Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

Skip to comments.

Americans are angry with us for polluting their language
The Telegraph ^ | February 7, 2011 | Kath Hinton

Posted on 02/07/2011 5:08:46 AM PST by NCjim

After mangling our language for years, Americans are complaining about the invasion of traditional British lingo, says Kath Hinton.

New Yorkers always fall for a nice English accent: whenever my well-spoken sister-in-law visits, they trill at her flowing diction and faultless vowels. Coming from Liverpool, I have a trickier time. In fact, I stopped ordering butter after three waiters in one smart restaurant failed to grasp my pronunciation. "Bootta! Bootta!" I pleaded, while my American friends wept with joy at my embarrassment.

Now, however, it is the words we Anglo-Saxons use, not how we say them, that is causing a stir. After mangling our language for years, Americans are complaining about their own dialect being polluted by "Britishisms".

New Yorker Ben Yagoda, a professor at Delaware University, is studying the invasion of traditional British lingo. He has set up a website to keep track of the wicked, uniquely British words such as "kerfuffle" or "amidst" that are creeping into everyday American usage.

Yagoda's biggest objection, he tells me, is to words for which there are "perfectly good American equivalents, like 'bits' for 'parts' and 'on holiday' instead of 'on vacation' ". They are, he says, "purely pretentious".

Of course, British English has been under assault from this side of the Atlantic for centuries. America's most notorious linguistic anarchist, Noah Webster, decided more than 200 years ago that the English couldn't spell, decreeing that theatre should become theater; favour, favor; jewellery, jewelry; and so on.

(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...


TOPICS: Culture/Society; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: british; english; expats; grammar; tiddler; tittingoffagain
Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-20 ... 41-6061-8081-100 ... 121-139 next last
To: MaryFromMichigan
I don't see your average Conservative using such silly affectations.

Talk about someone sounding pretentious, have you ever heard the more than average Conservative Rush Limbaugh pronounce 'schedule'?

61 posted on 02/07/2011 6:09:45 AM PST by varon (Allegiance to the Constitution, always. Allegiance to a party, never!)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 20 | View Replies]

To: NCjim
Americans who use Britishisms tend to want people to think they are sophisticated. Reporters,Actors,Liberals,Democrat politicians.
62 posted on 02/07/2011 6:11:15 AM PST by normy (Don't take it personally, just take it seriously.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: NCjim

My favo[u]rite:

Room Service:
“Morny. Ruin sorbees”

Guest:
“Sorry, I thought I dialed room-service”

Room Service:
“Rye..Ruin sorbees..morny! Djewish to odor sunteen??”

Guest:
“Uh..yes..I’d like some bacon and eggs”

Room Service:
“Ow July den?”

Guest:
“What??”

Room Service:
“Ow July den?...pry,boy, pooch?”

Guest:
“Oh, the eggs! How do I like them? Sorry, scrambled please.”

Room Service:
“Ow July dee bayhcem...crease?”

Guest:
“Crisp will be fine.”

Room Service:
“Hokay. An San toes?”

Guest:
“What???”

Room Service:
“San toes. July San toes?”

Guest:
“Uhh... I don’t think so”

Room Service:
“No? Judo one toes??”

Guest:
“I feel really bad about this, but I don’t know what ‘judo one toes’ means.”

Room Service:
“Toes! toes!...why djew Don Juan toes? Ow bow singlish mopping we bother?”

Guest:
“Oh, English muffin!! I’ve got it! You were saying ‘Toast.’ Fine.” Yes, an English muffin will be fine.”

Room Service:
“We bother?”

Guest:
“No. Just put the bother on the side.”

Room Service:
“Wad?”

Guest:
“I mean butter...just put it on the side.”

Room Service:
“Copy?”

Guest:
“Sorry???”

Room Service:
“Copy...tea...mill?”

Guest:
“Yes. Coffee please, and that’s all.”

Room Service:
“One Minnie. Ass ruin torino fee, strangle ache, crease baychem, tossy singlish mopping we bother honey sigh, and copy....rye??”

Guest:
“Whatever you say.”

Room Service:
“Tendjewberrymud.”

Guest:
“You’re welcome.”


63 posted on 02/07/2011 6:12:15 AM PST by MrB (Tagline suspended for important announcement on my about page. Click my handle.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Captain PJ

seperation = separation? ;)


64 posted on 02/07/2011 6:12:19 AM PST by bt_dooftlook (Democrats - the party of Amnesty, Abortion, and Adolescence)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 14 | View Replies]

To: Vor Lady
I think this has been around longer than you think.

