JuanSeiszFitzHall
yet another
- Joined
- Jun 30, 2019
- Posts
- 1,027
G.B. Shaw is credited with the witticism that the United Kingdom and the United States are two countries separated by a common language. If this is a problem, let’s fix it!
This thread is intended to help writers (and readers) understand the differences in spelling, usage, and colloquialisms among the various flavors of the English language, mainly the British and American types. Yet there are differences within each group, and this thread also welcomes other Anglophones (Australian, Canadian, Caribbean, African, South Asian, etc.) to seek and provide information for the benefit of all.
I would be classed as a Yank (despite never having lived in the Northeast of the U.S.), and my main goal is to understand what I read from authors with other usage backgrounds. I don’t expect to write from the perspective of an Aussie or a Brit, because I’d surely stumble somewhere along the way. But more adventurous authors may have this goal, so I wish them well.
I’m already aware of some obvious differences, such as Yanks using ‘Mom’ and Brits using ‘Mum,’ but I scratch my head over what may be tech terms or recent slang in the U.K., and I’m sure the converse is true. An exchange of PMs about a year ago, between me and Kumquatqueen, appeared to surprise both of us as we found that some terms we thought were universal turned out be local.
Here are a couple items with which I’ll start this:
* Is the British reference to ‘mains,’ apparently as an energy source, what a Yank would think of as ‘house current?’ As in, the electricity (110 or 120 volts?) available from a wall outlet, into which one would plug an appliance? (Yes, many dirty jokes are possible here, because this is a smut-writing site, but let’s deal with the literal meaning first.) Where I live, the term ‘water main’ is common, but ‘power main’ seems to have become archaic.
* I haven’t looked at this too closely, but is the difference in the endings of some abstract nouns (favor/flavour, colour/color) fading away? In the U.K., is the ‘-our’ ending falling out of, um, favor?
This thread is intended to help writers (and readers) understand the differences in spelling, usage, and colloquialisms among the various flavors of the English language, mainly the British and American types. Yet there are differences within each group, and this thread also welcomes other Anglophones (Australian, Canadian, Caribbean, African, South Asian, etc.) to seek and provide information for the benefit of all.
I would be classed as a Yank (despite never having lived in the Northeast of the U.S.), and my main goal is to understand what I read from authors with other usage backgrounds. I don’t expect to write from the perspective of an Aussie or a Brit, because I’d surely stumble somewhere along the way. But more adventurous authors may have this goal, so I wish them well.
I’m already aware of some obvious differences, such as Yanks using ‘Mom’ and Brits using ‘Mum,’ but I scratch my head over what may be tech terms or recent slang in the U.K., and I’m sure the converse is true. An exchange of PMs about a year ago, between me and Kumquatqueen, appeared to surprise both of us as we found that some terms we thought were universal turned out be local.
Here are a couple items with which I’ll start this:
* Is the British reference to ‘mains,’ apparently as an energy source, what a Yank would think of as ‘house current?’ As in, the electricity (110 or 120 volts?) available from a wall outlet, into which one would plug an appliance? (Yes, many dirty jokes are possible here, because this is a smut-writing site, but let’s deal with the literal meaning first.) Where I live, the term ‘water main’ is common, but ‘power main’ seems to have become archaic.
* I haven’t looked at this too closely, but is the difference in the endings of some abstract nouns (favor/flavour, colour/color) fading away? In the U.K., is the ‘-our’ ending falling out of, um, favor?
I have frequent correspondence with Canadian friends and they always use '-our', even one guy born and raised in the US. I read BBC news every day, and the US coverage always has '-our' even when it's apparently a US-based reporter.
