Re: The Worldwide Queen's English
By Dan Wilson, forwarded by Robbie Rhodes
Thanks to Darrell Clarke for the informative reply (sent to all).
Dan Wilson's rejoinder is below. (And I certainly enjoy the mild barbs he throws at us "non-speakers" of the Queen's English!)
... So, when I'm in the UK I wear "trousers", and otherwise I suppose that I wear "pants." Is wearing pants or trousers optional? ;-)
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| Robbie Rhodes |
| Return-Path: rrhodes@foxtail.com |
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Date: Mon, 30 Sep 96 01:05 BST-1
From: dwilz@cix.compulink.co.uk (Daniel Wilson)
Subject: Re: The Worldwide Queen's English
To: rrhodes@foxtail.com
Robbie -- How to invent Esperanto, very slowly !
The Latin nations welcome unchanged spelling in Latin-derived words (when you see a Spanish-English dictionary you realise just how many words are closely similar), and the Germanic nations welcome unchanged Germanic-derived spelling. Friesian (coastal Dutch) is almost modernised Anglo-Saxon.
I don't think an Australian can make too much of a thing about the "..or" ends. They have the Labor Party, after all.
I did some research on an English Victorian engineering family about 20 years ago. Their letters were peppered with "..or" and "..our" endings without preference or consistency. I don't think the UK standardised (..ized !) "..our" until around 1910. It's a non-issue. The important thing is to respect different usages, like "vest" and "pants", when you're in another country's discussion.
All best
Dan Wilson |
(Message sent Mon 30 Sep 1996, 04:46:44 GMT, from time zone GMT-0700.) |
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