Languages are quite arbitrary things. In languages there really are no absolutes. Nothing is set in stone, and all attempts to define rules that fit people’s usage of them inevitably come up short.
Standards for languages are created by declaring one region’s dialect the “official” version of the language at some moment in time, and the rules of the language are continually modified to meet the changing speech patterns of the language’s users. There is no right or wrong in language.
The United States and Great Britain are often referred to as two nations divided by a common language. For a foreigner learning English then, they have two major options in learning the language: learn British English or American English. While there is no “linguistically correct” language, there is a correct choice, and Germans always choose the wrong answer.
Purely from an unbiased standpoint, Germans should learn American English in school for a multitude of reasons. If a German were to watch the undubbed version of a movie, 9 times out of 10, that movie would feature actors with American accents, and the same goes for television. It just doesn’t make any sense to watch a movie about high school and then talk about your upcoming “A levels”.
A German is 5 times more likely to come into contact with an American than someone from Great Britain if the two people are picked up randomly from the planet and dropped into the same bucket.
In 2006 the GDP of Great Britain was $1.93 trillion, a paltry sum in comparison to the $13.13 trillion of the US. A German is more likely to be doing business with an American company than a British company.
A tourist in Germany is more likely to have come from the United States than from Great Britain. It would seem that the proximity to Great Britain would encourage British tourism in Germany, but the British also need to spend their vacation in some place sunny like Portugal. Plus they already have old stuff to look at at home.
If a German is going to visit long lost relatives whose ancestors emmigrated to an English speaking country, or vice versa, then those relatives will almost certainly be speaking with an American dialect.
It would seem like a good idea to go to the source for a language, but then Germans would just be learning German, when they actually want to learn English, and that doesn’t make any sense. So Germans instead learn what they refer to as “Oxford English”.
In theory there is nothing wrong with learning England’s version of English, just like there is nothing wrong with learning that Swiss language Rhaeto-Romanic . It can be done, but it is just not a worthwhile pursuit. English is the world language because of America, not because of England, so it only makes sense to learn America’s version.
In German schools you will receive bad marks for speaking with an American accent or using American spelling if you picked it up during your high school year in the States. Instead you should be receiving bonus points for learning the standards of a world economic and cultural super power. Mickey Mouse doesn’t speak with a British accent.
Any German reading this article will completely disagree with me, but it won’t be a bag of crisps that they are munching on whilst reading.
deutsche Übersetzung für Astrid ein/ausblenden
Howdy Astrid,
here’s yer translation:
Die Deutschen lernen absichtlich die falsche Sorte Englisch
Sprachen sind eine recht willkürliche Sache. In Sprachen gibt es keine wirklichen Absolute. Nichts ist in Stein gemeisselt, und alle Versuche, Regeln zu definieren, die dem eigentlichen Gebrauch gerecht werden, kommen zwangsläufig zu kurz.
Standards für Sprachen werden kreiert, indem man an einem bestimmten Punkt in der Geschichte den Dialekt einer Region als offizielle Version der Sprache deklariert, und die Regeln der Sprache werden kontinuierlich angepasst, um sich den wechselnden Sprachmustern des Benutzers der Sprache anzupassen. Es gibt kein richtig oder falsch bei Sprachen.
Die Vereinigten Staaten und Großbritannien werden oft als “Zwei Nationen, die durch die gemeinsame Sprache getrennt sind” bezeichnet. Für einen Ausländer, der Englisch lernt, gibt es also zwei Hauptoptionen, diese Sprache zu lernen: lernen Sie britisches Englisch oder amerikanisches Englisch. Während es keine “sprachlich richtige” Sprache gibt, gibt es eine richtige Entscheidung und die Deutschen wählen immer die falsche Antwort.
Von einem völlig unparteiischen Standpunkt aus gesehen, sollten die Deutschen aus einer Vielzahl von Gründen amerikanisches Englisch in der Schule lernen. Wenn ein Deutscher die Originalversion eines Filmes gucken würde, würde dieser in 9 von 10 Fällen Schauspieler mit amerikanischem Akzent enthalten, und das Gleiche gilt für das Fernsehen. Es macht einfach keinen Sinn, einen Film über die High School zu gucken und dann über die bevorstehenden A-Levels zu sprechen.
Es ist 5 mal wahrscheinlicher, dass ein Deutscher mit einem Amerikaner in Kontakt kommt als mit jemandem aus Großbritannien, würde man diese beiden Leute wahllos vom Planeten nehmen und in den gleichen Eimer werfen.
Im Jahre 2006 war das Bruttosozialprodukt von Großbritannien $1,93 Billionen, eine geringfügige Summe im Vergleich zu den $13,13 Billionen der Vereinigten Staaten. Ein Deutscher wird eher mit einer amerikanischen Firma Geschäfte machen als mit einer britischen Firma.
Ein Tourist in Deutschland kommt eher aus Amerika als aus Großbritannien. Es könnte den Anschein erwecken, dass die Nähe zu Großbritannien den britischen Tourismus in Deutschland fördern würde, aber die Briten müssen ihren Urlaub auch an einem sonnigen Ort wie Portugal verbringen. Ausserdem haben sie schon alte Sachen zum Angucken zu Hause.
Wenn ein Deutscher lang vermisste Verwandte besuchen will, deren Vorfahren in ein englischsprachiges Land ausgewandert sind oder andersrum, dann werden diese Verwandten fast sicher mit einem amerikanischen Dialekt sprechen.
Es erscheint als eine gute Idee, zum Ursprung einer Sprache zu gehen, aber dann würden die Deutschen nur Deutsch lernen, obwohl sie eigentlich Englisch lernen wollen und das macht keinen Sinn. Also lernen die Deutschen stattdessen etwas, das sie “Oxford Englisch” nennen.
In der Theorie ist nichts falsch daran, Englands Version von Englisch zu lernen, genauso wie nichts daran falsch ist, diese Schweizer Sprache Rätoromanisch zu lernen. Man kann es machen, aber es ist kein lohnenswertes Vorhaben. Englisch ist die Weltsprache wegen Amerika, nicht wegen England, also macht es nur Sinn Amerikas Version zu lernen.
In deutschen Schulen werden Sie schlechte Noten bekommen, wenn Sie mit amerikanischem Akzent sprechen oder die amerikanische Rechtschreibung benutzen, die Sie während Ihres Highschooljahres in den Staaten gelernt haben. Stattdessen sollten Sie Bonuspunkte dafür erhalten, dass Sie die Standards einer wirtschaftlichen und kulturellen Weltmacht lernen. Mickey Mouse spricht ja nicht mit einem britischen Akzent.
