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Originally Posted by Amber
Well, maybe there should be, seriously, English-speaking countries should think about it, otherwise it will happen to English what happened to Latin and in a century or two from now, English may have diverged into a dozen different languages and people will no longer be able to understand each other.
Like i said in a previous post, the first purpose of a language is communication, and when a language splits into mutually unintelligible dialects, that's not good.
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Latin died out because it was spread out across three continents without any mode of modern communication and transportation to keep up.
The English language has the luxury of existing in the time of telephone, internet and easy travelling so it is virtually impossible for it to have the same fate of Latin. The only hindrance I see to it lasting is the accent, but it has already been a bit over a hundred years and we're doing alright, thank you.
And perhaps it's my Canadian mentality but I would rather much prefer a democratization of the language by the people who use it. Not some Orwellian rule of language. As long as we understand each other, I don't see what the problem is.
I think what this boils down to really is taste. You can justify it anyway you like but there are several other dialects in the States alone, why you point out Ebonics is beyond me. It is a dialect, bringing up the concern of grammar is a moot point because avoiding proper grammar is part of what a dialect is all about.
Why you point out something
that isn't even part of the American standard, that is spoken by and only by a small minority of people, is beyond me.