Just Blame the Americans

A recent article on the BBC web site bemoans the "lengthy stream of Americanisms" entering the British language.  We look at what's really at the bottom of this. According to the Oxford Guide to World English, "American English has a global role at the beginning of the 21st Century comparable to that of British English at the start of the 20th". Is that what's really pissing the Brits off?

Toni:

When I first moved to the States, I arrogantly assumed that British English was correct every time. When telephone customer services messages promised to be with you "momentarily" I would sarcastically wonder how such a fleeting amount of time would serve my needs. And then I looked up the word - to find that in both British and American dictionaries, it did indeed include the meaning of "in a moment", even though at the time that wasn't widely used in England. Ah. Well then.

When I see denouncements like this BBC piece, proclaiming "Ugly and pointless new usages appear in the media and drift into everyday conversation", quite frankly, it really annoys me. OK, ugly is subjective, so I refuse to argue with the author,  - but pointless?? They're not pointless in the States, and no one is forcing Brits to adopt these phrases. What and with whom is his beef? Surely he can't be blaming Americans for the adoption of their phrases in Britain? Given that 80% of American don't even own a passport, it's not like they're crossing the Pond and physically forcing Brits to use their terminology.

On the one hand he acknowledges that technological terms, such as "cell phone" versus "mobile" have grown up on their own, but he derides "elevator". Excuse me? I'm pretty sure the first Brits in America didn't have multi-storey buildings which required a mechanical means of getting from one floor to the other. Like technology today, Brits and Americans came up with their own words - and both are correct. The contraptions elevate people to the next floor, and they also lift said people.

As for poo-pooing American spelling, just go back to Shakespeare's time and you'll see no "u" in words like color and honor. As most linguists will attest, language moves and develops more at its root than anywhere else, so it's often British English that adapts and morphs. Americans say "closet" instead of "wardrobe" because that was the English word more commonly used by Brits until the beginning of the last century.

To be fair to the author, he ends by stating that Brits are letting British English wither. So instead of the withering ridicule of American English, which serves its own country very well thank you, perhaps more criticism of Brits? Surely in this case, that's where the real problem lies.

Mike:

Like nearly everyone with a broadband connection, I have seen the articles about those annoying Americanisms insinuating their way into British English.  I liked the first one, and my wife and I laughed over every one, and agreed with most.  The rest of the articles—the commentaries, rebuttals, additions—I ignored, until I had to do some research for this post.  Seems a lot of people are pretty upset about this, and I see slings and arrows going back and forth across the pond claiming first dibs on certain words, or accusing one person or the other of being the equivalent of an etymological racist.

I find it all faintly amusing, and beside the point.

What these people are complaining about is no different than what I went through while I was living in New York and my kids came home from school saying stupid shit like, “My Bad!” and, "Awesome, dude!"  (We blamed California.)  Likewise, I cringe when I hear people using business-speak in real conversation, the likes of “24/7,” or “deliverables” or “FYI.”  Other words on the list were simply colloquialisms; I use some, I don’t use others, and I use some sayings--which are not on any of the lists--simply to annoy anyone who didn't grow up in Stuyvesant Falls.. (e.g. "Crick" is how we pronounced "Creek," and if you went into a bar you might be asked, “Ya want a dub-ya?” because “W” was the term for beer, but no one could tell you why.)

So I have no problem with the Brits being irritated at the apparent take-over of British English by American English; I feel the same way.  But words are not the issue here; they are just an unambiguous line in the sand, palpable evidence of a larger phenomenon that plays on their underlying fear of change.

Linguistic rage springs from the same root as  the uneasy feeling you get (but often don’t admit to) when you see the pastureland outside of town being bulldozed to make way for a warehouse-sized ASDA, or when that new-age hippy family moves in next door, or when you notice an increase of foreign accents on the high street.  The core question is not, “What is happening to my language?” or even, “What is happening to my country/county/village/home?”  It is “What is happening to the things I find familiar?”

In my own universe, being different was my familiar thing, but now a lot of people talk like I do and I find that sad; it's like Britain is disappearing one idiom at a time.  Watching something you found comforting and reliable slip away forever is bound to make you feel confused and frightened, but if you feel yourself getting angry about it, and blaming it on "them" (at the moment, it's the Americans) then, as Toni points out, stop letting it happen.  In this instance, it's simple:  keep using your own language.  We're not forcing you to use ours, honest.


For more on this topic, pop over to the excellent post from Not From Around Here, another American in the UK. 


And please tell us what you think about it all.