Jeder Deutsche, der diesen Artikel liest, wird mir widersprechen, aber es wird keine Tüte Crisps sein, die Sie beim Lesen knabbern.
Yall take care now, ya hear,
John
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July 18th, 2008 at 8:56 pm
This is exactly what I’ve been saying for years now. One of my profs actually told me I should try and get rid of my carefully acquired American accent because schools would require me to teach British English to the students - oh, I mean to the PUPILS. What for, I want to know, when American culture is less foreign to Germans than British culture?
July 18th, 2008 at 9:18 pm
Well, America may be the reason why English is the international business language and why people in Liberia, Guam, American Samoa, and the Philipines speak English as well. But most countries in the world (including the USA) speak English because they were former British colonies. So British English influenced more countries than the US (although, of course, today American culture has a much bigger influence).
This doesn’t justify why American English isn’t accepted in German schools but I just wanted to point out why so many people think Americans arrogant…^^
By the way: I like English accents over American accents. You easily understand every single word. Maybe that’s a reason why so many Germans prefer BE over AE - Americans mutter in a kind of way that is more difficult to understand if you’re not an auditive person.
July 18th, 2008 at 9:33 pm
Back in the days when I was still going to school (mid 90s) we could chose between AE and BE in tests, as long as you sticked to one version it was fine, it only counted as an error if you started to mix the spelling.
Yet I agree, it’s quite stupid to teach BE as most of business English is AE nowadays and that’s what you’ll need later.
July 18th, 2008 at 9:40 pm
as a german who learned more AE then BE at school i have to say that i think there are a lot more countries where BE is better spoken then AE. It’s not the point that the USA is bigger the point is that there are a lot additional colonies and they all are influenced by BE NOT AE. Why learn every dialect on his own (and the USA has got more than enough dialects on its own, so even if you try to learn AE you don’t need to understand every us american) if you can learn the source of all this fuzz?
Of course i could learn France (i speak “saxon” already) but that would be totaly different from learning english and would be everything but not redefining “source” correct.
so… yes i think the americans are arrogant if they do not see the many other nations and only themself (which obviously is the normal approach by the most american citizens)
July 18th, 2008 at 9:42 pm
Die Argumentation hat eine entscheidende Lücke:
Noch öfter als zur Kommunikation mit Amerikanern und Briten benutzt ein durchschnittlicher Deutscher die englische Sprache als Lingua Franca zur Kommunikation mit anderen Europäern (Polen, Spaniern, Finnen, …)
July 18th, 2008 at 9:48 pm
>you will receive bad marks for speaking with an American accent
No. Not at my school, and not at any other school where sensible teachers teach. I only tell my pupils to avoid mixing BE and AE, but as long as somebody has an American accent, that’s fine with me. Some of my colleagues, by the way, speak an American accent themselves.
And English lessons in Germany aren’t as exclusively Britain-centered as you seem to think. True, the book we use for fifth-formers (Gymnasium/Bavaria) starts in Nottingham; but later on, there is a visit to relatives in New York, and in years 9 and 10 the texts and stories are almost exclusively set in the USA.
@MuGo: Don’t you think you’re generalizing a bit too much? “Americans mutter” - really, as if a New Yorker and a man from Dallas had identical accents … And if you compare a Lake District accent with a Californian one, I’m not so sure which one is easier to understand for a learner of English. Of course, these a very superficial statements again, since they don’t take into consideration the speakers’ educational and social backgrounds etc. There are differences - and one of the jobs that English lessons ought to achieve is prepare pupils (or students, if you like) for the incredible variety that awaits them.
July 18th, 2008 at 9:51 pm
I encourage generalizing too much on this site.
July 18th, 2008 at 9:52 pm
You are just jealous. We know that Dr. Carson Beckett had spoken the best English in Stargate Atlantis until the persons in charge became jealous of his beautiful Scottish accent and kicked him out. But at last I forgave them since they got Jewel Staite as the new Doctor. I like her since I first watched Firefly.
What I ever wanted to know is if any American (not being from TX) ever understood the sheriff at the beginning of “From Dusk Till Dawn” when he spoke to the shopkeeper. I never got it and I tried hard (10 years ago).
July 18th, 2008 at 9:53 pm
“In German schools you will receive bad marks for speaking with an American accent or using American spelling if you picked it up during your high school year in the States.”
Let me disagree. That’s just plain wrong. At least in Bavaria. In school we were told to pick one (i.e. either AE or BE) and stick with it. The teacher didn’t care which one we picked and it was only ever a problem when we were inconsistent.
July 18th, 2008 at 10:02 pm
I completely agree. Also, there is no sense in learning some randomly picked Hanover accent as “High German”.
July 18th, 2008 at 10:05 pm
No, definitely not.
I prefer American spelling because it is far easier than British spelling.
July 18th, 2008 at 10:16 pm
Your SO right. i HATE british english.it sounds totally weird to me. actually it even sound kinda gay. they should really start teaching american english in school.
July 18th, 2008 at 10:21 pm
The biggest problem is that school teachers want us to be perfectionists. My English teacher told us the difference between child and children and that childs and childrens are both wrong. But even the president of the United States doesn’t get it right:
http://www.thedailyshow.com/video/index.jhtml?videoId=103508&title=childrens-do-learn
Since I have no ambition of being the next president of any country, I don’t see the point in being a perfectionist.
July 18th, 2008 at 10:54 pm
I can’t imagine that american english is not accepted in school. The kids don’t even learn Englisch any more but Amerikanisch. Sounds pretty accepted to me.
July 18th, 2008 at 11:20 pm
“English is the world language because of America, not because of England”
Aah, but:
Most other countries which have English as their main language (e.g. Australia, South Africa), or at least lingua franca (India) speak English because of British colonialism, not American colonianism.
July 18th, 2008 at 11:31 pm
It’s not that bad. There are some -mostly old- teachers that think you should talk with a British accent because it sounds sophisticated and some even give bad marks because of that. It’s ridiculous, i gotta admit it but you are not completely right. Not all Germans think BE is the right choice, it’s just that most of the teachers are speaking with British accent so the students naturally learn BE. So, it’s not our fault, even though it’s stupid. Blame the teachers!
July 19th, 2008 at 12:50 am
i disagree
as a german and as such from a real unbiased standpoint i must say british english is the choice number one, and i am glad that it is teached in german schools in favour (note the stylish ‘u’, john :D). the british accent is much cleaner, understandable and way more sexy then american dialects. british english has a special trait, which you americans managed to loose 
July 19th, 2008 at 6:05 am
Ich widerspreche nicht, aber ich erinnere mich an einen Vorfall aus meiner Zeit auf dem Gymnasium.
