Of Mice and Plurals

So slightly off topic:

A couple of weeks ago in the comments of my questions post Sarah asked why, in English, we use 'mice' as the plural of 'mouse', but 'houses' as the plural. Today I finally got around to asking my lecturer about it, like I said I would.

Firstly, the reason we say mouse in the first place. It's a remnant of an ancient plural form where '-iz' would be added to the end of words, and then a process called vowel harmony would make the vowel in the word sound like the i. So mouse (or its precursor, probably something close to the German 'maus') would become mouse-iz, which gets harmonised to mice-iz.

Now, languages hate redundancy, so when you can already tell the plural form from singular, with or without the -iz, the -iz will slowly get dropped from the word, leaving us with mouse/mice.

As for why this doesn't work for house? Well, as my lecturer said, the clue is in the Scottish pronunciation, of HOOOOOOOOS. See, back in about the 1400s, the English spelling system pretty much matched the way we said it, but over the course of a hundred and fifty odd years all the vowels moved around to... well, basically wherever they liked. So mouse, coming from something like 'maus', has always been that 'au' sound, and thus had developed the harmony from the -iz ending. Whereas house, having shifted from the totally different sounding 'hoos', never developed that, even though after the vowel shift it did develop the same sound as mouse.

Interestingly, the German word for house ('haus') has also been vowel shifted from this earlier 'hoooooooos' form, although early enough in the languages history that it now matches the rest of the 'au' type words.

And now you know.

Frequently asked questions

I'll be honest, I was not surprised to see any of these. I get them a lot. Not that that's a bad thing, they're all legit questions, and it's about time I sat down and wrote out well reasoned answers to all of them.

What do you study, precisely? What do you like most about what you learn?
What I'm studying, precisely, is a Bachelor of Arts with a double major in Communication Studies and Linguistics - that's two seperate fields. Neither field is especially big at my uni - Comms is smaller and less established here than at some of the other universities here, and linguistics is just obscure full stop.
Communication studies is kind of a mixed bag. It's media theory wrapped up in a handful of practical units - I think last time I checked there was film production, journalism, and game design. Linguistics is basically the study of language, but from a more scientific viewpoint than something like literature. The first one actually led to the second - one of the required units for first year Comms was a Linguistics unit, and since I enjoyed it I picked it as a second major.
What I like about this arrangement is that it covers both sides of the mostly imaginary logic-creativity spectrum. Comms lets me create stuff, and Linguistics lets me pick it apart. And I find both of those processes very satisfying, y'know, inside my brain.

So if anyone feels like asking questions about media, or grammar, or etymology, or why Americans can't tell the difference between cot and caught, fire away in the comments.

What do you hope to get a job in?
Honestly, I'm not sure. I do know that of the options I considered (the others being classics/ancient history and astronomy) this one probably has the highest prospects of getting a job. That said, there is a fairly persistent idea that 'arts students get jobs flipping burgers', even in the faculty, which is a bit scary.
What I would like to do is write science fiction stories, but failing that, journalism, or working in the film/TV industry would be pretty cool.

What is the story behind your name? We need to know! (I know it’s nothing to do with your degree, but I don’t care :P)
That is a secret, guarded by a sect of monks high in the Himalayas. In order to earn it, you must pass the six ancient rites, unite the amulet of destiny, and win the heart of a fair maiden. Only then will you be deemed worthy to enter the Temple of the Name, and do battle with the High Master on a single pillar of glass suspended over the vent of an active volcano. He will whisper in your ear the the secret only on his deathbed, and from that day forth you and you alone may bear the burden of The Name as the new High Master, until someone slays you and tosses you into the lava in your turn.

Still want to know?

You’re a squirrel, a boxer or a lab creature with a golden speedo? (No, there are no other possible answers)
Squirrel. Or lab creature. Possibly both. Not the boxer, never actually seen the movie. I know, I know, it's like being called Oliver and hating olives. I actually know someone called Oliver. He hates olives. Go figure.

Also, I made a thing. Enjoy.

EDIT TO ADD: Sorry to hijack what I'm sure will be an otherwise totally on-topic thread, but do any of you have Steam (the gaming platform)? If so we should totally look at doing a NICoA multiplayer game of something sometime. Just a thought.