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Merging of AmE and BrE | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| Josquin Heptaglot Senior Member Germany Joined 4844 days ago 2266 posts - 3992 votes  Speaks: German*, English, French, Latin, Italian, Russian, Swedish Studies: Japanese, Irish, Portuguese, Persian | Message 25 of 35 19 May 2012 at 3:55pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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I remember reading an article (don't know where it was though) where a British woman reported about the different expressions for "going to the cinema" in different generations of speakers. According to her, her own mother would have said "to go to the pictures", she herself would say "to go to the cinema", and her children would "go to the movies".
This is only one example for language change, but I think it definitely shows there is an American influence on British English. I don't know about the reverse situation though. Edited by Josquin on 19 May 2012 at 3:58pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Elexi Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5565 days ago 938 posts - 1840 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French, German, Latin | Message 26 of 35 19 May 2012 at 4:09pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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Interesting - I grew up saying 'going to the pictures' and then changed to 'cinema'
because 'pictures' sounded too common for me during an aspirant period. However, I would rather die than use the word 'movies'. 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Sunja Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 6085 days ago 2020 posts - 2295 votes 1 sounds Speaks: English*, German Studies: French, Mandarin | Message 27 of 35 19 May 2012 at 5:11pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
Feels outdated doesn't it? When I say "movie" I feel like I'm saying "moving picture"
I think there's still plenty of differences around, but they're not terribly confusing. sidewalk/pavement, traffic circle/roundabout, petrol/gas, aubergine/eggplant, braces/suspenders, dummy/baby pacifier, car boot/ car trunk, bucks/quid, line up/queue up, advertisement/commercial, booking/reservation, caretaker/janitor, cooker/stove. That's just a few. Foreign speakers have to learn the differences in school. I was checking my daughter's English homework and she used the word "cooker" and I (being from the US) had to think for a moment -- "ah-ha. That's stove." Other than that there's never any problem with understanding.
I think some people are hard to understand, irregardless of where they're from. I have a German friend who works for an international company and has no trouble with American, whereas he has a really hard time understanding British. I think part of it is that his ears are just more accustomed to American English. He also has one British colleague who's from the North and likes to drop everything: 'orrible, 'ow's, lorre-. My friend can't understand him. His other colleagues either speak with less of an accent, or they make the effort to speak clearer out of consideration for their non-English-speaking co-workers^^. There are some corners in America also with heavy-coated accents -- not that anyone thinks I'm picking on one region. Edited by Sunja on 19 May 2012 at 5:23pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| clumsy Octoglot Senior Member Poland lang-8.com/6715Registered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5178 days ago 1116 posts - 1367 votes Speaks: Polish*, English, Japanese, Korean, French, Mandarin, Italian, Vietnamese Studies: Spanish, Arabic (Written), Swedish Studies: Danish, Dari, Kirundi | Message 28 of 35 21 May 2012 at 9:30pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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If you think about it, why did Latin diverge into several languages?
Well, they did not have TV, nor Radio, so they had nothing to look up to. Too large area. but now, when we live in mass media era, things are very different, language change has been hampered, or maybe rather it became more widespread (American slang affects other 'Englishes' due to the influence of TV). I think in a few hundred years AE and BE will not be that different as Latin and Arabic became in different parts of the world, during the same period of time. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| hrhenry Octoglot Senior Member United States languagehopper.blogs Joined 5130 days ago 1871 posts - 3642 votes Speaks: English*, SpanishC2, ItalianC2, Norwegian, Catalan, Galician, Turkish, Portuguese Studies: Polish, Indonesian, Ojibwe | Message 29 of 35 21 May 2012 at 11:02pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
More to the point of the subject, TV and radio cause languages to become more homogenized. Without both radio and TV, Italy probably would not even have the standard Italian that it has today. Even in American English, if you listen to teens, most emulate their idols on TV and the radio, and most of those idols tend to have a fairly generic accent when they speak in public. Certainly teens today sound nothing like the teens where I grew up in Northern Minnesota. Their accent isn't nearly as strong as when I was a kid. R. == 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| PillowRock Groupie United States Joined 4734 days ago 87 posts - 151 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 30 of 35 23 May 2012 at 8:50pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
In my experience, that's how most Americans feel about saying "pictures". That was very common in American usage in the 1930s - 40s. The 1930s popular hit song "You Oughta Be in Pictures" was an American song. On the other hand, to many Americans "cinema" sounds like it is only referring to the portion of the medium that could be considered "high art". The word "film" sometimes can carry some of those same connotations. "Movie" comes across as a more casual, less serious, thing that is more "mass entertainment" than "high art". Even further in that direction is "flick". So looking at 1981: Chariots of Fire and The French Lieutenant's Woman were generally considered "films" intended for the "cinema", while Raiders of the Lost Ark and Arthur were very successful "movies", and Escape from New York was kinda a fun "flick". Note that it is always possible for a given film / movie to shift from one of those categories to another over the years, for example when a low budget movie is later recognized to have contained a higher level of artistry. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Sunja Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 6085 days ago 2020 posts - 2295 votes 1 sounds Speaks: English*, German Studies: French, Mandarin | Message 31 of 35 27 May 2012 at 6:51pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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This is cool, PillowRock.
Without making any kind of statement about what it is I say "film", but that's German influencing my speech. When students learn English here "cinema" is a place they go, like "ins Kino gehen". It corresponds nicely with "au cinéma". Your right, "cinema" also alludes to a category of filming that goes beyond general box office fodder. edit: typo Edited by Sunja on 27 May 2012 at 6:51pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| COF Senior Member United States Joined 5831 days ago 262 posts - 354 votes Speaks: English* | Message 32 of 35 27 May 2012 at 7:31pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
British people don't really speak like that. Such a stilted way of speaking would sound really unnatural and awkward to almost all Brits. The specific examples you use sound very unnatural, and such usage would likely sound foreign to a British English speaker. 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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