Eine zweisprachig aufgewachsene Mitschülerin liest englischen Text in feinstem British-English vor und wird danach in äh Englisch mit starkem deutschen Akzent von der Lehrerin drauf hingewiesen, dass sie in Zukunft bitte deutlicher sprechen soll. Vielleicht wäre es in diesem einen Fall besser gewesen American-English zu sprechen. Who knows?
July 19th, 2008 at 7:43 am
In my opinion it is not so important which “dialect” to learn. People will understand each other most of the time if they try to understand and help each other, regardless of some different spelling or a few different words.
I think it is most important to learn a foreign language at all, and to learn about life in other societies. This is something all Europeans do (and why not learn the language and culture of their neighbours, like France or Great Britain?). It would be very helpful if more Americans would learn a foreign language, learn about other cultures, and perhaps travel abroad …
July 19th, 2008 at 8:26 am
why oxford-english? to pick the least common? at least BE or AE are spoken by some, but oxfordian?
Are americans or the british learning german in an siebenbürgen-dialect?
July 19th, 2008 at 8:38 am
British English is of course the correct one to learn as AE is just degenerated. Here some examples…
BE: “I was pretty surprised.”
AE: “I was like whoa!!!”
BE: “I was confused.”
AE: “I was like wtf???”
July 19th, 2008 at 10:59 am
Die Argumentation, dass AE eine Abwandlung des BE sei ist im Übrigen ebenfalls Schwachsinn; beide Variationen stammen vom Englisch ab dass zur Zeit der Amerika-Konolisation gesprochen wurde und haben sich unterschiedlich entwickelt
So. 
July 19th, 2008 at 11:00 am
Oh my… Entschuldigung für die Schreibfehler da oben. Ich sollte wirklich erst lesen was ich geschrieben habe, bevor ich es abschicke. *erröt*
July 19th, 2008 at 11:00 am
I got penalty for using US slang in my Leistungskurs exams all the time, but then again, my teacher was a retard. It might be my fault for not switching to BE when I’m able to quite well (Monty Python and Doctor Who left their mark), but making a point was more important to me.
Also, my LK was somewhat annoying anyway since only two people in it actually *spoke English*.
July 19th, 2008 at 11:42 am
Monty Phyton is reason enough to lern BE.
July 19th, 2008 at 1:34 pm
What really strikes me about the comments on each and every one of the posts at this blog is that about two per cent of the participants seem to have read any of the other comments. The other 98 per cent might as well write e-mails to John. How communicative.
July 19th, 2008 at 1:42 pm
Speaking of Monty Python: these comments remind me of the explanatory footnotes you find in the Taschenbuch editions of Monty Python skits. You know, to help you understand the jokes better and thus, make it all that much funnier.
July 19th, 2008 at 2:19 pm
A very dear American friend of mine once clued me in to the best-kept secret of Americans, one they’re deeply ashamed of:
People talking with a British accent give them a b*ner.
July 19th, 2008 at 2:31 pm
In ‘My Fair Lady’ Prof. Higgins sings about the English Language “And the Americans haven’t used it for years.”
Germans don’t learn the wrong ‘English’. They learn the ONLY English.
Americans (the 50% that do not speak Spanish) have something as a language that sounds a little bit like English but is totally different. Like the German that is spoken in Switzerland.
PS: Some years ago the USA had no official language.
July 19th, 2008 at 4:28 pm
it is wrong to say that schools don’t accept american accent and spelling. when I was in middleschool, we were tought american spelling,after we learned brittish spelling in earlier years. when in Highschool, we were given the choice to decide which spelling to apply, as long as we were using it in a coherent way.
July 19th, 2008 at 6:31 pm
“Any German reading this article will completely disagree with me, but it won’t be a bag of crisps that they are munching on whilst reading.”
Nope. I agree. Although I never ever had any trouble using AE in tests.
July 19th, 2008 at 6:46 pm
I really don’t see what all the fuss is all about. I’m an American that’s been teaching English for over 11 years in Austria, and I’ve yet to see any important differences between BE and AE. I teach my students/pupils Standard English, so that they can be understand anywhere in the world. If we encounter a word like “color”, then I explain to them that there’s another spelling variation “colour”, and that it’s far more important to consistently stick to one style of spelling and pronunciation than it is to worry about whether AE is better than BE and vice versa.
I also encounter a lot of bias and b*llshit regarding the so-called superiority that BE is supposed to have over AE. People here swear that there’s something inherently better about British English, for example British people supposedly speak more clearly, use better grammar, use less slang, etc., etc., yet hardly any of these Austrians or Germans have ever been to England to actually hear how people there communicate. For the record, I’ve been to England several times, and I can assure you all that the British do NOT speak a superior form of English to the Americans. As a matter of fact, they speak so badly there that most of the times you can hardly understand what they’re trying to tell you. A large percentage use appallingly bad grammar, swallow or mumble all their words and use the most unclear and confusing accents I’ve ever heard. What most Austrians/Germans don’t know, or what their teachers never teach them in school, is that what they call British English is spoken by a minority of British speakers - mostly educated professionals who reside in London. Everyone else speaks some form of insufferable dialect that requires subtitles in films (even in English speaking countries!) in order to be understood.
The English language in England is being so badly mutilated that CNN reported several months on accent schools in London, whose only purpose is to train British speakers on the correct usage of English language. Apparently, so many Brits are now being turned down for jobs because of their bad English or incomprehensible accent, that people are now having to resort to accent school in order to polish their grammar and develop a more neutral, professional sounding accent.
So much for the superiority of British English!
July 19th, 2008 at 6:56 pm
I am German and married to an American and I absolutely agree with what you wrote. My little brother is still in school and of course he uses American English because that’s how he communicates with my husband and his teacher had the nerve to substract points from his last exam because he used the American spelling for some words (center instead of centRE) and his teacher won’t let him pronounce words
“the American way” either and it just pisses me off…
July 19th, 2008 at 6:57 pm
> “Any German reading this article will completely disagree with me, but it
> won’t be a bag of crisps that they are munching on whilst reading.”
Indeed not. But it’s a bag of Gummibärchen which, I am told by wikipedia, was created by a Briton in 1909.
Blimey!