It's fairly new to me but of course when one's senile, everything is.

65 posted on 02/07/2011 6:13:26 AM PST by Graybeard58 (Of course Obama loves his country. The thing is, Sarah loves mine.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 52 | View Replies]

To: Vor Lady

The biggest English-speaking country in the world is India.

It is possible that in the future Americans and Brits will all be speaking “dialects” of proper English, which is the Indian version.


66 posted on 02/07/2011 6:14:16 AM PST by CondorFlight (I)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 46 | View Replies]

To: Captain PJ

No kidding. I’ll take “gobsmacked” and “kerfuffle” any day of the week over “we be chillin” and “shiz.”


67 posted on 02/07/2011 6:14:35 AM PST by BuckeyeTexan (There are those that break and bend. I'm the other kind.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 14 | View Replies]

To: jiggyboy
I lived in Reading, Pa. for awhile, believe me, I got my fill of PA Dutchisms. But I do loves me some shoo fly pie.
68 posted on 02/07/2011 6:16:18 AM PST by Graybeard58 (Of course Obama loves his country. The thing is, Sarah loves mine.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 58 | View Replies]

To: varon
have you ever heard the more than average Conservative Rush Limbaugh pronounce 'schedule'?

I believe Rush uses it as an over much continuing "funny", after all, he went to shool too.

69 posted on 02/07/2011 6:18:48 AM PST by Graybeard58 (Of course Obama loves his country. The thing is, Sarah loves mine.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 61 | View Replies]

To: NCjim

I think it’s cute when Brits try to speak American...


70 posted on 02/07/2011 6:19:06 AM PST by Tailback
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Daveinyork
Unless you are in Pennsylvania, I presume you are in York and are probably a redheaded descendent of the Vikings who colonized the place and ultimately passed beyond the ken of history, no doubt from indigestion.

Only someone with the palate of a goat could find those dishes comestible


71 posted on 02/07/2011 6:20:37 AM PST by nathanbedford ("Attack, repeat, attack!" Bull Halsey)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 57 | View Replies]

To: Graybeard58
I believe Rush uses it as an over much continuing "funny", after all, he went to shool too.

I think you mean, "scruel".
72 posted on 02/07/2011 6:23:24 AM PST by Carpe Cerevisi
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 69 | View Replies]

To: NCjim
I seen the accident, is not Brit. The infusion of the misuse of verbs comes from Americans. And the worst part of it is, some Americans do not know what the verb fault is in the first sentence.
73 posted on 02/07/2011 6:25:09 AM PST by righttackle44 (I may not be much, but I raised a U.S. Marine.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: Tailback

My battery’s gone flat.

What? Did you run over it?

No, it’s gone flat - my car won’t start!

Oh! Your battery’s dead!

No... it never was alive.


74 posted on 02/07/2011 6:25:12 AM PST by MrB (Tagline suspended for important announcement on my about page. Click my handle.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 70 | View Replies]

To: nathanbedford

Actually I’m a Jew of Latvian/Hungarian descent.


75 posted on 02/07/2011 6:25:21 AM PST by Daveinyork
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 71 | View Replies]

To: NCjim

I personally don’t know any Americans who are angry about this.


76 posted on 02/07/2011 6:25:32 AM PST by Buckeye McFrog
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: MrB

That’s one of my favorites. :)


77 posted on 02/07/2011 6:26:29 AM PST by RoseyT
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 63 | View Replies]

To: NCjim

Only concerned with you people polluting our politics with your Islamophilia, Hoplophobia and general socialist one world globalism.


78 posted on 02/07/2011 6:26:46 AM PST by ZULU (No nation which ever attempted to tolerate Islam, escaped total Islamization.)
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 1 | View Replies]

To: reagan_fanatic; NCjim

oik


79 posted on 02/07/2011 6:26:58 AM PST by 1066AD
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 3 | View Replies]

To: rightwingintelligentsia

I use bum over butt—it was passed down from my English mom. She’s been out of England so long though, she isn’t familiar with most of the British slang words they use now.


80 posted on 02/07/2011 6:27:25 AM PST by beaversmom
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 56 | View Replies]


Navigation: use the links below to view more comments.
first previous 1-20 ... 41-6061-8081-100 ... 121-139 next last

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson