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Topic: I think British English is weird! (Read 9098 times) previous topic - next topic
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I think British English is weird!

Reply #25 –
And have we mentioned nautical terms like "boatswain", "rowlocks" etc? (bosun, rollicks).

And just to change tack slightly [span style='font-size:8pt;line-height:100%'](sorry)[/span] have you ever noticed that gaol and prison are synonyms, but gaoler and prisoner are antonyms? [span style='font-size:8pt;line-height:100%'](I think that's "jail" in some parts[/span]).

Cheers,
Alan
Cheers,
Alan

I think British English is weird!

Reply #26 –
I think 'Leicester' is 'lester', so that i.e. Leicester square becomes 'lester square'. And Greenwich is 'grenich'. I don't even dare to try 'Worchestershire' out

How about Cockney rhyming dialect then

Finnish is a phonetically perfect language. Every single letter has a corresponding pronounciation, in every single word, with no exceptions whatsoever. Thus there are no accented letters and the whole concept of 'spelling bee' sounds ridiculous to a finnish person; everyone in Finland can spell every single word they hear.

Too bad that finnish grammar is utterly impossible to learn, and pronounciation is difficult for people from anglosaxian or roman language backgrounds. Some people also say it sounds like a horde of sheeps because of all of the vowels

I just visited the beautiful island of Crete, and it seems that also greek is somewhat phonetical minus the diftongs of course. They have the sharp 'r' too (finnish has it), I love it

I think British English is weird!

Reply #27 –
Quote
I think 'Leicester' is 'lester', so that i.e. Leicester square becomes 'lester square'. And Greenwich is 'grenich'. I don't even dare to try 'Worchestershire' out

It's either "wuss-ter-sheer" or "wuss-ter-sher" (I think it varies).

Edit -- john33, correct... Spokane = "spoke-ann."  Probably heard of it, I'm guessing. 

I think British English is weird!

Reply #28 –
Hmmmm... I see we haven't been entirely thorough with our "ough" words!
Cheers,
Alan

I think British English is weird!

Reply #29 –
I find British English really cool, but maybe that's because John33 has a great accent and he's the only English person I ever seriously talked to

I think British English is weird!

Reply #30 –
Quote
Edit -- john33, correct... Spokane = "spoke-ann."  Probably heard of it, I'm guessing. 

Kind of a cheat, really!!  I worked for a company, here in the UK, back in the late 80s that had it's HQ in Spokane.

I think British English is weird!

Reply #31 –
The focus here is mostly on phonetics, I know, but what about definitions of words that are completely different between Britain and other countries (namely the USA):

American English:  Eraser
British English:  Rubber

American English: Cigarette
British English: a word I won't type here, but used as derogatory slang in the US to mean a homosexual male

American English: Headphones
British English: Cans (OK, who here didn't know that one    )

American English:  Man
British English:  Bloke

American English:  Elevator
British English:  Lift

American English:  Trunk (of a car)
British English:  Boot

Others, anyone?

As if pronunciation variances weren't enough between two countries that seem to share the same language.  Who was it that once said "The United States and England are two countries divided by a common language."

And some here have pointed out the additional difficulties introduced by having a non-English (or non-American) accent.  In my experience, I tend to prefer talking to someone for whom English is not their first language.  I notice that many such people try harder to have correct pronunciation and grammar in English, and therefore do so more often than native English speakers.  I think it's why many people tend to be drawn to people with accents.  In my case, for example, English was not the first language for either of my last two girlfriends (one was Russian, the other Polish/German).


[span style='font-size:7pt;line-height:100%']Edit:  Typos...[/span]

I think British English is weird!

Reply #32 –
Quote
American English:  Trunk (of a car)
British English:  Boot

Others, anyone?

Sticking to car terms, since I use British written Haines repair manuals:

British        /      American
Bonnet        /      Hood
Strangler    /        Choke
Split pin      /        Cotter pin
spanner      /      wrench
wind screen  /      windshield
Driver side    /    Passenger side 

I think British English is weird!

Reply #33 –
Possibly the potentially most dangerous is:

British/American

Pavement/Sidewalk

Road surface/Pavement

I think British English is weird!

Reply #34 –
British/AMerican

mini-roundabout/What the heck are they doing?

I think British English is weird!

Reply #35 –
Quote
British/AMerican

mini-roundabout/What the heck are they doing?

I was going to post

British / American
roundabout / "How do I get off this thing?"
"How do I get off this thing?" / FreeWay

;-)

Cheers,
David.

