American English Professor hates British English
- Thread starter Naheal
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The closest I can think of is when I edit wikis (since I can't tell the difference between proper British spellings and just plain incorrect spellings, I get a lot of flack for changing what I see as incorrect spelling but is viewed as correct British spelling [seriously, why do they spell paralyzed with an 's' and color with an 'u' and etc?]) and my occasional use of British slang (usually it's limited to 'bloody').
You must have been blatantly writing stuff like "colour" or "armour". If you were adding U's to your words i'm not surprised he was mad.
Due to reading widely when I was younger, I used to mix the two (and still often do in my spelling in casual situations) and I was told by numerous teachers and professors to stop. I did and I can entirely understand the problem they had with it. Forbidding the use of one or another is dumb, but forbidding mixing is sensical from an academic standpoint.Naheal said:
And as for the English knowing about the English language, what is that even supposed to mean? Languages aren't some weird "thing" that exist independent of the people who speak them. People can't know more about a language than other people who speak it. Assuming you're a native speaker of English, you know English as well as any other native speaker knows English, regardless of what dialect you speak. If you want to make a point about who knows the prescriptive rules of academic English better, you're still in trouble. Though English arose primarily in England, older English looks absolutely nothing like academic English and the varieties of English spoken and written in England today are similarly distinct from academic English. As it turns out, many strictures of academic English never existed in any spoken dialect of English.
If it's an American English class he's right, if it's simply an English class, they he should let up on it, but still, if you're in America, he's not completely wrong.
I recall one of my teachers in high school assigned the class a research project, but didn't allow us to use one of the most useful websites I found because it was made with British spelling. Apparently spelling color as colour is a crime to my teacher.
I suppose the first question that ought to be answered is whether or not you are British, or from some other place that would sensibly use British grammar, or where raised in a household populated by people of this background.Naheal said:
If not, it would appear that you're being pretentious. When writers are intentionally and needlessly difficult in their writing style, it only serves to muddle (and thus diminish) the message, so the professor would be right in telling you to stop it.
If you are, then it is important that you be consistent in which style you are writing. If you expect to write acceptably in both, you've got to learn to compartmentalize them. It's called code-switching, and human beings are perfectly capable of doing it as they do so all the time without training or problem.
Why should you be consistent? It's because what you write and how you write isn't about you. It's about the reader. That's the first lesson anyone writing anything has to learn. If you're writing for an American audience and you're using British spellings, British turns of phrase, British slang, or other localized features of the language, you're going to likely confuse those readers who aren't familiar with such things. If you're constantly jumping back and forth, it's even worse, because they can't even get a consistent frame of reference for what to expect.
When you stop and think about it, a professor asking you to tailor your writing style to the audience at hand (Americans) is no more problematic than you insisting that every member of your potential audience adopt your particular preferences for communication. In fact, the professor is more correct in that he is encouraging you to write in a way that is audience-friendly.
I remember when I was learning Spanish there were some differences in conjugating certain verbs to accommodate Spain Spanish and South American Spanish, similar to the different Brazilian's you describe.The Random One said:
*Shrugs* I don't think one is better than the other, they're just different, and I don't really see a problem with them being different. If I were living/working/studying in Britain I would do my best to use British grammar, same for America. I think your professor was a bit of an ass in the way he handled it, but I also think it's important, at least in academic or professional writing, to have consistent grammar and can understand how blending the two might be irritating.
The english didn't quite invent the english language
they had many influences from europe after they got invaded so many damn times, mainly scandanavia
and the mixture of languages slammed together and over centuries created English
but here's the thing, The English had the decency to rename this malformed version of anothers language
and brabded it 'English'
If the Americans don't like it
why don't they have the decency to rename their language 'American'
and yes i know it's just one man in question who doesn't like it
i'm just hypothesising
they had many influences from europe after they got invaded so many damn times, mainly scandanavia
and the mixture of languages slammed together and over centuries created English
but here's the thing, The English had the decency to rename this malformed version of anothers language
and brabded it 'English'
If the Americans don't like it
why don't they have the decency to rename their language 'American'
and yes i know it's just one man in question who doesn't like it
i'm just hypothesising
