american (mis)use of english - the queen responds!

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It's amazing how riled up people can get about different dialects of a language, and about spelling. Ideally, people should be able to spell words however they want as long as it is understood, like they did in Shakespeare's time. Most of the original diversity of English has been eliminated anyway.

Lingua Brittanica topic

All languages evolve. Some of the Italian words spoken in Toronto amongst second and third generation Italian Canadians are incomprehensible to those coming over from Rome today.

There are language standards in the places of higher learning, especially for written assignments. This is an area in which correct grammar and English (or French, if you are in a Francophone environment) is important.

The Queen could have done with a thorough education in linguistics. I'm an Irish person, living in England, part of my degree was in linguistics... and I can say that there is no "gold standard" of how English should be used. For example, English as spoken idiomatically by the Irish actually has an extra tense from standard English, which means that our English is slightly more subtle in some ways. The Irish in general use a more varied and slightly more old fashioned vocabulary than their English counterparts. That does not mean that Irish English is superior, just that it is different. Those differences are looked down upon by academics (and presumably the Queen) but the fact is our usage reflects our culture. The same can be said of African/Asian dialects in English... the ways in which different ethnic groups use language reflect their heritage. The US is a melting pot of many different cultures, and from that crucible a unique form (or I should say unique forms) of English have arisen. So, quite frankly American English is in no way worse than "English English", it's just different. In other words, the Queen is dissing cultural diversity... she's a racist. For some reason in this country you can be racist to Americans, and nobody notices it.

The Queen simply isn't as well educated on these matters as she should be. Most people with her level of ignorance regarding cultural dialects wouldn't be quoted, however, so it's not really fair to laugh at her for her ignorance. Because almost every ignoramus thinks they're an expert on everything, her level of certitude despite her ignorance of the subject is scarcely remarkable. The only problem is nobody ever told the Queen that her opinion doesn't really matter.

LOL at all you people taking this seriously...