasis goes.
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frick why am I like this i didn't eman this why am i seeing this 2 months later I am so skrry
YESSSS i am SO delighted to see more linguistic and etymological videos from Tom again!!! feels like the old days 😀
Missed opportunity to say “But for now, it’s what it’s”.
Tom would be the best stand in teacher ever. He can teach anything.
Nice'n't'st've
owie@@erikeriks
It’s what it’s
@@LambertBricksit's't'it's
Brain ain’t braining
@@unsolveddiamond6042 Brain't'ng
Thank you for the incredible title
i'm a western american english (pacific coast) speaker as a primary language. i wouldn't say "there'dn't've", but i would say "there wouldna" (something like /ðɛr wʊdnnə/), as in, "there wouldna been a problem, if i hadn't said something"
The Language Files series got me interested in linguistics and I'm having so much fun in my Intro to Linguistics class right now, so thank you for that! :DD
Love to see this series be continued it’s my favorite
It's coming to an end soon
Same
It's!
2:45 I'm reminded of that clip of the bowler yelling "WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE, I AM!"
Wow, I am so impressed. As a retired ESL teacher, that presentation was superb. And such great articulation!
Me, a non-native english speaker: "Finally, after years of studying, no one will stop me from speaking and understanding english"
Tom Scott: "Hold my beer".
Noone isn't a word by the way. It's no one, 2 words.
who's noone? why is noone trying to stop you from speaking english? 🤣
@@ReclusiveHTID Tom is doing great, no need to help him!
Studying*
No one*
Tsk tsk 🤣
why are people being arseholic pedants to some random guy for a negligible mistake
Clitics are so important, and so much fun to explore!
It’s a shame that so many men can’t find them.
I had to scroll way too far for this
Don't assume any genders, now!
@@Visstnok Don't get offended at forms of speech
love your language related videos!