I’ve always been amused by the English language.  Since it has been influenced by so many other languages, it’s acquired quite a lot of odditites and quirks, and can at times be very complicated.  But that also means you can have some fun with it.

For example, the other day I learned about some fun you can have with the word “Buffalo.”  You’re probably familiar with two meanings of that word.  Buffalo is a city in upstate New York, and therefore can be used as an adjective to indicate things from that city.  Buffalo is also another name for the nomadic American Bison.  However, you probably don’t know, as I didn’t, that buffalo is also a verb, meaning to bully, confuse or intimidate.  This in itself isn’t anything special, there are plenty of homophones in the English language.  What makes “buffalo” interesting is that it can be used as an adjective, a noun, or a verb.  This is where the fun comes in.  Suppose you want to tell someone about the social behavior of Bison from upstate New York.  You could say:

“Bison from New York, who are bullied by bison from New York, also bully other bison from New York.”

But it is equally accurate to say:

“Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo.”

My brain did a double-take when I heard that one.  But it works, that is actually a grammatically correct sentence, and I find that very amusing.  I was also amused that Wikipedia has an article dedicated to that sentence, but then they have an article for everything.  The sentence is an example of lexical ambiguity, since it is unclear which definition of “buffalo” is intended.  Using all three definitions just makes it that much worse!

Wikipedia also gives a list of “linguistic example sentences,” many of which are pretty funny.  Some of my favorites are:

“We saw her duck.”

“Police help dog bite victim.”

“Throw your father down the stairs his hat.”

And the extremely complicated “James while John had had had had had had had had had had had a better effect on the teacher.“

Yeah, I love English.