July 19th, 2008 at 8:09 pm
Sothis said: ”…the british accent is much cleaner, understandable…”
OK, if the people actually speak BE maybe with just an accent but without dialect, then you’re right. But who does in GB? Out of home sometimes people don’t even understand others living just a few kilometers (a few 0.621… miles *s*) away. I had been in the south of GB a few years ago by business. And (honestly!) one Briton asked another Briton what a third Briton was talking about, because he didn’t understand him!
I think, the reason is, that British dialects come out of a time, when traveling was extreme seldom and telephone has not been invented. So the people lived in their small regions, capsuled from the others and language made it’s own local evolutions. On the other hand, in the USA in the beginning the people came from all over the world and had to learn English as a foreign language. So they learned that, what was called English in those times. So i think, in practice the AE is closer to ‘correct’ BE then most of the Britons actually speak.
Some commentators here argued that BE is spoken in the British colonies (or former British colonies). Do you really believe that (for example) English in India is still BE? Our company hast a subsidiary in India which supports our technical designers in CAD. You can believe me - it’s nearly impossible to understand those people when you just hear them (on the phone). In the beginning some of them had been in Germany for technical trainings. During that time the communication with them was a combination of sketching, demonstrating, gesticulating and speaking (in exact this order!).
On the other hand our company has a couple of subsidiaries in Europe and South America. To talk with the people in those places we use English, which is a foreign language on both sides. But communication with those people is (for us) definitely the best and easiest of all (after German of course). On the second place is talking with Americans (works quite good) and on the third place is talking with Britons (mostly just hardly works). And far away is talking with people out of countries where something like English is the official language (works catastrophically). Doubtless there are exceptions, but there is a saying: ‘the exception proves the rule’.
July 19th, 2008 at 8:36 pm
>>In German schools you will receive bad marks for speaking with an American accent or using American spelling if you picked it up during your high school year in the States.<<
Actually, teachers don’t care wether you spell the whole bunch of words whose suffix is ‘ize’ with ’s’ or ‘z’ (hypnotize/hypnotise) [I prefer hypnotize; I’m not even sure if ‘hypnotise’ is spelled correctly?].
@ the ‘centre’ / ‘center’ thingy: at least at our school teachers don’t care about that… perhaps they just don’t know which one’s correct.
However, the thing I dislike most about learning ‘Oxford English’ is the pronounciation of certain words like “can’t” or “dance”. ‘Yuck’ *g*
July 19th, 2008 at 9:06 pm
“However, the thing I dislike most about learning ‘Oxford English’ is the pronounciation of certain words like “can’t” or “dance”. ‘Yuck’ *g*”
Actually, the American pronunciation of words like “can’t” or “dance” (using the “æ” vowel) is much closer to the original, *correct* pronunciation than the “Broad A” accent used in British English. The “Broad A” pronunciation began as a fashion among the English upper class sometime in the late 18th to early 19th century. They suddenly developed the habit of using a “Broad A” in words like “can’t” and “dance” in order to differentiate themselves from the ignorant underclasses, or so the theory goes. Since this trend never caught on in America, the Americans continued using the correct pronunciation, with “æ”, right up to the present day.
As a matter of fact, many Brits would be shocked to know that American English pronunciation is much closer to original English than British English, hence another blow to the supposed superiority of British English.
I can also confirm a lot of what Tarkus said in his post. Austrian friends of mine that travel to England come back shocked that they didn’t hear the type of Oxford English that they learned in school and were lead to believe was prevalent there. One friend who vacations every year in England has dozens of stories about hotel clerks or waiters in restaurants who seemingly don’t speak a word of recognizable Standard English. As a matter of fact, he’s quite fond of writing down whatever unintelligible phrases they use and later bombarding me with explanations of what they could possibly mean.
July 20th, 2008 at 12:16 pm
In German schools you will receive bad marks for speaking with an American accent or using American spelling if you picked it up during your high school year in the States.
And so it happened to me for two years indeed! Of course, like so many before me mentioned, we had to chose between spellings and stick to one - which I did. Nevertheless, I was always told be pronounce words the British way. After the first two months of 11th grade I got so angry with the teacher that I asked her if she would re-fund my parents the many thousands of German marks they had spent for sending me to the US. I told her if she would, then I would consider reverting to BE. So I know exactly how the commenter “Sol” feels. I’ve been there too, mate! (Especially being stuck in a Leistungskurs with people who had no clue about English)
July 20th, 2008 at 1:06 pm
I got penalty for using US slang in my Leistungskurs exams all the time,
maybe that’s because you use slang? slang is not accepted in any language when it comes to leistungskurse. that has nothing to do with AE or BE.
July 20th, 2008 at 1:09 pm
Actually, the American pronunciation of words like “can’t” or “dance” (using the “æ” vowel) is much closer to the original, *correct* pronunciation than the “Broad A” accent used in British English.
so what would that original version be then? even in received pronounciation which sets the standards for the broadcasting language (equivalent to high german) calls it dance with long a. by the way not sure whether you noticed but it’s called ENGLISH for a certain reason…
July 20th, 2008 at 1:35 pm
Does that mean non-Germans will learn the Bavarian accent in the future, since it is the language of the so much more successfull Germans than those weird people from Hannover.
July 20th, 2008 at 4:04 pm
Thomas… If they’re more likely to hear a Bavarian accent from (randomly chosen) speakers of German than Standard German, why shouldn’t they?
July 20th, 2008 at 4:26 pm
@vanessa: No, I restraint from using slang. But my teacher just loved England; she went there on vacation every year. So, naturally, she tried to “convert” me to use “proper” English.
Her England-trips, however, did not improve her English. It was horrible as she tried to teach English in English. She made so many mistakes it hurt my ears. After a while, I just faded out and let my mind wander. I guess my lack of participation (in a class where there were actually only two out of fifteen students who had the skills for a Leistungskurs) made her angry and that’s why she graded me down in the beginning and constantly corrected me.
I tried to resolve it with her, stayed after class to discuss it with her. It didn’t help so in the end, my mom (who’s also an English teacher) talked to her and told her to stuff her preconceptions and to start grading me according to my level of performance, not to her personal taste.
It helped. Got my English Abitur with 15 points
July 20th, 2008 at 4:56 pm
@Vanessa
Linguists claim that American English is closer to the historical pronunciation of the English language than British English is for two main reasons:
1. The English spoken by British pilgrims to the American colonists is still very close to what’s spoken by Americans today
2. The English language in England has undergone several fashionable changes over the past two centuries, as opposed to AE, one of these changes was the introduction of the Broad A accent. You can see this in some north east American cities (northern NY State and Boston, for example) that have also adopted the Broad A accent on account of their close proximity and historical ties to England.
