The goal of this blog is to spread knowledge about Roots English, what it is, why it is, and how it can be made to happen. I seek to write something new a few times a week, whether it is a small bit of writing or my thoughts on some bit of speech.

What is Roots English?

Roots English is a kind of English—or a way of looking at our tongue—which sees much of the borrowing from French, Latin and Greek (called FLaG) since 1200 to be misled. It works to take out as many of those words that we can, while still writing in a way which is meaningful and can be understood. The goal is to lessen how many such words are in English, but accepts that sometimes words are so well inbedded that they need be kept.

Why was this borrowing misled?

English underwent a time when it was a second–class tongue in a society where speaking French was privileged by those at the top. The uneven relationship meant that many French words came into English through their prestige, rather than through honest use or need. Even when English began to be spoken by the upper layers of society, its former low position made it vulnerable to further borrowings from ‘classical’ languages such as Latin and Greek. There was little or no trust that English was—or could be—of equal worth and capability.

Where will new words come from?

Roots English seeks to right the situation by making as much use of English’s inbuilt potential as we can. New compounds, new derivations, maybe a few old words here and there, can cover a fair deal of the words that we wish to take out.

I’m wary, why should I want this?

It’s really about showing that English has a lot of strengths as a language, about showing that we don’t need to lean on Latin or Greek for new words, but can find them within our own speech. Even though much of the borrowing was done a long time ago, it doesn’t mean that we can’t show how we feel about English now. Besides, there are still plenty of folk who would rather say a Latin word to an English one. You likely know somebody today who likes dropping fancy Latin and Greek words into their speech or writing to sound ‘smart’, but does that mean without them English is ‘dumb’?

We want to show that English is as good as any tongue, and put an end to the belief that we ‘need’ French, Latin and Greek. I hope you feel the same way.