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Americanisms


twobears

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Whilst we are on the subject of language usage, does the use of multiple Americanisms set anyone else's teeth on edge or is that an intolerance peculiar to me? I know that language changes over time and I don't have a problem with that. Who would have thought we'd have the verbs 'to Google' or 'to Skype' a few years back and yet now they are almost universally understood.

 

I have to confess to being less keen on those words whose meaning changes in such a way that it becomes confusing since you no longer know whether people are using the word in the old or new sense e.g. 'disinterested'. Does the speaker mean 'unbiased' or 'uninterested'? To my way of thinking, if you mean 'uninterested' then say 'uninterested'.

 

When we adopt Americanisms willy nilly (now there's a lovely old English term :lol: ) I think we do English a disservice because, to me at least, English and American English should retain their differences as well as their commonalities. If we all end up speaking American English it will be a shame as we will have lost something valuable.

 

Words and phrases I dislike, but which seem to have been adopted by many native English speakers over the last few years include - "Working a job" (we have jobs or we work surely? - anything else is tautology), "gotten" (which I can only assume sounds more impressive than 'got' to some people?), 'passed' instead of 'passed away' and I've even heard 'pi**ed' as in "he was really pi**ed with me" which takes away one of the most common English expressions for drunkenness and may lead us all to adopting Michael McIntyre's term "gazebo-ed" instead :wacko:

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I work for an American company so am very used to the differences in language so much so if I'm targeting an American audience with an email I use their spelling etc.

 

I have also been known to use the word vacation outside of work :blush:

 

Interestingly I work with an American who has a love of linguistics and he shared an article with me a while back which made a case for American English being closer to the English in use over here when the mayflower sailed. If I can find it I will share.

 

Language evolves, it's a two way street as my American colleagues all use british colloquialism's. Mainly "cheers" when ending a call :lol:

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"Language evolves, it's a two way street as my American colleagues all use british colloquialism's. Mainly "cheers" when ending a call :lol:"

 

I don't doubt that language evolves and that is not a bad thing but simply adopting the words and phrases of America seems a bit dull to me. Why not coin our own neologisms? Much more interesting and I'd volunteer for the post of "Neologiser in Chief" if it were advertised :lol:

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We have fun with it too, one of the guys is a proper Texan who has the cowboy attitude and way of speaking. I was getting him to pronounce aluminium the British way on a conference call and he couldn't.

Actually none of them could apart from a Canadian. They often poke fun out of our gratuitous use of "u" in words such a colour etc.

 

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I work with Americans, Aussies, Kiwi's and Singaporeans all who have English as their first Language plus all the main European countries - we all use each others phrases sometime with amusing outcomes. My particular favourite is to describe a very rainy day - Il pleur comme la vache qui pisse. Another gem was my Aussie depot manager complaining he had no internet and shouting 'The Routers rooted' which of course as pronounced as the rooters rooted.

 

I can't see a problem with it. English is an international language and the primary language in both the Maritime and Aviation industry. I do not expect people from overseas to have a perfect command of the Queen's English. Most Brits do not have that in a perfect grammatical sense. I guess it comes down to how globally aware and travelled a person is and by that not a 2 week holiday in Thailand actually living and working within a community at the local level

 

I do however growl when Microsoft ask me if I Want a US English setting !

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Mudman, I too work with HK and Singaporeans and I agree we make light of certain situations and it can be a great ice breaker.

 

With regard to US English setting are concerned I often set test server consoles to British keyboards on the admin account :lol:

 

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Mr Twobears works for a global company so I too have experience of many different nationalities speaking English, even if it is not their first language. Most of Mr Twobears' Lync calls sound absolutely wonderful with a huge mix of accents and ways of speaking. I love all this and am quite a keen linguist with, obviously, an interest in languages including, but not confined to my own native tongue. I am not advocating a standardised form of English, quite the opposite. I just feel concerned that we may lose the rich variety of our language if we adopt standard Americanisms instead. Does that make sense? :dry:

 

Re the cow who laughed (modified that one for a family audience :lol: I love the Spanish phrase 'ponerse como una sopa'.

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Ha ha, I am an oldie KyleR, I will grant you that :lol: I have no problem at all with English adopting words from other languages and I'd be an odd sort of linguist if I did. Some 'foreign' words are necessary and very welcome because they encapsulate ideas so succinctly, far better than long-winded English phrases and others, "schadenfreude" being an oft quoted example, express sentiments for which we, in England, have no single word.

 

All I am saying is that the wholesale takeover of American English words and phrases seems reductive. I don't want to lose all our English words because variety is essential to keep our language vibrant. We have a lot more words than most other languages (all other languages? not sure on that one) don't we? We should invent new words and phrases of our own rather than just relying on what we hear in the movies (did you see what I did there) :lol:

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I am not saying that I (or we) are right) but I don't want to lose the richness and variety of words that we have enjoyed for so long. I suspect that I am the only one though, having read all the responses on this thread. I've always been out of step with the majority though so I'll just carry on in my own sweet way :lol:

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Oh my gaad!

