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This blog is written in en-GB

shkspr.mobi

51–60 of 474 posts

Re: This blog is written in en-GB

#51
post #28

I am the only Brit in the department I work in. No one gets the cultural references or British idioms I use, and I've found myself significantly changing the language I use to a very utilitarian and direct style to prevent the endless blank stares... reading this blog post just made me realise that this self-editing has made my interactions rather more 'flat' and unnatural, as they now lack spontaneity, with everythi…

Think of it as learning a second language. It should be a lot easier for you than most people.

Re: This blog is written in en-GB

#52
post #19

I have to admit I have every device running some sort of voice assistant on en_GB or Australian the American voices always sound like parodies or the Walmart greeter. The intonation is perpetually trying to please me, as if programmed for relentless customer service. It's hard to explain, but there's something exhausting about a voice that's always smiling.

TBF, some Australian accents put a rising intonation at the end of sentences, as though the speaker is always asking their interlocutor for approval. Just another thing that's reminiscent of Clive James' remark that too many Australians are descended from prison officers.

Re: This blog is written in en-GB

#53
post #25
post #7

Being proud of your culture including your language and exercising it, at the risk of readers not understanding everything immediately, is not racism. In the worst case, a non-British gets curious about one expression or the other and looks it up. That's engagement.

It's funny, and perhaps not entirely unwarranted, that "racism" pops up here? As a Black American, I find the author's idea extremely interesting and naturally began to wonder -- what might this idea (in code?) look like for us? Owing to history and whatnot, the role "Black American English" might play is of course very much a moving target, but it's interesting to think about.

Is there an internationally agreed upon standard for designating AAV? I suppose it's a large and influential enough dialect it wouldn't hurt to have one

Re: This blog is written in en-GB

#58
post #21

It should be just "en", since we invented and it's the one true version:-)

That may be true, but in practice, US english has no taken over as the de-facto English. All thanks to the Internet. I am glad someone is pushing back on this, though, and I want more multi lingual sites on the Internet in general.

No, no I don't think it has. Americans are vastly outnumbered by commonwealth states using and teaching standard English

Re: This blog is written in en-GB

#60
post #19

I have to admit I have every device running some sort of voice assistant on en_GB or Australian the American voices always sound like parodies or the Walmart greeter. The intonation is perpetually trying to please me, as if programmed for relentless customer service. It's hard to explain, but there's something exhausting about a voice that's always smiling.

When I still used siri I had it be a british woman solely because it made me feel like I was in a James Bond movie
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