The Internet has facilitated the growth of global communities with people all over the world coming together to interact over specific interests - from role playing games and programming to cooking and parenting - as well as a general need to connect. Perhaps the biggest divider of community is language. If you can read and communicate in a certain language you can join that community; if you can’t you are naturally excluded or you have to build your own community. For those of us who speak English, coming across spelling and grammar idiosyncrasies can often bring back the awareness that we are communicating with others from a totally different culture half-way around the world. It can be tricky for editors to decide whether a “foreign” voice needs to be changed to conform, or retained for its fresh appeal. It’s a fine line that depends on many variables including an "irritation" factor. In fiction writing, dialogue is often spelt with artistic licence (i.e., incorrectly) in ...

Last month we started looking at some quirky differences between UK English (written English used in the UK and countries like Australia, New Zealand, and South Africa) and US or North American English used in the US, Canada, and countries that do a lot of written communication in US English (such as India, Singapore, Hong Kong). Here are some examples that you shared with us: Marsha Pants: NA = trousers; UK = underwear Rubber: UK = eraser! Fit: UK = slang for sexy or attractive; NA = in good physical condition Specialty (NA) vs Speciality (UK) Artefact (UK) vs Artifact (NA) Star A fanny in American means your bottom but in England that means a lady's private parts. Meg "Color" and "colour" Jon Gibbs When I first moved to the US, I got a strange look from a builder when I told him his partner had popped out for a fag. In England that means you've stepped outside for a cigarette. Apparently it means something quite different over here :) menopausaloldbag (MO...

In years past, people would travel if they wanted to experience a different culture. These days we can simply click a mouse and go surfing. The Internet has become such a normal part of our day to day life that we no longer really consider the fact that we are interacting with people from all over the world. If you keep a careful eye on vernacular English, you can really expand your markets for articles and short stories, in particular, or even pick up some out-sourced work. And, of course, it is a simple matter to edit your old articles to rework them for a foreign market. Here are my top three favourite differences between North American English (NA) and UK English (UK): Aluminum (NA) Aluminium (UK) American English has dropped the second “i” and changed the pronunciation to “al-oo-mi-num”; UK English pronunciation is “ala-min-ee-um”. I could care less. (NA) I couldn’t care less. (UK) UK English speakers don’t consider “less” to be a negative, but a comparative - ie, the opposite of ...

Most people who bother with the matter at all would admit that the English language is in a bad way, but it is generally assumed that we cannot by conscious action do anything about it. Our civilization is decadent, and our language--so the argument runs--must inevitably share in the general collapse. It follows that any struggle against the abuse of language is a sentimental archaism, like preferring candles to electric light or hansom cabs to aeroplanes. Underneath this lies the half-conscious belief that language is a natural growth and not an instrument which we shape for our own purposes. Now, it is clear that the decline of a language must ultimately have political and economic causes: it is not due simply to the bad influence of this or that individual writer. But an effect can become a cause, reinforcing the original cause and producing the same effect in an intensified form, and so on indefinitely. A man may take to drink because he feels himself to be a failure, and then fail...