Setting one's own standards
06AN
<<Also, why on earth would anyone want to learn an English dialect spoken by a small minority when the US alone accounts for 60% of all English speakers? >>
Not quite correct. The US accounts for 67% of all NATIVE English speakers - at a 1997 count.
<Sure, but that does not give a sole right to them for disrespecting the language and use it in whatever way they deem fit to use it. British English is correct English. >
We're not only looking at disrespect, but innovation, invention and nativisation. The latter are often positive things.
"those who make authoritative pronouncements about a standard English are simply those who, irrespective of accidents of birth, have elevated themselves, or been elevated, to positions of authority in academe or publishing or in other public areas. Whether or not their pronouncements will continue to be accepted is another matter."
http://education.guardian.co.uk/tefl/story/0,,638858,00.html
<<British version is more accurate and more original. Other versions are fake or circumcision adaptations of the original language i.e British English.>>
With all due respect, this entire idea is silly. 'British English', as you know it, developed out of Middle English. Middle English developed out of Old English.
Old English looks like this:
Hwæt! wē Gār-Dena in geār-dagum,
þeod-cyninga, þrym gefrunon,
hu ða æþelingas ellen fremedon.
If you want 'pure English', then learn to speak and write that. Everything since has been corrupted by, amongst other things, the Norman invasion of 1066 (and the infusion of French it brought to English) and lots and lots of outside influences from languages like Latin and German. In point of fact, modern 'British' English is full of all kinds of 'fake' things imported from American/Canadian/Australian English.
Of course, when you learn Old English, don't expect anyone outside of a tenured professor in the subject to understand you. Why? Because language evolves and changes. The authoritative version reacts and shapes itself according to the people who speak it, not a professor or linguist on high who decides the rules. It isn't dictionaries that decide how a word is said and people who go along with it; it's people who decide how a word is said and the dictionaries that go along with it.
As such, you can declare this or that accent to be the 'right' accent and all the others to be wrong. The net effect of that would be....nothing. The majority will continue to speak in the 'wrong' way, and the only result will be that you won't understand them as well as you might if you accepted the view that language isn't divine truth chiselled on a tablet somewhere that people either follow exactly or speak incorrectly.
"British version is more accurate and more original. Other versions are fake or circumcision adaptations of the original language i.e British English."
Hilarious!
You're not serious of course.
"Not quite correct. The US accounts for 67% of all NATIVE English speakers - at a 1997 count."
If that's the case, and my estimate was too conservative, then all the more reason for AE to have primacy over other forms of English!
Ha ha!
Boltonion English sets the standard of course, awight.
<<Boltonion English sets the standard of course, awight.>>
Boltonian! LOL!
<If that's the case, and my estimate was too conservative, then all the more reason for AE to have primacy over other forms of English! >
You missed your error. You said "60% of English speakers" when you really meant NATIVE English speakers. Do you see the capitalised word "NATIVE"?
<Boltonion English sets the standard of course, awight. >
Notlob for ever! Nethen, lad.
"The authoritative version reacts and shapes itself according to the people who speak it, not a professor or linguist on high who decides the rules. It isn't dictionaries that decide how a word is said and people who go along with it; it's people who decide how a word is said and the dictionaries that go along with it."
Is this true? I'm not so sure. The relationship between the written word and the spoken word is more symbiotic than you suggest. Because of the power of Standard English (as in the dictionary and grammar books etc) people are often unsure of how to pronounce a word. I bet you have experienced this as well - how do you say hegemony, or pedagogical? Even in my last sentence there is an example. 'Often' was originally pronounced without the 't', but people are now unsure as to how to say it... is it ofen or often?
Spoken and written language have become inextricably linked. You cannot simply seperate them and treat them as seperate entities (in my opinion of course).
>> 'Often' was originally pronounced without the 't', but people are now unsure as to how to say it... is it ofen or often? <<
No, often was originally pronounced "oftin" in the 1300s. It's still that way for most speakers of Canadian English.
The point still stands. Spoken and written language have become inextricably linked. The original view was too simplistic.