I think British English is weird!

Reply #36 –
Quote
roundabout / "How do I get off this thing?"

for full size (ie with something other than pavement in the middle):

British/Massechussets/Rest of America

Roundabout / Rotary / Traffic Circle (Though outside of MA they aren't too common.)

I think British English is weird!

Reply #37 –
Quote
British/Massechussets/Rest of America

Roundabout / Rotary / Traffic Circle (Though outside of MA they aren't too common.)

British / Massachusetts / South Georgia / Rest of America

Roundabout / Rotary / Demolition Derby / Traffic Circle

...or, depending on the size of vehicles involved...

Roundabout / Rotary / Monster Truck Challenge / Traffic Circle

I think British English is weird!

Reply #38 –
Quote
As long as we're on the general topic of language... I live in an area of the USA (Pacific Northwest) with a lot of American Indian names for cities, counties, rivers, and other things.  Anyone want to take a stab at these?

* Puyallup
* Spokane
* Snoqualmie
* Sequim
* Rainier
* Issaquah
* Tukwila
* Sammamish
* Enumclaw
* Mukilteo

Edit -- no Googling allowed... 

A little farther up the coast your will run into this tribe: Tlinget.

Howdyasaythat?

I think British English is weird!

Reply #39 –
Quote
Quote
As long as we're on the general topic of language... I live in an area of the USA (Pacific Northwest) with a lot of American Indian names for cities, counties, rivers, and other things.  Anyone want to take a stab at these?

* Puyallup
* Spokane
* Snoqualmie
* Sequim
* Rainier
* Issaquah
* Tukwila
* Sammamish
* Enumclaw
* Mukilteo

Edit -- no Googling allowed... 

A little farther up the coast your will run into this tribe: Tlinget.

Howdyasaythat?

Not completely sure, but it looks rather phonetic --as in "til-ling-get."

I think British English is weird!

Reply #40 –
klin-ket is about as close as you can get in modern US english.

I think British English is weird!

Reply #41 –
Have we mentioned the mixed-up American date format??

For instance today is 16/8/03 in Australia which quite logically works from micro to macro (day/month/year), however in America it's 8/15/03 which apart from being a day behind makes no logical sense whatsoever.
Cheers,
Alan

I think British English is weird!

Reply #42 –
Quote
Finnish is a phonetically perfect language. Every single letter has a corresponding pronounciation, in every single word, with no exceptions whatsoever. Thus there are no accented letters and the whole concept of 'spelling bee' sounds ridiculous to a finnish person; everyone in Finland can spell every single word they hear.




Not quite true.

Finnish language has phonemes (like /äng/) for which there is no corresponding letter (or grapheme).

Pronounciation is not always consistent with writing (e.g. consonant doubling, assimilation, glottal pauses, aspiration, foreing influence writing style, vocal length, vocal harmony, etc), although very consistent compared to English.

Also, in Finnish language one really should use diacritical marks for exact pronounciation markings if one wanted really tight mapping between writing and pronounciation, but they are not used (nor recommended by language authorities as part of the official Finnish language).

All of the above makes learning Finnish pronounciation a little bit more difficult to a foreign language student, although consistency is remarkably high (phoneme-grapheme pairing has near 100% consistency).

Finnish children also spell some words incorrectly the first time they see them (when they haven't heard them), but spelling bees are indeed non-existent.

However, Finns practise lexical morphing and proper writing of words in written language a lot and that is the biggest stumbling block for most people trying to study Finnish as a foreign language. It's also quite consistent system, but a little bit complicated.

What causes most Finns trouble these days are compound words. In Finnish, words are almost always written together without spaces (almost completely opposite to English). However, due to the huge cultural impact of English, most young people do not know how to write compound nouns anymore. They have started to write Finnish as if it were English.

On a related note (pronunciation/dates), I'm really apalled by the non-standards measurement units (like American measurement units, based on imperial units). It would be so much nicer if we all agreed on SI units and corresponding scale prefixes, instead of the ambiguous "million", "billion" and the like.

regards,
halcyon

PS I've noticed that the more I've used English as a spoken language, the more I start to make errors in my writing, especially of phonetic origin, like no = know, etc.

I think British English is weird!

Reply #43 –
Quote
PS I've noticed that the more I've used English as a spoken language, the more I start to make errors in my writing, especially of phonetic origin, like no = know, etc.

