Yes, British errors . . .
Just watch it, li'l doggie - right?
I have a rolled up newspaper specially for you!
Yip . . . . yipyipyip . . . . yipyipyipyipyipyip . . .
Guess i told her . . . .
Sorry - you weren't speaking English...pardon?
Setanta wrote:Yes, British errors . . .
Q: What is the name of the language we are using?
A: English
Q: Which country forms the largest part of Britain?
A: England
Q: Who, therefore, is using the correct language?
A: We are!
Q: Who, therefore, is using the incorrect language?
A: You are!
uhoh......spread out folks!
Walter - I've retired into my bunker, awaiting heavy flak from across the waters...
Don't worry about it Mr. G, we are content to tolerate your conceits about our language . . .
(warning shot over the bow....!)
Setanta wrote:Don't worry about it Mr. G, we are content to tolerate your conceits about our language . . .
I didn't realise I was conversing with a fellow countryman! It just seemed from your posts that you were trying to claim
our language on behalf of those damn Yanks!
(snigger)
(Refusal to lower flag and surrender...)
Where would your average Aussie stand on this matter dlowan?
I've noticed (from extensive research of Australian soap operas) that there seem to be fewer differences between Australian/UK English as there are between US/UK English. Or is it just the way Neighbours is written?
As regards the knuckle trick to learn the months of the year, Piffka shows a typically American refusal to accept a world consciousness, and the idea that perhaps the same ideas can be conceived in different places, at different times.
Tis okay...we Canajuns, and the family forgive you anyway, just because you are so nice.
Where i come from, callin' someone a Yankee will git ye a knuckle-sandwhich . . .
Canajuns is cute, but have a very confused view of the world . . .
Ahhh, I just love digressions. This thread could have been started by the bunny with the cig. No, I take that back. Ms. Dlowan wouldn't have started a thread like this, probably, but it seems the thread has been co-opted by those of us (oh,yes,yours truly included) who delight in digressions.
So, I'll play the spoil-sport and try to get us back on track here (or bavk on travl, as the case may be).
With well-earned due respect to Graham and co., I'm not at all sure about the English-speaking world being merely a 'mental construct', whatever that phrase may mean in this connection. The fact that the language was spread initially through conquest, colonization and subjugation of native peoples is irrelevant. Language does not exist in a vacuum, nor is it possible to spread it unilaterally without also spreading some of the mind-sets, concepts and philosophies embodied in that language. A person whose 'milk language' (to use a Japanese phrase) is other than English, in learning English learns far more than the language. That person will have to read Shakespeare and John Stuart Mill, may come across the words of the US Constution and Declaration of Independence, the sublimely beautiful English translation of the Bible into Elizabethan (okay, okay -- Jacobean) English.
I feel I'm rambling here, but the thought is clear in the back of my alleged mind. I have noted that naturalized citizens of the United States (myself included) tend to change their thinking on a number of political subjects once they have learned the English language. Along with that language come concepts of human dignity, freedom of choice and a whole host of other subversive notions. There is no word for 'boredom' in the language of the Mohawks. There is no word for 'frustration' in my native Latvian. I imagine a couple of hundred other examples could be cited here if I only knew what they were.
Rock on, Setanta. Great thread.
Thanks, Boss . . . now, if we can get them there other 'Merican speakers to unnerstand how this all works . . .
cavfancier wrote:As regards the knuckle trick to learn the months of the year, Piffka shows a typically American refusal to accept a world consciousness, and the idea that perhaps the same ideas can be conceived in different places, at different times.
Tis okay...we Canajuns, and the family forgive you anyway, just because you are so nice.
What is family lore anyway? In my family it was said the world was all in black and white until I was born.
(Funny how knuckles can come up in two contexts.)
Andrew - Good point. I concede defeat.
Setanta - I give up. Even though it is MY language, there are 5 times as many of you lot and (in the true American way) as long as you have the majority then you are right and we are all wrong. As for 'Yanks', then as far as most people over here are concerned you are all Yanks. If not Yanks then what?
'Mericans . . . i do appreciate your acknowledgement that might makes right . . . i was afraid for a moment there that we might be obliged to do a little therapeutic regime change . . .
:wink: 
