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The TRUTH!!!

Yup. It's perfectly accurate and a neutral term. In any event, think of it as being less offensive than being called English because someone thinks it's all the same.

Actually, your name is a classic example. Elizabeth - the current Queen - is officially Elizabeth II, but of course there's never been an Elizabeth I in Scotland.

After she was crowned, ERII started to appear on post boxes, Scottish Government correspondece, Post Office vans, etc. There was a massive outcry and although Buckingham Palace refused publicly to back down, well - put it this way. None of these things appear any more.

It never occurred to the English that we might get upset!

It's especially ironic that a lot of foreigners call her the Queen of England, given that the English royal family died out with Elizabeth I and was subsumed within the Scottish Monarchy (James IV and I).
 
Architect said:
As opposed to Lisbon where?! :confused:
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If I hadn't specified, SOMEONE out there would be going "Lisbon?" ;)

Or thinking "What's a Submarine doing pulling into -

Here

Or Here

Or Here

Or Here

Or Here

Or Here

So, I figured I'd specify - Here :)

ETA: By the way, you ever been to -

Paris?

Rome?

The Parthenon? Athens is a very nice town!

Maybe Bristol is more to your liking?

The edit was to show two things. First, there was the chance, however slim, of ambiguity. And second that while we have shaken off the bonds of our overseas master's (;)) We still have many reminders of our heritage :)
 
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Architect said:
Actually, your name is a classic example. Elizabeth - the current Queen - is officially Elizabeth II, but of course there's never been an Elizabeth I in Scotland.
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I know, I remember the flap when Cunard started building the QEII. A lot of the people working on her (the ship, not the Queen) were Scots and got terrifically testy about the name of the ship. So Cunard very hastily said that the II meant that this was the second SHIP to bear the name of "Queen Elizabeth."

And I also remember that a lot of the Welsh were pretty resistant to the investiture of the current Prince of Wales.

So that's why I was surprised to hear that "British" would be acceptable to them. Although I understand how it might be preferable to "English." :)

I had never thought about that point you made, about the throne of Scotland actually taking over the throne of England with the Jameses. Of course, it's actually been the House of Hanover (now Windsor) since the Georges, right?
 
Oliver said:
As far i can tell concerning the german kind of reporting
about it - i guess there is no real difference. I guess these
two teams are called "Englische Nationalmannschaft"
and "Englisches Olympiateam".

I know the difference but the german language seems
to have difficulties to differentiate between "british" and "english".

Also the german translation of British Airways is not a usual
translation here - we use to say "British Airways". But i guess
that "Britische Luftfahrtgesellschaft" is the better translation
because the more familiar sounding name. :boxedin:

Oha - you got me. Is this some kind of Football-thing? :boxedin:
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That's "British Flying mover company" literally, am I right? (I never miss a chance to stay up on my pop quiz German).
 
ConspiRaider said:
So then us colonials should then never use "England" not never ever again - ever?

Frankly it's not a lot to get us into a twist over - we don't even know where England / UK / Britian / Great Britian / British Isles are and/or is. As long as we can find our way to the nearest Walmart, we're cool, dude.
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It may be something like talking to someone from Texas. He's a Texan, but he'd probably rather be called an American than a Yankee.
 
TjW said:
It may be something like talking to someone from Texas. He's a Texan, but he'd probably rather be called an American than a Yankee.
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Think of it more as how upset Texans would get if we started referring to all of America as California, and called all of you (Texans included) Californians.

And then the Californians did nothing to correct it.




In all fairness, I know dutch people who don't live in the bit called Holland that get upset when the whole country gets called that instead of "the Netherlands".
 
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Polaris said:
That's "British Flying mover company" literally, am I right? (I never miss a chance to stay up on my pop quiz German).
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Your knowledge is pretty good and also correct. You may
translate "Fahrt" as "Travel" or "Luftfahrt" as "Air-Travel"
- this would be a more literal translation. :)
 
Oliver said:
Your knowledge is pretty good and also correct. You may
translate "Fahrt" as "Travel" or "Luftfahrt" as "Air-Travel"
- this would be a more literal translation. :)
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Danke mein Freund. Aber, meine Deutsch ist nicht sehr gut.
 