Interesting... sounds like something related to the brain beginning to make connections between letters/words and actual sounds, and the resulting (temporary) confusion -- almost like a form of synesthesia.  Phonetic confusion isn't uncommon among native speakers either, of course...

By the way, the word "synesthesia" reminds me of another difference between British and American English... often "ae" is replaced with just "e" in the American dialect, as in "synesthesia" rather than "synaesthesia."

Edit -- more on the topic (just one among dozens of sites):

http://www.fis.edu/eslweb/esl/parents/easy/aebe.htm

I think British English is weird!

Reply #44 –
Quote
Not quite true.

Okay, I stand corrected. It seems that you have a bit more experience and english vocabulary in the area of linguistics than I do

However I didn't actually take dialects and relaxations of spoken finnish into consideration. Of course 99% of the people will use a relaxed form of finnish in speech, a form in which the pronounciation isn't totally consistent anymore, but that doesn't counter the fact that official finnish is really very phonetic.

Lexical morphing also belongs to the gray area of dialects and it's really someone's own fault of they can't use compound words properly. Although the appearance of misspelled compound words in newspapers and other official sources irritates me greatly.

However you can easily be bad at any language. There are finnish persons who hardly now any finnish at all just as there are american persons who very barely know the english language (the famous "I ain't done nuthin!" expression doesn't even qualify as slang, it's just plain horrible).

Quote
Pronounciation is not always consistent with writing (e.g. consonant doubling, assimilation, glottal pauses, aspiration, foreing influence writing style, vocal length, vocal harmony, etc), although very consistent compared to English.


Yes, but these are more commonly associated with dialects instead of the official language. It's possible to read several pages of finnish text out loud without any occurences of these inconsistencies.

Although spoken official finnish will indeed sound somewhat clumsy, snobbish or possibly even silly at certain contexts, it's still perfectly valid finnish.

Quote
Also, in Finnish language one really should use diacritical marks for exact pronounciation markings if one wanted really tight mapping between writing and pronounciation


Okay. That we can agree upon.

I on the other hand wish for the utter disappearance of the expressions 'wanna', 'gonna' and 'ain't' from the english language

BTW, How is the name Mary pronounced in as british way as humanly possible? In the UK alone, I've heard it pronounced M-aery like in aerial and M-ari like in Aristotle. Some day when I'm going to visit Britain, I would like to order a Bloody Mary with proper pronounciation

I think British English is weird!

Reply #45 –
Quote
http://www.fis.edu/eslweb/esl/parents/easy/aebe.htm

The topic is so confusing that the author has a mistake in his lists:

In British English, Vase rhymes with cars and stars, not plays. At least, not the way most people say it. Many people would still understand the vase/plays pronuciation, but very few use it.


Two interesting things come out of this topic.

Firstly, many words make their way across the atlantic enough to be understood (but not used - at first!), but some words do not, even though they're just as common.

Secondly, it seems that all BE/AE confusing words and phrases are avoided in many Hollywood and UK films.

This sometimes means British characters in films use American words - not because English people usually use those words, but because they're understandable to Brits and people from the USA, whereas the real British words may not be. The same thing happens with brand names, phrases, experiences etc.

I guess the opposite happens sometimes too, but I wouldn't notice it.

Cheers,
David.

I think British English is weird!

Reply #46 –
Quote
Quote
http://www.fis.edu/eslweb/esl/parents/easy/aebe.htm

The topic is so confusing that the author has a mistake in his lists:

In British English, Vase rhymes with cars and stars, not plays. At least, not the way most people say it. Many people would still understand the vase/plays pronuciation, but very few use it.

To complicate things further, there is no "one" British English, just like accents and even usages vary all over the USA (and Canada, for that matter).  Often it comes down to regional and even sometimes city-specific differences!  Insane, man... 

P.S. I live on the West coast (USA), and when listening to certain E. coast based news media (CNN, etc) there are clear pronunciation differences (altho you have to listen carefully for some)... and of course the classic "southern accent" speaks for itself...
 

I think British English is weird!

Reply #47 –
Quote
In British English, Vase rhymes with cars and stars, not plays. At least, not the way most people say it. Many people would still understand the vase/plays pronuciation, but very few use it.

Actually Vase is more correctly rhymed with Spas (or Bras) - in many parts of the UK (and the USA) the 'r' in Cars is more than just a vowel modifier, it is pronounced as a consonent, i.e. Carrrs to my ears anyway.

The American pronunciation rhymes better with Base than with Plays AFAIK.
Cheers,
Alan