A standard is basically what anyone chooses to define it to be. The British defining the Broad A accent as Received Pronunciation doesn’t make it any more correct than any other variety of English, however we can still say that many aspects of American English is closer to the historic English than BE.
July 20th, 2008 at 6:08 pm
There’s an easy solution to all of this for you Germans trying to master English: learn how to imitate accents. The other differences between AE and BE are fairly minor.
July 20th, 2008 at 7:01 pm
I as a German completely agree with that article. I’d have loved to learn AE at school. However, they always told us to pronounce words the “British Way”, which, in my opinion, just sucks…
July 20th, 2008 at 8:02 pm
I’ve learnt both at school, first few classes in British and then American English in the Oberstufe. I guess my pronunciation is closer to the American standard, should there be such a thing.
July 20th, 2008 at 9:37 pm
What was that again? AE means awful English and BE means better English? ;-P
That said, the point is to understand people and be understood. I think it is easier to learn BE and understand Americans than vice versa. So unless you live in America (continent, not only USA) go with BE so that you can easily adjust to local customs.
Prost!
Robert
July 20th, 2008 at 9:38 pm
Actually most Germans speak english neither with a british nor an american accent. Säi schpieek it wis a tschörman äkzent.
July 20th, 2008 at 9:46 pm
Um… I’m way too lazy to read through all the comments now, so it might have already been said, but when I went to school (and I got my Abi only two years ago) we were taught first British English, then one or two years later American English. Both were accepted, the accent as well as the spelling, though we were asked to be consistent in the use.
Can’t remember if anybody really ever cared about consistency, though^^
Of course, what our teachers actually told us was more of a German English (or rather Bavarian English), but that is a completely different matter…
July 20th, 2008 at 10:39 pm
> Starstuff
Honestly, after a year I didn’t quite care anymore. So I got a B or a C when my level was above that, but as I said, he was a retard.
> vanessa
Slang as in trunk where my teacher expected boot. It’s not as though I pulled out borderline incomprehensible wording.
July 20th, 2008 at 10:49 pm
Well, as all of the 3 years I lived in Germany (and where I learned German) were in Bavaria, small bread “rolls” will always and forever be “semmeln” and not “broetchen”.
AND as an American living the past 2.5 years in England- I can attest to the diverse and often hard to understand dialects in this small country! We (my German husband and I and the kids) once drove a few hours north to Stoke-on -Trent, and I COULD NOT understand what the people there said. My husband just flat out refused to try and order at Mcdonalds, and I was BARELY able to place an order, those people talk like they’ve got rocks in their mouths! Yeah, the BE people learn outside of Britain is likely the so-called “Queen’s English” and is only actually spoken by a minority of people here!
July 21st, 2008 at 12:33 am
Since only relatively few Germans earn their money as translators or maybe tourist guides, the English spoken by the majority Germans is of course that of amateurs. Their German accent will usually be so thick that it doesn’t matter at all whether they say “shedule” or “skedule”, etc.
The comments for this post are a good example, at least as far as the written form is concerned. To quote a few examples:
“as a german who learned more AE then BE at school i have to say that i think there are a lot more countries where BE is better spoken then AE”
“Your SO right. i HATE british english.it sounds totally weird to me. actually it even sound kinda gay.”
“I can’t imagine that american english is not accepted in school.”
“i disagree
as a german and as such from a real unbiased standpoint i must say british english is the choice number one, and i am glad that it is teached in german schools in favour (note the stylish ‘u’, john :D).”
(The previous one is my favourite, getting the spelling of “favour” right, but not the past participle of “teach”.)
“why oxford-english? to pick the least common? at least BE or AE are spoken by some, but oxfordian?”
“it is wrong to say that schools don’t accept american accent and spelling. when I was in middleschool, we were tought american spelling,after we learned brittish spelling in earlier years.”
“Of course, like so many before me mentioned, we had to chose between spellings and stick to one - which I did.”
Other than that, well, I find it a bit difficult to comment on something that isn’t meant to be taken seriously, but I want to point out that if the ranking of a country among Germany’s foreign trade partners should guide us here, French (or “France”, as another commenter charmingly called the language) is greatly undervalued, as France is the leading importer in Germany as well as the leading recipient of German exports.
July 21st, 2008 at 7:52 am
Back in school I had some kind of ongoing argument with my English teacher. She insisted on always using BE since that was the kind of English the ministry of education insited on.
The funny thing though was that we were to use BE even when analyzing texts written about topics in America.
So I always got a few nagative remarks for continuously using the type of english during my interpretation that was used in the original text. But we kept this very friendly and I got the maximum number of points for my English part of the Abitur.
July 21st, 2008 at 9:24 am
After 5 trips to the UK i realized:
Nobody talks English at all in that country! I went to a KFC in Grennock, Scotland, were nobody understood anything what was told, even my scottish(!) father just shrugged and said: “they know we’re germans so they do this on purpose!
July 21st, 2008 at 9:27 am
@Sebastian: What’s your point? People who make grammar or spelling mistakes must not be allowed to participate in this discussion? Are you kidding or just plain arrogant? Do you really believe you can deduce pronunciation skills from spelling mistakes? Ever heard of dyslexia or good ol’ typos (choose vs. chose, for instance)?
July 21st, 2008 at 10:55 am
Isn’t it nice how much of a discussion each of these articles raises? Only for the record: I stuck to the AE I picked up during my exchange-year in 1985 and never got downgraded for it. I believe that understanding and being understood is the key here, and as someone has already pointed out, I mostly speak english with non-Brits and non-Amis, who mostly have their own, or an AE accent, which is predominant in business communication.
July 21st, 2008 at 3:58 pm
There are, of course, a lot of teachers here who still insist “red nicht in diesem klebrigen Ami-Slang” - and that’s deplorable, of course. I had a charming moment in my current LK when a student fresh from Maine with a very convincing accent told me, upon hearing me speak (I sound, although I don’t necessarily write, quite British) that he thought he needed to work on his British accent. I told him to forget about it. Now, this guy is actually a good student who frequently gets excellent marks - but I tend to mistrust people who claim their teacher gave them bad marks just because of an American accent. More often than not, they will just not be very good at English.
And yes, Matthias, you can deduce quite a lot about people’s language skills from the way they write. There are typos and then there are mistakes.
>Slang as in trunk where my teacher expected boot.
Please don’t call it slang when it’s not slang. It’s simply a different variety. And no, being closer to 17th century English doesn’t make American pronunciation any more or less valid than British English. They just are. Get over it already.
