#4 Why Does English Have Weird Spelling?
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Expression of Today: Turophobia - is the fear of what?

Muhammed asked on Facebook “Why are there some letters that we don’t pronounce?” For example: Know, Listen, Often, Neighbour

**29% of English is French (France was the main language after the 1066 invasion for 600 years)Examples of French words: **Beef, Pork, Pastry, Salad, Portrait, Capitalism, Camoflague

26% of English is from Germanic languages (including Old English, Old Norse and Dutch)

• Old Norse words are often concrete nouns, things we can feel. They often have hard consonants, such as "dirt, gun, club"
• Words with silent Ks usually come from Old Norse and the K used to be pronounced. Over time, the pronunciation changed but the spelling remained the same.
• In Old English, the E used to be pronounced. "Bite" used to have two syllables.

**6% of English comes from Greek  - it’s a very old language and supposedly the first to use an alphabet with vowels (AEIOU) and consonants (BCDFG). **

• Philosophy (pronounced like "FILO..")
• Phobia (something you’re scared of)

**English also likes to borrow words from other languages. **Tsunami, karate (Japanese) Caravan (Persian-->French-->English)

**Know - **Comes from old English. The K has stopped being pronounced.

**Listen - **Also form Germanic languages. The T is quite hard to say so probably why it stopped

**Often - **Middle English - Can be pronounced both ways

**Neighbour - **Old English -  from *nēah *‘nigh, near’ + gebūr ‘inhabitant, peasant, farmer’

Game of Thrones Expressions

"**Lady of Winterfell, [it] has a nice ring to it"**If something "has a nice ring" that means it sounds good or is pleasing to the ear."Sir John? That has a nice ring to it"

"**It had its moments"**This means that an event was not completely boring or terrible. Some parts were fun or interesting."The party last night had its moments"

"**I’m sure you weren’t thrilled to hear the Lannister armies are marching North."To be thrilled **means to be happy about something."I'm sure you weren't thrilled to see it's raining today."

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