dialects

[Do228]

Do many Englishmen get angry when they hear people talk with heavy dialects, e.g. Indian English or Scottish English?
I as a speaker of standard German feel so annoyed when I hear Austrians, Saxons, Bavarians, etc. talk because it feels to me like they're raping the language.

 

[emsr2d2]

Do many Englishmen get angry when they hear people talk with heavy dialects, e.g. Indian English or Scottish English?
I, as a speaker of standard German, feel so annoyed when I hear Austrians, Saxons, Bavarians, etc. talk because it feels to me like they're raping the language.

1. I'm sure we've told you before that "Englishmen" is probably not the word you want. It's better than "Englanders" (I can't remember if it was you who previously used that) but it really doesn't mean much. Do you mean "native speakers of English who come from the area referred to as England"? And what about all the women from England?

2. What makes you think that Indian English and Scottish English are necessarily "heavy dialects"? And do you mean "dialect" or "accent"?

3. What exactly is "standard German"?

4. I really think that comparing language use to rape is unnecessary and verging on offensive.

 

[jutfrank]

Do many Englishmen get angry when they hear people talk with heavy dialects, e.g. Indian English or Scottish English?

No.

I as a speaker of standard German feel so annoyed when I hear Austrians, Saxons, Bavarians, etc. talk because it feels to me like they're raping the language.

That's unfortunate.

 

[Do228]

1. I'm sure we've told you before that "Englishmen" is probably not the word you want. It's better than "Englanders" (I can't remember if it was you who previously used that) but it really doesn't mean much. Do you mean "native speakers of English who come from the area referred to as England"? And what about all the women from England?

2. What makes you think that Indian English and Scottish English are necessarily "heavy dialects"? And do you mean "dialect" or "accent"?

3. What exactly is "standard German"?

4. I really think that comparing language use to rape is unnecessary and verging on offensive.

I used "Englishmen" for 2 reasons. A) My favorite term "Englanders" is not really accepted on this forum and B) "Englishmen and English women and English transgenders and English kids etc." would be too wordy, wouldn't it?
Frankly, I wish you would encourage your pupils to use "Englanders" more often so that it maybe becomes a common term someday. I mean it's a short, catchy term which includes males, females, everybody, don't you think so?

 

[Rover_KE]

How do you feel when some native English-speakers address all German people as Krauts?

 

[emsr2d2]

I used "Englishmen" for [STRIKE]2[/STRIKE] two reasons.
A) My favorite term "Englanders" is not really accepted on this forum and B) "Englishmen and English women and English transgenders and English kids etc." would be too wordy, wouldn't it?
Yes, it would be too wordy. Did you consider "English people"? That's the collective term.

Frankly, I wish you would encourage your pupils to use "Englanders" more often so that it maybe becomes a common term someday. We're not going to do that.

I mean it's a short, catchy term which includes males, females, everybody, don't you think? [strike]so?[/strike] It's one syllable shorter than "English people" and it's not catchy. You have to remember that it already has negative connotations, as you've been told before.

Please see my comments above.

You need to remember that people in the part of the UK referred to as England don't routinely refer to themselves as English. Most of us say we're British or that we're from the UK. Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish people do tend to be a little more specific.

The dictionary definition of "Englander" is "a native of England", meaning only "someone who was born in England". In this multicultural society, being born in England does not dictate your accent. It tells the listener/reader absolutely nothing about someone's nationality or ethnicity and, therefore, nothing about their accent.

In your first post, you used the word "dialect". That's not the same as "accent". If someone from Scotland started speaking to me in their specific dialect, there's a good chance I would struggle to understand them but that's down to a combination of accent and vocabulary. According to your post, because I speak with an accent from the south-east of England, I should be annoyed by this Scottish person. Of course I wouldn't! My first reaction would be fascination and then I would have to ask the person if they could, effectively, translate what they'd said for me.

 

[Disckstuckinfan]

There is no such thing as Indian English.

 

[Disckstuckinfan]

Although there are countless English dialects, I have always thought that the official variations of English are British and American.

 

[jutfrank]

You need to remember that people in the part of the UK referred to as England don't routinely refer to themselves as English. Most of us say we're British or that we're from the UK. Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish people do tend to be a little more specific.

I'm not sure I understand what you mean here. Of course people from England refer to themselves as English, as people from Scotland refer to themselves as Scottish and people from Wales as Welsh. All of these groups refer to their wider identity as British, since a) these territories are part of the greater territory that we call Britain, and b) British is the word we happen to use for our nationality as UK citizens. Northern Ireland is an interesting case in that its people, being citizens of the UK, are technically British by nationality, even though they live in Ireland, not Britain.

Nationality is only one way of the many different and important ways in which people identify themselves.

 

[jutfrank]

There is no such thing as Indian English.

That seems a strange thing to say!

Although there are countless English dialects, I have always thought that the official variations of English are British and American.

I wonder what on earth you might possibly mean by "official variations". In what sense did you think other varieties were unofficial?

The terms 'dialect' and 'variety' do not mean the same thing.

 

[emsr2d2]

I'm not sure I understand what you mean here. Of course people from England refer to themselves as English, as people from Scotland refer to themselves as Scottish and people from Wales as Welsh. All of these groups refer to their wider identity as British, since a) these territories are part of the greater territory that we call Britain, and b) British is the word we use for our nationality as UK citizens. Northern Ireland is an interesting case in that its people, being part of the UK, are technically British by nationality, even though they live in Ireland, not Britain.

Nationality is only one way of the many different and important ways in which people identify themselves.

I'm struggling to quite explain what I mean, in all honesty! I think it might have something to do with Scottish, Welsh and Irish people seemingly being a little more proud of their heritage. If you ask someone from London where they're from, they're likely to say either "London" or "The UK" (or maybe "I'm British"). If you ask the same question of someone from Glasgow, they're likely to say either "Glasgow", "Scotland" or "I'm Scottish" (the same idea goes for someone from Cardiff or Belfast). I'm only going by my own experience. Of course, their actual nationality is British (I am very aware that "nationality" is used very differently in AmE).

And yes, people from Northern Ireland live on the island of Ireland but they don't live in Ireland (if you use Ireland to mean the country).

 

[Tdol]

There is no such thing as Indian English.

Yes, there is.

 

[Tdol]

Although there are countless English dialects, I have always thought that the official variations of English are British and American.

There is no such things as official English- a number of English-speaking countries don't even have English as an/the official language. Australian, South African, Jamaican, Singaporean, Indian, etc, etc, Englishes are all English.

 

[Tdol]

I as a speaker of standard German feel so annoyed when I hear Austrians, Saxons, Bavarians, etc. talk because it feels to me like they're raping the language.

I am closing the thread because of this. We are more likely to get angry when we hear our fellow speakers described as language rapists. This seems more nationalism than linguistics to me.

 

[probus]

There is no such thing as Indian English.

You are dead wrong about that, and you can take it from me: a native speaker of English and a citizen of India.