On the recommendation of a few friends I checked out a book from the Library called Watching the English by Kate Fox. It is so fantastic, I wish they had one called "Watching the Texans" when I moved to Amarillo! The most interesting part is that I have a little bit of an uncontrolled experiment going on because I'm reading the book as I'm here and so sometimes find myself in situations before I've read about them and sometimes after. For example, we went to a pub on Friday and I noticed some differences between American bars and pubs, but didn't think too much of it. Reading her chapter on Pubs though threw a whole new light on the experience. When we went in I automatically started looking for a place to sit and wait for a waiter, but my brother said no, we have to go to the bar to order. Fair enough. But Kate goes in depth as to why this is so, how the English use going to the bar as an opportunity to talk to other people since starting conversations is culturally more difficult here etc. etc. Fascinating.
The chapter on language was really interesting too, having lived with Madeleine (Hi Maddy!) for a while, then reading about all the words she uses and what they mean in terms of where someone is from etc. What I found particularly striking was how so many of the words that "smart" or "posh" upper class people used (sofa instead of setee, dessert instead of afters, home instead of inside, bathroom instead of toilet) were common (no pun intended, for those familiar with the English use of the word "common") in American usage. I wonder if Americans were trying to imitate upper class accents and that turned into the American vernacular? or did our adoption of those words evolved independently ? Fascinating stuff, even if you aren't an anthropologist. I did skip ahead to the chapter on sex (!!!) just out of curiosity and it largely involved a discussion on dating. Very apropos because a girl in the knitting group has a date on Thursday. Perfect for me to compare notes with Kate Fox's ideas on the subject.
Fun English difference of the day noticed at the Hammersmith Bus station waiting for my Red Double Decker number 220: Way out instead of Exit, Way In instead of Enter.
When I lived in Moorea there were two English girls living next door -- one from the North and one from the South. Aside from the radically different accents, they also used different terminology -- lunch vs. dinner vs. supper, etc. However, both called the sweet stuff you ate after the evening meal "pudding". It could be fruit, or cake, or ice cream, they called it all pudding. We had trouble explaining to them what American pudding is. :)
ReplyDeleteAlso, fwiw, I vaguely recall from my linguistics class that American English is closer to the English that was spoken in colonial times. Basically we stayed roughly the same and the accent/word usage changed over time in Britain.
ReplyDeleteAnother British-ism courtesy of the next-door Brits -- "tea" as a meal rather than just a beverage. :)
tea used for dinner is a term used by lower class English society, never to be confused with the tea the beverage, the life blood of all true English people! Pudding is used in all circles of society to mean anything sweet which follows a main course. 'Dessert', is posh terminology.
ReplyDeleteRe the bar, I have to disagree. The English are so generally socially repressed that they are not likely to start a conversation at a bar. Unless male and drinking alone, then starting a conversation with another lone male is fair game. Of course, if a man is looking for female company, he may also strike up a conversation at the bar!Its complicated!