July 21st, 2008 at 4:21 pm
@Sabine:
“but I tend to mistrust people who claim their teacher gave them bad marks just because of an American accent. More often than not, they will just not be very good at English.”
You may do so. I went to the US with an A in English at the end of 10th grade and had 15pts (full marks) in 11th and 12th grade after I returned. In my Senior English courses in the US I was usually the student with the best grades, especially when it came to grammar and spelling. Why is it so hard to believe that some teachers feel threatened by more competent students?
But that’s just me.
—–
Regarding the discussions about “being able to understand English native speakers” … I must admit that I always had and still have trouble to understand BE. Of course, if I listen to a speech given by the Queen or back then by Tony Blair, it was no problem at all. But meeting people away from big cities … no chance. Or when I had British customers while I was working for a car rental agency at our local airport … I had no idea what they were saying and we actually ended up using more sign language than words
July 21st, 2008 at 7:33 pm
@ mez:
“Actually most Germans speak english neither with a british nor an american accent. Säi schpieek it wis a tschörman äkzent.”
You nailed it!!!
@ all:
Believe it or not - I’m a pronounciation freak: In school I had a British accent, when I went to Canada for 6 months I had a Canadian accent, and now, living in the US, I have a Midwestern accent.
I think if you learn the basics it’s a piece of cake to adjust. Just try it and keep an open mind about the language. I don’t think I would’ve made a lot of friends here trying to impose the BE on them.
Americans arrogant (regarding language)? I don’t know - I keep hearing that BE is the ONLY English, but I never hear over here that AE is the only TRUE English. Au contraire: When I slip back to my highschool days and use something like “fortnight” I get questions but never negative comments. I think Americans have more of an open mind in regards to their language. They try more to understand rather than to correct.
July 21st, 2008 at 7:57 pm
>> A German is 5 times more likely to come into contact with an American than someone from Great Britain
That’s why many Germans think English is a simple language.
*snicker*
July 22nd, 2008 at 5:49 am
I just love your blog
And you so damn right
July 22nd, 2008 at 7:48 am
>Why is it so hard to believe that some teachers feel threatened by more competent students?
Oh, I do believe that, and clearly your English is very good. I had an LK teacher myself who felt a little threatened that someone actually spoke and liked to speak English. He once told me I couldn’t call a shopping center a mall, as that’s a place where people go horseback riding in London. Oh well. And I do have some colleagues who have unreasonable prejudices against American English. It’s just that I’ve met plenty of students who came back from the US (or other places) with a good accent and some idioms, but with as little grasp of grammar and spelling as they left with. Not everyone will be brilliant at languages. Of course, in the long run all that counts is whether you can communicate well, but as a teacher, you have to take the overall competence into account.
The other day we had a surprise visit in class from an 18-year-old from Texas, who was quite happy to display his shocking lack of ignorance in matters linguistic and political. After one year of careful deconstruction of anti-American prejudices, he ruined my hard work at one fell swoop.
July 22nd, 2008 at 8:49 am
The whole British vs. American English debate is completely moot, given that native speakers of the English language have long since lost sovereignty over it anyway. To really survive in today’s business environment, you need to be able to be adept enough to deal with Chinese speaking bad English, Indians speaking bad English, and Russians speaking bad English — in addition to the masses of poorly educated, poorly spoken Brits and Yanks around.
July 22nd, 2008 at 10:25 am
> Sabine
“Please don’t call it slang when it’s not slang. It’s simply a different variety.”
Do tell that to my former teacher. In one exam, I wrote trunk and he wrote “AE slang, don’t use!” next to it. I should’ve put it in quotation marks, though, to make my joke easier to recognize.
Generally, my English education was laughable. I went to an altsprachliches Gymnasium and accordingly the English and French education was truly hideous. I more or less taught myself English with TV shows, movies, books and the internet.
Which led to an interesting incident where I failed grade 11 because of English and French (same teacher, too), switched schools to a neusprachliches Gymnasium and quite suddenly had an A in English! And still a D+ in French despite the fact my class had had French from grade 7 with five hours a week, and I had had French from grade 9 with three hours a week, i.e. had no chance in the first place.
My second English teacher had married an American, though, and hence didn’t care whether I used AE or BE as long as it was correct, leading to me choosing the Leistungskurs in the first place… of course THAT teacher was a “purist” (i.e. idiot) again, so down to B and eventually C it was.
But honestly, I don’t care much anymore; I got my Abitur, went on to university and it’s unfortunately a fact that my English is still better than that of 70% of the Anglistik students I know.
July 22nd, 2008 at 1:02 pm
“In German schools you will receive bad marks for speaking with an American accent or using American spelling if you picked it up during your high school year in the States. Instead you should be receiving bonus points for learning the standards of a world economic and cultural super power.”
My english teacher allowed students who went to the United States as an exchange student to speak and write american english - on the condition that they use *only* american english then. No usage of both “color” and “theatre”. The few who tried quickly came back to their senses and happily accepted The Queen’s English as the only way to speak english, and not that bastardized colonial way.
July 22nd, 2008 at 1:52 pm
“The few who tried quickly came back to their senses and happily accepted The Queen’s English as the only way to speak english, and not that bastardized colonial way.”
Oh pray, do tell, what on earth is the “Queen’s English”, where is it spoken and by whom?
July 22nd, 2008 at 7:20 pm
By teachers like the one who told my husband:
“Martin, it’s your turn. In your best Queen’s English, please.”
I roll my eyes in his general direction. Even the Queen has drifted downmarket in terms of language during her reign.
July 22nd, 2008 at 7:34 pm
Oh wow John, I believe you have stirred up quite a hornets nest this time.
I live in the US, I work for a German company. I have a co-worker who is British.
This is an interesting blog.
As there are many dialects in Germany, and in the UK, there are also just as many dialects in the US.. Each with their own slang. Personally, I find people in the US from the North East, and Deep South hard to understand some times, as they are quite different in terms of accent and slang. I also find it just as hard to understand my co-worker from the UK.. Different words, different pronunciations. What I find funny is the use of very odd words when some of my German co-workers use English. They put some words in wrong places, and leave others completely out.. Some of it I can attribute to learning BE.. Some of it I believe is a mixture of Deutsch and AE. For example: “We didn’t take breakfast in this morning”
“I am sorry you spent your holliday at hospital” “We should be for making the better looking version of the thing”
See what I mean?
>Sabine
“The other day we had a surprise visit in class from an 18-year-old from Texas, who was quite happy to display his shocking lack of ignorance in matters linguistic and political. After one year of careful deconstruction of anti-American prejudices, he ruined my hard work at one fell swoop.”
