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Thu 26 Aug, 2004 08:24 pm
LOVE might be an international language but, when it comes to David Blunkett's approach to UK citizenship, only English will do.
The Home Secretary's American lover, Kimberley Fournier, may be able to impress her paramour with her repartee, wit and pillow talk, but Yorkshireman Dave has noticed key differences.
So, the Telegraph says, Blunkett has decreed that under new Home Office regulations Australians, New Zealanders, Canadians and any Americans seeking British citizenship must pass a language test even if English is their mother tongue.
Unsurprisingly, this has not gone too well with the thousands of future bar workers, au pairs and actress/singers/presenters in the land Down Under.
"The poms no longer take for granted that we antipodean colonials speak anything they recognise as English," says The Age, Melbourne's daily read (as translated by Anorak).
"Who are they to stand in judgement on us?"
But this is a matter not without some substance, and the paper hears from Margaret Maclagan, a lecturer in communication disorders at Canterbury University, New Zealand.
She says that her fellow Kiwis are often speaking a different language to the British mother tongue.
"Young New Zealanders fail to distinguish between cheer and chair, beer and bear, ear and air," says she.
The advice is for any wannabe Brits to drop the colloquialisms and learn to speak English the way Blunkett intended it to be spoken.
So for any non-English speaking English speakers tuning in, repeat after us: "Do you think the papers will ever find out about our affair?"
The peepers will never find out about our a fear!
Blunkett's Yorkshire twang is hardly the Queens' English, is it Col Man? He's not half a cheeky sod.
Hmm, what is proper English? The inflected English spoken a few hundred years back has never been, to my knowledge, repealed as England's official language. Does this mean that we should be thouing?
Let's hope not, Drom! Gadzooks...
When i worked at the University of Illinois, i was sitting in a cafe once, and a gentleman came up and asked to sit at "my" table. I assured him i would enjoy the company. We began to chat, and he explained that he was there to attend the aviation institute. He was very frustrated, though, because he was being made to wait for an ESL "testing cycle." He was infuriated that, as he put it, "some yob who doesn't speak the Queen's English" could stop him from enrolling until he had taken a test to prove he reads and writes English, which, as he pointed out, would not prove that he was competent to speak English. I refrained from pointing out to him that his black skin was very likely a determinant factor in his treatment.
Set - In your opinion, would a Briton in the US using British English be 'corrected' by Americans for differences in spelling and grammar, or are Americans generally less possessive of your version of the language than we are?
I would say that Americans would simply consider the joker's speech to be quaint, but would be unlikely to comment or correct. Correcting the speech of someone one knows is usually seen as bad form, and rather snobbish; it would usually be considered completely unacceptable to correct the speech of a stranger. In addition, there is a whole passle of Americans who slavishly suck up to royalty, who would gush all over someone with such an accent in a disgusting manner. I believe you're from Yorkshire, no? If so, and you came here speaking your thickest Yorkie accent, the likely response would be: "Huh? Speak English, will ya?"
But really, i dunno nowt 'bout that.
Kudos for usage of 'dunno' and 'nowt'!
I suppose that if I had a duchess and some little viscounts and viscountesses and moved to the colonies, then my kids would be taught American-English in school & college and be corrected for using colour, cheque, grey, pavement, fortnight, boot (cf trunk), rubbish bin, tap, tights, bollocks etc. The same would happen here if the situation was reversed.
My accent is more Northern than a Yorkshire accent, but there are many similarities. Would I have loads of luck with women if I moved to America, do you reckon? I do know that the Aussies and Kiwis just laugh at our accents.
You might score, Boss, if your accent sounded "posh" . . .
Damn. Looks like I've got to do some more work on my Hugh Grant impersonation then.
I was in Paris recently, and a waiter at Planet Hollywood told me that I have a american accent
I hope he did not spit in my food
he had probably peed in it instead gautam
by eck
itll be a sad day when we cant say
eh up
eee by gum
and
ta ta
anymore...
av spilt more ale doon mi westc't than thees supt tha neet
down to grey vs gray or color vs colour. And heaven help us---the pronunciation of 'aluminum.' The very first time I heard it in "Brit-speak," I went, say WHAT again?
Though, actually the differences are slight, but even within the UK, much less the US and Aussies and New Zs--the dialects and accents can make it hard.
Heheheh Col. What is that last sentence meant to mean? Is it true that there are people who say 'tha' instead of 'you' up in Yorkshire, like in A Kestrel for A Knave?
We write 'aluminium,' Waves; our own special inflection of alúmina...
Lady Chatterly's Lover was an eye opener for the gardeners strong accent...and come to think of it for other reaons as well...
dròm_et_rêve wrote:
We write 'aluminium,' Waves; our own special inflection of alúmina...
So I noticed Drom. However, the true King's English when spoken is such a pleasure to the ear. Just know that I mangle it in my own Delmarvous way. LOL.
:wink:
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