Here's a few more that are used on this forum:-

Heads Up

My Bad

You do the math

Zee instead of Z

Rotors instead of Disc brakes

Besides americanisms creeping into the language, our high streets are swamped with american fast food and coffee outlets

I just want an ordinary cup of coffee, instead of a cappuccino or some feckin americano :rant:

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Oh my gaad!

Here's a few more that are used on this forum:-

Heads Up

My Bad

You do the math

Zee instead of Z

Rotors instead of Disc brakes

Besides americanisms creeping into the language, our high streets are swamped with american fast food and coffee outlets

I just want an ordinary cup of coffee, instead of a cappuccino or some feckin americano :rant:

 

I agree with the first part of your post and that is what I've been trying to say i.e. that if we have a perfectly good word or phrase for something in our own language then we should either continue to use it or, if it no longer pleases us or is inaccurate, let's invent a new word of our own.

 

Regarding the American fast food and coffee outlets though - I love them! I don't think americanos or cappucinos are American though. Just Wiki'd it (another new word but one that is perfectly good :teeth: ) and it says that americano might have come from American Spanish and I know that cappuccino is definitely Italian. I wouldn't be without 'foreign' food and drink I have to say. We have nice food in the UK but other countries also have some brilliant dishes and drinks :thumbs:

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I know what you're saying but I'm sure Samuel Johnson could have argued the same when he first started documenting the language. Why have new words when we have existing ones such as perambulate..... ;)

 

It's evolution, lots of acceptable words in today's British English have their roots in the old empire and would have been foreign to the fast majority of the British public....

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Bring back 'perambulate' I say :teeth: Brilliant word and one which I have used myself on a regular basis ... or have I? :lol: I think I mourn the loss of subtlety because that will disappear in some instances if we lose too many words that have precise meanings. I think there are words we need to shed and new ones that we can benefit from adding but not by adopting wholesale, as I said, American English expressions.

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I should probably admit to being a big fan of Stephen Fry (whose views I think are somewhat similar to mine?) and Will Self. I revel in the use of language, am not averse to sprinkling my conversation with abstruse words or those which definitely belong to another language (most often French or Latin but will sometimes use Italian, Spanish or German) and am against the dumbing down of language in any way.

 

I think I have spectacularly failed to put my point across but I know what I mean. Must learn to speak better English in order to be understood perhaps? :lol:

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I get what you mean, I think Stephen Fry is a master of the language and can out step many with the use. He's a very clever man.

 

By the way, I too love the word perambulate hence my use, for some reason it always makes me smile very much the same was as Robbie Coltranes potrayal or Samuel Johnson in blackadder - which is also the reason I used the example :lol:

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Heads Up

My Bad

Zee instead of Z

Rotors instead of Disc brakes

Besides americanisms creeping into the language, our high streets are swamped with american fast food and coffee outlets

I just want an ordinary cup of coffee, instead of a cappuccino or some feckin americano :rant:

 

I have also been known to use the word vacation outside of work :blush:

 

Thing is, these are actually quite useful terms and sometimes more accurate than the "other" version - a vacation can just be time off of work, where a holiday suggests youve actually been somewhere for your annual break, for instance.

 

Ive been saying "heads up" when playing football since I was a kid, my bad although not grammatically correct is a lot easier than saying "Im awfully sorry, I believe the mistake in that instance was mine", Zee is how the entire rest of the world says the letter "Z" and rotors are the rotating part of the brake TBF ........

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To me a vacation definitely means going on holiday B) That's the thing I don't like about these types of linguistic changes because they obfuscate matters. I prefer to use language like a scalpel, using it to say exactly what I mean rather than being ambiguous. I think that is why a lot of email exchanges, texts and forum posts end in confusion, because the words used can be read in different ways.

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That always make me laugh when talking about the American Language . .

 

 

I speak to "mericans all day and have loads of fun with the language. "Let me just check my diary" to which they all assume I'm opening a small book with Hello Kitty on the front and a padlock :lol:

 

Jiggery Pokery is my word of the week . . . and I try to insert it in to as many different conversations in meetings as I can. 5 so far this week.

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Great video. Horrible dress though :thumbdown: I've seen him live a couple of times and he was dressed as a man and I felt cheated!

 

I'm a big Hello Kitty fan. My bad? :lol::lol::lol:

 

I used to love inserting random words into work conversations when I worked in an office. One team member thought they'd got the better of me when they nominated me to say 'supernova' in the next meeting but they hadn't factored in that the office was situated on top of a car park and it was the 1980s :p

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