Please, please, please, please, do not let this one bad encounter with a “Southerner” (as we call them where I am from) ruin your perception of all Americans. People from the south tend to be a little more prejudice and ignorant of things not from the South. (NOT EVERYONE from the south is like this, but there are a LOT that are)
There are a lot of Americans that use better english, and have a better understanding of political matters than your surprise guest.
John: I hate using generalizations so much, but in a discussion like this, its almost impossible not to do. Not to mention the fact that SOMEONE will disagree with your generalization because they’re one of the few people that do not fit it and will become upset that you made it.. Why does no one understand that a generalization does not mean EVERYONE, but MOST?
Scott
July 23rd, 2008 at 12:20 am
yay. i was quoted, because i said british english sounds better, and doing a grammar mistake in the same sentence. it is even the favourite one of sebastian \o/ i won this discussion, can be closed now
July 23rd, 2008 at 12:51 am
Wait… Am I not getting something? Didn’t Sabine say “lack of ignorance”? Doesn’t “lack” mean that something is missing? I’m a bit confused… Please help this poor English-learner out!
July 23rd, 2008 at 12:53 am
Hey Fabian, this English native speaker is just as confused. I think it was supposed to be either lack of knowledge, or just ignorance.
People from around these parts and especially that age are often proud of not knowing anything…
July 23rd, 2008 at 6:12 am
Ha! my own shocking lack of ignorance is exposed! Of course it ought to be lack of knowledge or level of ignorance or abyss of ignorance. An edit function would be nice
Scott, I believe the mangled sentences and the weird use or non-use of articles is just one of the general difficulties people encounter when learning a foreign languages and not at all the fault of British English or even of a particularly German handicap. Do you speak German at all? If so, you may have noticed that articles are a particularly thorny problem - in German even more so, because of the gender hassle. I find that even quite advanced students still get the odd article wrong, because it is really very difficult.
And never fear, I certainly won’t let that idiotic young man ruin my perception of Americans, although I’ve got to say I’ve only ever seen anyone that stunningly ignorant* on television, and I’d always thought these people were paid by sensationalist reporters to say these things. But it’s my job to give my students a balanced picture, and he really blew it. The boy who brought him to class was deeply embarrassed and apologized to me afterwards.
*we were reading Macbeth at the time and I thought it would be a nice idea to have a native speaker read a part (one of the few prose sections) - but to hear him stumble through the lines and then afterwards declare that this “Old English” wasn’t really read by anyone anymore and that he knew plenty of dumb kids who wouldn’t understand it (as if!)…
July 23rd, 2008 at 8:31 am
@Sabine: einfach nicht ignorieren…
July 23rd, 2008 at 8:43 am
“we were reading Macbeth at the time and I thought it would be a nice idea to have a native speaker read a part (one of the few prose sections) - but to hear him stumble through the lines and then afterwards declare that this “Old English” wasn’t really read by anyone anymore and that he knew plenty of dumb kids who wouldn’t understand it (as if!)…”
Well, he IS partly correct. That type of English is in fact NOT spoken anymore, which means that most English speakers nowadays would need some form of training in order to be able to enunciate and narrate it correctly. This is the reason why we have specially trained Shakespeare actors, which is probably what you would have needed and not some 18 year old with no idea of 16th century English literature.
Would an 18 year old German native speaker be able to correctly narrate 16th century German literature?
July 23rd, 2008 at 12:57 pm
“Would an 18 year old German native speaker be able to correctly narrate 16th century German literature?”
not perfectly, but it would be possible i think
July 23rd, 2008 at 4:23 pm
“not perfectly, but it would be possible i think”
Well, you’d have to be fairly well educated or trained to be able to properly read and enunciate 16th century English literature. That type of language just isn’t in use anymore.
July 23rd, 2008 at 5:46 pm
To my students, however, it is many times more foreign and they managed to do a pretty good job.
>That type of language just isn’t in use anymore.
Yet Shakespeare remains wildly popular. Come on. I wasn’t expecting a new John Gielgud or anything, just basic reading competence of a scene in prose. If learners of English can do it, a native speaker ought to be able to do it, too.
July 23rd, 2008 at 6:14 pm
I find it neat how Shakespeare’s English is sometimes more simililar to modern German with “Thou hast…” and such!
July 27th, 2008 at 3:29 pm
a german once said to me when i was in the gymnasium trying desperately to make friends, that in order to speak american english, all you have to do is chew some bubblegum and proceed. i laughed a little, but was also a bit offended. Is that really what some germans think about AE? it was the first i’d ever heard of it…
July 27th, 2008 at 5:32 pm
That is exactly what everyone says about American English here. I’ve even heard teachers say it…
July 28th, 2008 at 9:44 pm
“People tend to invent all sorts of nouns and verbs and make words that shouldn’t be. I think we have to be a bit careful; otherwise the whole thing can get rather a mess.”
“We must act now to insure that English — and that, to my way of thinking, means English English — maintains its position as the world language well into the next century.”
I think that’s what Prince Charles would have to say about this…
July 30th, 2008 at 1:54 pm
>> Would an 18 year old German native speaker be able to correctly narrate 16th century German literature?
Let me think… 16th century, hm.
What about the Luther Bible, more or less the birth of what is called “Hochdeutsch” today, completed in 1534. So yes, I think it’s very well possible, as long as it’s not an original printed in Fraktur.
However, some might even have problems reciting Goethe, though that may be a problem with reading in general, unfortunately.
July 31st, 2008 at 12:13 pm
I agree. And not just because i always got bad marks for using american english (our teacher was a brit-loving bitch) ^_^
August 1st, 2008 at 6:19 am
Oh, I can’t pass this up. The best English is, of course, in Canada. Well, except for in Quebec and Newfoundland, of course.
The Canadian accent is not dissimilar from the AE often heard on the national US evening news shows, and generally has very clear enunciation. It’s not usually easy to use accent alone to determine whether your co-worker is from Vancouver, or from some muskrat-infested bog in northern Manitoba.
There are far fewer “like’s” and “y’know’s” in use (there’s need to mention “eh”) compared to in the US.
Popular (American) opinion to the contrary, “about” is NOT pronounced “aboot”. It’s just got a sort of Canadian sound, more formally known as the “Canadian raising.”
If a Canadian goes to England, it’s generally easy for them to pass their accent off as American, especially by using some carefully chosen Americanisms. Whether doing that’s a good idea is a different topic.
