{"id":12075,"date":"2019-01-22T20:15:06","date_gmt":"2019-01-23T01:15:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/?p=12075"},"modified":"2019-01-22T20:15:06","modified_gmt":"2019-01-23T01:15:06","slug":"the-sufferings-of-s","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/?p=12075","title":{"rendered":"The sufferings of &#8216;S&#8217;"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/proxy.duckduckgo.com\/iu\/?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.newdesignfile.com%2Fpostpic%2F2012%2F05%2Fletter-s-font-styles_44732.png&amp;f=1\" alt=\"\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>In this strange life<\/strong> I\u2019ve stumbled into, I spend a lot of time living inside a foreign language. I think I\u2019m beginning to develop a slight empathy for what foreigners encounter when they try to learn our very bizarre English tongue.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">What struck me the other day was the way we use (or torture)\nthe letter S.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At the end of a word, \u201cs\u201d can mean one of three different\nthings in English:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>It can mean a simple plural: \u201cdog\u201d becomes \u201cdogs.\u201d<\/li><li>If we precede it with an apostrophe, it means a possessive: \u201cEdward\u2019s\u201d (except in the case of \u201cits,\u201d an unfortunate and confusing side effect of the very problem I\u2019m complaining about).<\/li><li>Finally, when used with a verb, it means present tense: \u201cThis is the product Acme makes.\u201d<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This is all the result of bad table manners on the part of\nthe English people \u2013 bolting down a Germanic language and Old French without\nchewing them properly (Old Norse for dessert).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Norwegian is much more rational (a final &#8220;s&#8221; means possessive. That&#8217;s all). I\u2019ll bet Chinese is too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">And pretty much any other language you could name.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">But I love English. It\u2019s kind of like one of those exclusive neighborhoods with the winding, poorly marked streets:<em> \u201cWelcome to Pretentious Heights, Minnesota. If you can\u2019t find your way around, it&#8217;s probably because you don\u2019t belong here in the first place.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In this strange life I\u2019ve stumbled into, I spend a lot of time living inside a foreign language. I think I\u2019m beginning to develop a slight empathy for what foreigners encounter when they try to learn our very bizarre English tongue. What struck me the other day was the way we use (or torture) the &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/?p=12075\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">The sufferings of &#8216;S&#8217;<\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[1],"tags":[883,1605,2048,2450],"class_list":["post-12075","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-english","tag-languages","tag-norwegian","tag-s"],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12075","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12075"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12075\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12075"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12075"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brandywinebooks.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12075"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}