Oh, one thing I do, I'm not sure if it's normal or not, but if I have a character from a foreign place speaking, I'll use whatever spelling they would use, but only within their quotation: "What a beautiful colour," spoke the honorable Queen Elizabeth. I feel like it provides a subtle accent which would be hard to convey in writing.
Have you been participating in discussions with Latinos who are disgruntled by the gentilicio that Americans use for themselves and which the rest of the world applies to them? I've seen my fellow brethren perennially engage this topic, in deep umbrage, and with much culturally sanctioned chest-thumping, and some proffer "United-Statesers" (a one-for-one cognate with estadounidenses) out of a sense that somehow U.S. citizens have usurped the word American, which, in a different sense, does also apply to everything in the New World. The fact that my people spend time on things like this is one of the reasons why we have no space programs.
Might have. Maybe. Probably. Yep. Friends of mine. Lovely people. Angry sometimes. At stuff like this. Think I might be with them, actually. In spirit, anyway. Perhaps. I've devoted a surprising amount of class and social time to this thorny issue. I actually laughed aloud. I am still laughing. I will laugh some more when I tell my friends.
Be sure to give me a heads-up since my grave breach of the el pueblo no se chotea* rule will surely have the Culture Police beating on my door. * In my neck of the hispanosphere chotear means to tattle or tell on.
@Wreybies I will tell them you are Mexican. The Spanish (Castilian speaking ones — mustn't forget to keep everyone happy) get ticked off by the old Americanians appropriating the word as well. Pero bueno, se queja la gente y luego no hace nada (it's a national sport, you know). But we (I consider myself adopted) do chip in to the European space programme. There are plenty of satellites with Spanish bits on them. I'm hedging now, aren't I? Still laughing though...
A bit, but that's ok. I have even more heretical views as regards nuestra madre, España. First of the madres to abandon her "children" after the Age of Exploration and yet, the New World still gives Her obeisance. In an attempt to keep my comments at least laterally related to the original post, I point out that to this day, here in the New World, Spanish dictionaries are not considered "real" if not stamped (there's an actual seal on the front cover) by the Real Academia Española. That would be akin to Americans kowtowing to the OED. Preposterous. ETA: To be fair and bipartisan, asking Brits to kowtow to Webster would be equally preposterous.
She was the first to cast off her críos so her guilt makes her angry that they might forget her. You just wait till the Brits have faded further [farther] into the pages of history, and they'll launch a reconquest of their own — the war of independence [revolutionary war] is not over. They're gonna spike the burgers, a coup d'etat that puts a Limey in the White House. Webster's will be burned from coast to coast, and the people in this thread will be the first against the wall. Wait till you see the colours of their eyes. There. Not derailed at all. Right back on track with the original topic.
LOL The Resistance will paint "Honor" and "Valor" (sans U) in large red letters across city walls in abject defiance. It will be the War of Words, The Skirmish of the U. I totally feel a short story brewing.
I can't tell you how many times, here in Scotland, somebody asks me 'where in America do you come from?' This from people who know I'm not a Canadian or a Mexican. America really has become synonymous with the USA in usage here, anyway.
Yeah, that whole thing with the word American is an internal argument contained pretty much within just the Hispanophone world. When you present the argument to others as a thing, it tends to just get this face:
What you think are actors, are actually spies. We shall replace all of your actors with our own, and, when the time comes, it will be too late, you shall pronounce aluminum properly.
The Brits pronounce aluminum that same way as the Youessayians. But they do say al-you-min-ee-um, when they maintain the imperial eye (aluminIum).
Exactly. If I'm reading a book where the POV character is British, they bloody well better use British spellings, particularly if the setting is the UK. Otherwise it seems fake.
So - many - drunk - nights coming home to Tempelhof AFB in Berlin from the Linientreu club, and stopping at the döner stand at Platz der Luftbrüker with a wild case of drunken munchies. Ah, days of youth...
I'm with you on that one. It depends on where the story is set and the characters. My story is set in New York, most characters are American and the one who isn't, is an Italian living in America for at least 14 years, so speech and spellings are of the American variety: Trash/rubbish Pants/trousers Basin/sink Color/colour Neighbor/neighbour Basque/bustier Etc.
Hear, hear! . . . But here in the US I believe we, too, call the garment a bustier. I've never heard of the term "basque." Except as the name of a people who live in the north of Spain and don't really agree with the Spanish.
And while, as an American I know what a basin is, that's not the word I would use. It's a sink. Everything but the kitchen basin sounds bizarre. Sink. It's a sink. Kitchen sink.
Over here in the UK it's called a basque. My US spellchecker kept capitalising it and that's when I decided to research the US term. It was the same with the UK stockings and suspended belt, which in the US, is a garter belt. Amazing what you find out when you're an author.