In the US, a Canadian accent usually puts one in the “friendly neighbour”, uh, “neighbor” category. However, when someone with an English accent is visiting the US, Americans can never quite shake their vague suspicion that the visitor may, in fact, be a foreigner.
Canada are content to use British spellings, except when it makes no sense.
So, think of the advantages if one learns Canadian English (CE) instead! The very best part: any inconsistencies or errors can be attributed to a critic’s poor understanding of the lesser known CE. You might slip something through by saying something like: “Well you see, in Canada they often spell it the way I did. Of course, the variant you mentioned is also acceptable.”
August 1st, 2008 at 7:06 am
“English is the world language because of America, not because of England”
Hahaha. So, the fact that England had colonies all over the world wasn’t the major reason that English is the world language?
August 7th, 2008 at 9:31 am
I absolutely agree with what Curtis wrote.
All this is what I experienced as well.
a) English spoken in the UK is as good (or bad) as English spoken in the US. It`s good or bad in a different way, maybe, but the overall quality is not noticeably better on either side.
b) Which is easier to understand (BE or AE) is a matter of “exposure” rather than an absolute quality of BE/AE.
I don`t have any problems with understanding AE- my fiance is American, I watch a lot of US movies, and I´ve spent quite a few months in the USA.
BE is much harder for me, but I´m sure that, had I spend more time in Great Britain and my fiance was English, it´d be the opposite.
Also: which is easier to understand, High German or Swiss German? Well, ask a Swiss guy and a German, and you will get two answers.
c) It seems to me it´s a very German thing: the need for choosing ONE English accent as the (”officially confirmed”) better one.
Why´s that?
Britons don`t do that all the time, and neither do Americans.
The British and American people I know are extremely relaxed about different accents- some even show a certain fascination.
They might be smiling about “funny words” or the unfamiliar sound, but they do it in a well-disposed way.
Really- it´s always the Germans who are unrelaxed and split into two parties (with any member of the opposite party being considered almost a traitor).
________________________________________________________
Curtis wrote:
I really don’t see what all the fuss is all about. I’m an American that’s been teaching English for over 11 years in Austria, and I’ve yet to see any important differences between BE and AE. I teach my students/pupils Standard English, so that they can be understand anywhere in the world. If we encounter a word like “color”, then I explain to them that there’s another spelling variation “colour”, and that it’s far more important to consistently stick to one style of spelling and pronunciation than it is to worry about whether AE is better than BE and vice versa.
I also encounter a lot of bias and b*llshit regarding the so-called superiority that BE is supposed to have over AE. People here swear that there’s something inherently better about British English, for example British people supposedly speak more clearly, use better grammar, use less slang, etc., etc., yet hardly any of these Austrians or Germans have ever been to England to actually hear how people there communicate. For the record, I’ve been to England several times, and I can assure you all that the British do NOT speak a superior form of English to the Americans. As a matter of fact, they speak so badly there that most of the times you can hardly understand what they’re trying to tell you. A large percentage use appallingly bad grammar, swallow or mumble all their words and use the most unclear and confusing accents I’ve ever heard. What most Austrians/Germans don’t know, or what their teachers never teach them in school, is that what they call British English is spoken by a minority of British speakers - mostly educated professionals who reside in London. Everyone else speaks some form of insufferable dialect that requires subtitles in films (even in English speaking countries!) in order to be understood.
The English language in England is being so badly mutilated that CNN reported several months on accent schools in London, whose only purpose is to train British speakers on the correct usage of English language. Apparently, so many Brits are now being turned down for jobs because of their bad English or incomprehensible accent, that people are now having to resort to accent school in order to polish their grammar and develop a more neutral, professional sounding accent.
So much for the superiority of British English!
August 8th, 2008 at 6:33 pm
I remember watching the OV of Chicken Run in English class back in school, and how our teacher, a quite competent guy, named all the different British accents therein + the stereotypes associated with them! (Sadly I don’t recall details anymore. Only in the case of the hen with the tartan scarf, because this is so obvious…)
August 12th, 2008 at 5:50 am
British English is simply a lot more classy and stylish. It sounds and looks just as distinguished and clean as the culture it represents. That’s why I prefer it over American English any time. What’s more: In England, I never came across even a fraction of those dreadful mutilations Americans constantly inflict on their language, like for instance “Nite” instad of “Night”, “L8er” instead of “later” etc. Stuff like that, in my opinion, is a sign of linguistic decay.
Personally, in the late 80s/early 90s, I had the choice between studying in the US and studying in Great Britain. Guess where I spent three years of my life. Guess where I got my BA in the end…
August 12th, 2008 at 6:01 am
PS: Just for the records: US immigration has left quite a few stamps in my passport(s) as well. I’ve been mostly to New York City and to Talahassee, but I’ve also spent some time in North Carolina. I had been taught British English by some teachers, and American English by others, and I have no problems whatsoever with either version.
August 13th, 2008 at 7:53 am
Ute wrote:
In England, I never came across even a fraction of those dreadful mutilations Americans constantly inflict on their language, like for instance “Nite” instad of “Night”, “L8er” instead of “later” etc. Stuff like that, in my opinion, is a sign of linguistic decay.
__________________________________
Interesting.
First, I experienced the exact opposite.
Whenever I come across something like “i luv 2 talk 2 u kiz cuz ur cool” it’s definitely written by a Briton. AMericans don’t do it to that extent.
Second, “nite”, “lite”, etc. are mutilations, yes.
But language is organic- it develops and changes (this also applies to what we call “British English” today, right?)
Why would that be a sign of linguistic decay?
It’s so funny- as I mentioned above (August 9th or so), it’s always the Germans who have the need to take sides with either the British or the Americans. It seems like taking sides with the one party makes you an enemy for the other party.
Why does it seem to be impossible to grant each English “dialect” their own benefits?
August 19th, 2008 at 5:48 am
I’m not taking sides. It’s a matter of preference, of taste, if you like. British English simply has a nicer ring to it.
Maybe it’s something to do with the fact that American English is (in Germany at least) often associated with loud, obtrusive American tourists who noisily stomp through our churches and seem to regard the whole of Europe as one giant amusement park, erected for their personal pleasure, and to be raced through in a single week. If that. [g]
(How’s that for a topic for your blog?
)
August 24th, 2008 at 6:45 am
to alleviate your irritation john i will tell you the reason why germans do not learn english the correct, the american way.
in places outside the ozarks it is considered not quite chic to sound like you’ve skinned a squirrel for breakfast.
also having just recently lived down a certain reputation for unilateral tourism germans don’t want to be met with the same kind of warm hospitality americans enjoy wherever they go.