Morris Minor Owners Club

May I make a rant on a subject which I find annoying?

Our Morris Minors are lovely english cars and this is an English Website covering them. Where would we all bewithout it? We all make mistakes sometimes in writing/typing - me more than others and especially so as my Default Settings are for German.

But why do so many People here use US american spelling? Asking for "advise" rather than "advice" ? Finalize? Color? plus other phrases and words I do not like to think about. People also have a habit of doing things "different" instead of "differently".

I think I do know the answer though.

Firstly, most People are using Windows which Defaults to US English unless you follow a tricky path to Change the Default Settings.
Secondly, your TV programmes are heavily influenced by US imports such that many People in UK use and write the slang they hear. At least here they are dubbed, as are nearly all imports.

It is a sort of neo- colonisation or should I write neo-colonization?

Ok Rant over -

Sadly 'americanisms' are creeping into 'British English'
It's worth remembering,however that all languages change and evolve over time. Reading a Victorian era newspaper or book can be quite instructive and challenging. Even more so if one goes back to Shakespeare or Chaucer!

PS I was once on business in the US and was introduced to an American as 'a colleague from England '
'Gee' he said 'and what language do you speak over there?'

Indeed languages do evolve and we have "neu Deutsch" which includes a lot of foreign, mostly English words.
The evolvment does not necessarily have to come from one source. Indeed modern engl is a derivative from Nieder Deutsch still spoken in the North as a Dialekt but of course, heavily influenced from after 1066 from elsewhere.

We had an American, nice chap ( ) staying with us a few years ago and at 3 a-m the phone rang, a caller for him. We woke him up thinking the worst. After a while he came back and explained that there was no emergency. when told the time his caller said " you have a different time Zone over there?

The spoken English is slowly being lost at the BBC too, the Queen might not be amused by it

Bill Bryson's book on the English language is interesting. I think it's called 'Mother Tongue '
The American term 'Fall ' is becoming quite common instead of the usual 'Autumn '. Bryson points out that it was,in fact, the generally used word at the time of the early emigrants. So a strange situation where a word became archaic and obsolete in its original land,survived elsewhere and is now returning home.

It's an interesting point, and can wind me up, but several of the examples you've given are actually more likely to be a case of badly written (or spoken) 'British' English, rather than Americanisation. Some of it could also be down to regional differences in English. I do agree about spellcheckers though, and also 'globalisation' in general - people travel around so much these days that regional differences begin to be watered down. As SteveClem says, though, this 'evolution' of language is inevitable, and has always happened. For example, some of the way the Americans say or spell things are actually truer to the English of a couple of hundred years ago than the way we in Britain now say or spell them, as it is us who have changed them - a couple of examples that spring to mind are 'aluminum' vs. 'aluminium', and the 'ize' suffix compared to the 'ise' that we now use. In both of these cases, the Americans have stuck with the old English spelling, and we have changed.

I have a bit of an issue with badly written English (more so than American vs. British), but i am probably in the minority these days. Some people are lazy or ignorant, but many actually really struggle with spelling and grammar, through dyslexia for example,so it's best not to be too judgmental. Unless I'm at work of course, where I work as a medical writer!!!

I know of one retired English teacher who says that most cases of dyslexia are really down to bad spelling

A dyslexic man walks up to the bra........................

I hope I'm not going to offend whoever posted it, but just below this section is a reference to a "Stollen Car". Thought that might make our German friends feel a trifle festive, don't want to mince my words ...etc etc

Mark

Edit - just actually read the item and see I was beaten to it by others

Mark Wilson wrote:I hope I'm not going to offend whoever posted it, but just below this section is a reference to a "Stollen Car". Thought that might make our German friends feel a trifle festive, don't want to mince my words ...etc etc

Mark

Edit - just actually read the item and see I was beaten to it by others

That has been making me smile for the past week!

I think that misuse of 'advice/advise' and 'braking/breaking system' etc., could in many cases be due to the curse that is predictive text. I do get somewhat irritated when I overhear schoolkids here in the West Midlands complaining about having to pay 'five bucks' for KFC and the likes... Americanism or what...??

This is a really interesting thread. I suspect that younger people are less precious about spelling, maybe because they are used to 'text speak'
Must say though, when I was in business and recruiting young staff I wasn't impressed by CV's with dodgy spelling because I wanted our business letters to go out accurately. I'm not quite so anal about it now.

Ok, you got me started on this one. Mispronunciation!

Even on the BBC they say...
WORRY rhyming with LORRY. WRONG! Worry rhymes with hurry.
Two times instead of twice

As for spelling, we now have spellchecker, there's no excuse for spectacular fails unless they are deliferate...

TDV102 wrote:Ok, you got me started on this one. Mispronunciation!

Even on the BBC they say...
WORRY rhyming with LORRY. WRONG! Worry rhymes with hurry.
Two times instead of twice

As for spelling, we now have spellchecker, there's no excuse for spectacular fails unless they are deliferate...

Very good!! Had to read it twice...

Something to keep in mind is that the forum has a large contingent of Americans. (Hello! ) I use American orthography because it's second nature, since I am in fact American.

Stollen is good , but only the original Dresdner Stollen.

Personally I like the Standard english spoken in the south-east and also the Yorks/lancashire tones ( I cannot tell the difference) and the welsh sing-song. The pseudo Cockney is awful and hurts my ears and the scottish dialect I do not understand at all. Also how the royal Family speak is to me very inflated speech. I also find it interesting that accents in England are almost a social Thing and remnant of the class System from the past.
In Germany all School children have to learn and are taught hoch deutsch ( high German) but usually speak their own dialect to each other. This is necessary as People from other areas would not understand them if they could not converse in the high German. The German speaking Areas have more dialects that the whole of the englisch speaking world combined. When Swiss or some Austrian films are shown on german TV, they put Subtitles on. In Britain, if People used anything other than their own dialect/Accent they would be viewed with suspician.

The spelling check facility is a great tool - but as mentioned before, but please set your Default to British not US english.

TDV102 wrote:Ok, you got me started on this one. Mispronunciation!

Even on the BBC they say...
WORRY rhyming with LORRY. WRONG! Worry rhymes with hurry.
Two times instead of twice

The one that annoys me (ITV news often the culprit) is Nuclear, mispronounced 'Nuculer'

Suspician?