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American flag or British flag for English | ||
Tags: Cultural Identity | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| COF Senior Member United States Joined 5831 days ago 262 posts - 354 votes  Speaks: English* | Message 1 of 66 16 June 2012 at 3:46pm | IP Logged | ||
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I've noticed that on websites with multi-language options, often the American flag is used to represent the English language, while, for example, the Portuguese flag is often used to represent Portuguese, despite the fact that Brazil has a much larger Portuguese speaking population.
Likewise, often the Spanish flag is used to represent the Spanish language, despite the fact there are various South American nations with bigger populations than Spain. On the whole, it seems most European websites predictably use the British flag to represent the English language. However, this is not always the case, some times even European websites use the American flag rather than the British flag. In general, what do you think is the best flag to use to represent the English language? I can see arguments for both. The US is the country with the largest native English speaking population in the world, so on that basis it seems logical, but the UK is where the English language originated and British English is considered by many to be the "best" English, so on that basis using the British flag seems logical too. Edited by COF on 16 June 2012 at 3:58pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| jazzboy.bebop Senior Member Norway norwegianthroughnove Joined 5418 days ago 439 posts - 800 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Norwegian | Message 2 of 66 16 June 2012 at 3:59pm | IP Logged | ||
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To be honest, I'm surprised more sites don't use the English flag for the English language. Then again, it isn't as well known as the union flag.
3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| ReQuest Tetraglot Senior Member Netherlands Joined 5032 days ago 200 posts - 228 votes Speaks: Dutch*, English, German, French Studies: Spanish | Message 3 of 66 16 June 2012 at 4:05pm | IP Logged | ||
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Depends, I've a dictionary with the union jack which uses british spelling and meanings for words.
But if a course features american pronunciation I think it shoud use stars and stripes on the cover. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| sillygoose1 Tetraglot Senior Member United States Joined 4636 days ago 566 posts - 814 votes Speaks: English*, Italian, Spanish, French Studies: German, Latin | Message 4 of 66 16 June 2012 at 4:12pm | IP Logged | ||
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Probably because that's the version they speak or are learning.
2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| iguanamon Pentaglot Senior Member Virgin Islands Speaks: Ladino Joined 5262 days ago 2241 posts - 6731 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Portuguese, Haitian Creole, Creole (French) | Message 5 of 66 16 June 2012 at 4:28pm | IP Logged | ||
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I don't care either way, as long as I can access a language I can understand. Nationalism is so yesterday. The flags are just an easy visual cue for convenience.
16 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| tarvos Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member China likeapolyglot.wordpr Joined 4707 days ago 5310 posts - 9399 votes Speaks: Dutch*, English, Swedish, French, Russian, German, Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Afrikaans Studies: Greek, Modern Hebrew, Spanish, Portuguese, Czech, Korean, Esperanto, Finnish | Message 6 of 66 16 June 2012 at 5:58pm | IP Logged | ||
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I use the flag of New Zealand
8 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| tommus Senior Member CanadaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5866 days ago 979 posts - 1688 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Dutch, French, Esperanto, German, Spanish | Message 7 of 66 16 June 2012 at 6:42pm | IP Logged | ||
I was wondering when you would return with another thread with a divisive and negative undertone. 22 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| COF Senior Member United States Joined 5831 days ago 262 posts - 354 votes Speaks: English* | Message 8 of 66 16 June 2012 at 7:44pm | IP Logged | ||
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I find that Americans in general are quite arrogant about their own version of English, "American English" and regard it as superior to British English and other forms of English.
If you look at Amazon reviews for the Teach Yourself courses, one of the most common complaints from Americans is the use of British English over American English. If they don't want to hear British English, perhaps they shouldn't buy a British made course? In fact, many Americans actually suggest other courses that use American English, because for what ever reason it seems most Americans can't bear to listen to any other accent other than an American one. 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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