American English...

I would think by now, over my many years of blogging (or not blogging for that matter) that it would have become painfully clear that I have a passion for the English language. I don't feel that there's any point denying it, and am proud to say that I love the English language and the grammar which gives it structure.

I would say that I'm probably an oddity in society as most people are content abusing the language I adore, rather than spending the extra syllable to say a whole word or even using the same number of syllables to say  the same thing with grammatical correctness. While shortening words or pronouncing "th" as "f" is something which I consider physical laziness (rather than mental ineptitude), when a person actually replaces "was" with "were", or other such infractions that don't save time, it is just ignorance and hubris in their challenge of the norm. As with all hubris, it will lead to our downfall.

Although I am given great hope and am very proud at the underground movement to improve the spoken and written word, there comes a point where I feel there is a lack of distinction being made with many of the websites that claim authority over peoples linguistic queries.

Speak American Gawddamnit!

While travelling the world with my then girlfriend, my now wife and I were in the back streets of Venice, lurking and exploring and smelling the wonderful aromas wafting through the narrow doorways of the restaurants at dinner time. When by chance we are stopped in the crowd by an woman who in her brash loud voice asks, "Do you speak American?!" I looked at her, looked at my wife, looked back at her and replied, "No, but I do speak English fairly well."

We all laughed, she at her nativity, us at her ignorance.

Of course I didn't (and don't) blame her for thinking American is a language. American English, even though any difference other than accent would be unrecognisable in the spoken form, does have a different spelling structure to Standard English (what I'll call the form of English used in the UK, Canada & Australia from here on). But the lack of distinction which was displayed by the woman in Venice is now filtering through to the websites that are popping up all over the internet to help instruct people in grammar, spelling and other like queries.

The issue at hand...

Recently I've seen more and more websites come up in my searches when I'm checking something here or there (as I wouldn't consider myself proficient yet), and only after reading through a page of explanation find a line at the bottom stating that in the UK, Australia and Canada they do it differently. At times I wonder if the Americans creating these websites know that the "www" at the beginning of their url means World Wide Web, for I'm certain that they think that only Americans can access their websites, thus avoiding any confusion for those in the rest of the globe using Standard English.

I suppose it's not really an issue, as once I finish reading the waste of time that the websites have offered me I go back to a tried and tested resource to get the relevant information. But something, even a little flag placed on the page to show what the default definition is would be helpful to the billion or so other users looking to improve their English language skills.

Not to say that I have an issue with American English for existing - it attempts to rectify much of what is confusing or illogical in Standard English (although some might say it doesn't go far enough), but rather my gripe is for the confusion it can create for those who aren't sure of their abilities to begin with.

It's these perverse websites that influence our children to stray from the norms of society. Nothing irks me more than correcting a students hand written work for American English spelling mistakes, and I think that this differentiation between grammar and language websites would offer the clarity to those who seek it.