Polaris said:
Danke mein Freund. Aber, meine Deutsch ist nicht sehr gut.
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You should try understanding hochsdeutsch when you've been brought up with Schweitzerdeutsch. :confused:


And go to school in a country where they also take time to explain the difference with Plattsdeutsch and so on. :eek:
 
Polaris said:
Danke mein Freund. Aber, meine Deutsch ist nicht sehr gut.
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Your german is pretty good - you may just practice it a little bit
more - just like i did when i came here. I guess i made some
pretty good progress. :o

Architect said:
You should try understanding hochsdeutsch when you've been brought up with Schweitzerdeutsch. :confused:

And go to school in a country where they also take time to explain the difference with Plattsdeutsch and so on. :eek:
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I also have problem to understand all the different "plattdeutsch"-
versions but you can compare it to standard-english and
hillbilly- or Slang-english. It just sounds different but somehow
it may be english, too... :D
 
Oliver don't start that again. Both your own Government and the EU say Plattsdeutsch is a seperate language.
 
Architect said:
Oliver don't start that again. Both your own Government and the EU say Plattsdeutsch is a seperate language.
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Pah! So you wanna have WW3? Well, you get it: :D

Plattdeutsch is formally a different language but it´s still
german. Is slang a different language, too?
11107451db56d36f14.gif
:p
 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plattdeutsch#Official_status

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_languages#Germanic_languages

http://www.international.niedersachsen.de/en/sprachen.html

http://www.geocities.com/Athens/9479/platt.html

http://www.linguistics.ruhr-uni-bochum.de/~strunk/LearningLowSaxonGender.pdf

On December 1, 1998, Low German was accepted by the European Council into the European Charter of Minority Languages. Low German now has official status as a language. This means, for example, that legal proceedings must now be conducted in Low German if requested and if it is the native language of either parties involved. A group of politicians and interested citizens under the leadership of Wolfgang Bürnsen, member of Germany’s Federal Parliament, organized the bipartisan campaign that is responsible for its success.
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Architect said:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plattdeutsch#Official_status
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Mhmm, i don´t care much about official definitions as long
i can understand "Plattdeutsch" and i can see that there
is the same sentence construction and choice of words.
For example: The residents of Berlin use to say "Icke"
instead "Ich" meaning "I". But i wouldn´t declare their
slang as being a different language because some different
sounding words.

I´m also able to understand large parts of the Amish people
but i guess their language is a different one because they
are pretty hard to understand. On the other hand Wikipedia
says that it´s just a dialect:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amish

But i admit - it´s pretty hard to distinguish between
hundreds of versions... :boxedin:
 
Never start an argument about minority and regional languages with someone who's first language is indeed a minority or regional language!

Tha mise ghaidhlig ach a beurla agamsa ceudeuchd!
 
Architect said:
Never start an argument about minority and regional languages with someone who's first language is indeed a minority or regional language!

Tha mise ghaidhlig ach a beurla agamsa ceudeuchd!
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Huh? Does this mean that "Tha mise ghaidhlig ach a beurla
agamsa ceudeuchd!" is some kind of Plattdeutsch? :confused:
 
Lit: For I myself am Gaelic, but I speak English too.


Gaelic is the traditional language of Scotland, but now confined to a small minority. The Gaelic Language Bill was recently passed into law and it's status has changed considerably:

http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/vli/language/gaelic/index.htm



The Parliament also use Scots (which I speak), arguably now just a dialect of English but certainly a seperate language right up until the 18th century. Several million speak it informally.

http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/vli/language/scots/index.htm


ETA:

Just as a matter of interest, and I'm not taking the mick, how much of this do you understand? You clearly have very good English, but I wondered whether you could follow it (hint, it's easier if you read it out loud as some words sound very similar to English):

http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/vli/language/scots/makingYourVoiceHeard/info/words.htm
 
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