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aeka
2008-11-25 07:50 pm UTC (link)

boogara : "'Non-English-Speaking-English-Country' is a country where American English is not spoken (well). Britain for me isn't in this field 'cause all the times I've talked to a Brit, they didn't speak much/any British-English."

wibbble: "I think you've got this backwards. America is the 'non-English-speaking-English-country' (if that phrase can have any meaning at all).

Or to put it another way: English, you're doing it wrong. "

wibbble does have a point. English didn't come from America or it would have been called 'American'. Therefore British English is technically correct. Noah Webster simply tweaked it in the mid 18th Century as part of reforming the American education system from the British system.

I wonder if

boogara even knows who Noah Webster is. S/He would probably be a little less ignorant if s/he did.

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	napalmnacey 2008-11-25 11:53 pm UTC (link)
	I prefer British English (Australia has adopted some of America's habits) and it causes such havok with spell checkers. I swear, those things are the tool of the devil. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	aeka 2008-11-25 11:59 pm UTC (link)
	I quite agree with that. I don't believe I have to keep adding colour, realise, paediatrics, etc, as part of the "dictionary" each time that I write in British English. They are still correct, just not to American standards. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	napalmnacey 2008-11-26 12:34 am UTC (link)
	What's worse is that some of the British English things I learnt in school don't seem to be in the British English dictionaries that you download with most programmes. Like doubling the last consonant of a word when you add 'ed'. Like, there are some words I do that with and my spell check freaks out. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	tree 2008-11-26 01:54 am UTC (link)
	oh god it pains my soul when they're not doubled; I have to insert them mentally (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	napalmnacey 2008-11-26 02:04 am UTC (link)
	Do a search for "alloted" and despair at the number of pages that show up. TWO T's, motherfuckers! (Reply to this)(Parent)

ellensmithee
2008-11-26 01:44 pm UTC (link)

To further depress you, I work in a writing field and do a lot of computer texts in both British and American English, and "programme" is officially spelled like American "program" in regard to software in British English (the traditional spelling holds for the other meanings of the word).

I noticed the consonant doubling thing recently, but I thought it was an error in the spell checker.

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	napalmnacey 2008-11-29 12:51 am UTC (link)
	I refuse to leave off the 'me' in that word and nothing will make me write it any different, yo! (Reply to this)(Parent)

darkling
2008-11-26 10:53 pm UTC (link)

No matter how many times I set my spellchecker to 'English- UK' as a template, it *still* automatically starts a document as American English. I'm typing away in what I consider to be perfectly acceptable spelling (what I've been taught, read and what makes sense in those contexts) and there are these red lines EVERYWHERE. Every single damn time. Really doesn't help that I'm a wee bit pedantic (can you tell)?

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	napalmnacey 2008-11-26 11:56 pm UTC (link)
	Oh, I'm like that too, I fucking hate it. Sadly, it seems to happen in Open Office as well. :( (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	mary_mac 2008-11-27 12:16 am UTC (link)
	At least once you fix it within the document you have open, Open Office keeps it that way for the rest of the session. Word 2007, I fix it, and it immediately changes itself back. Driving me slowly insane. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	napalmnacey 2008-11-27 12:39 am UTC (link)
	I don't use Word anymore. I don't trust it. Not since losing a buttload of fic back in 2003 or 4. It was heartbreaking and I thought, "Fuck you Word, I'm using Wordpad." That doesn't have any features, but it also doesn't crash. Then Open Office came along, thank the Gods. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	mary_mac 2008-11-27 12:46 am UTC (link)
	I use Word mostly because our computers are so locked down I can't install Open Officw, and also because I invariably forget to swap the formats when I email stuff, and it makes my supervisor cry. In fairness, it doesn't crash, exactly. Sometimes it just doesn't open the document at all. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	napalmnacey 2008-11-29 12:52 am UTC (link)
	Well, I'm writing fan fic so I don't have the same worries you do, obviously. LOL. Oh, aren't computers fun?! (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	mary_mac 2008-11-29 01:11 am UTC (link)
	My sweet young officemates are learning a lot of new ways to insult Bill Gate's mother, if that's what you mean by fun, yes. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	napalmnacey 2008-11-29 01:26 am UTC (link)
	Strangely enough, that's exactly what I meant! (Reply to this)(Parent)

	aethereal_girl 2008-11-26 08:28 pm UTC (link)
	Um, no. Contemporary British English is neither more correct, more original, nor older than contemporary American English. Both are equally venerable and legitimate descendants of the English that was spoken in England before America was colonized by the English. (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

aeka
2008-11-27 12:15 am UTC (link)

No shit Sherlock. But just for clarification, the point that I was trying to make with this comment, is that British English is still accepted as correct, especially since the language did originate in England. Therefore it is stupid for someone to say that their version of the language is wrong.

To put it another way, it's not any less correct than American spelling simply because it doesn't follow the standards that Noah Webster developed for the American writing system.

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	jat_sapphire 2008-11-27 01:07 am UTC (link)
	I read this, and all I could hear was "You don't know the history of English, and I do!" Really, couldn't you just take that point you say you found and sit down on it? (Reply to this)(Parent)(Thread)

	aeka 2008-11-27 01:09 am UTC (link)
	Hey, whatever floats your boat mate. (Reply to this)(Parent)

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