Curious: the spellcheck on this site turned up last night in Imperial English. It has objected to neighborhood, aluminum, color, vise (the clamping tool), endeavor and paralyze so far, so it's fairly simple to spot a trend here.
I can't find anything under 'my account' to toggle it, so I'm guessing it's that way throughout the site right now. Is there a way to change it back for U.S. users?
Eric
Just think of it
as a cultural experience.
Browser setting
What standard is used is usually a browser or spell checker setting, not a website setting.
“When a clown moves into a palace, he doesn’t become a king. The palace becomes a circus.” - Turkish Proverb
English English
I’m a citizen of both the United States and Italy. I spent the greater part of my life (98%) in or around the United States and it was there that I learned English (or what the US considers English anyway).
Now for the fun part... I spent only three months in England back when I was twelve and during that time many of my word spellings shifted to English English. My spell checker still changes all my “misspelled†words into US English but my mind still writes in both.
Blimey, isn’t that a bloody kick in the face?
A.
(Am I a confused person? You bet.)
likewise
I spent a year at school in the U.K. when I was fourteen. It warped me for life, but in a good way.
not as think as i smart i am
Just think of it as the
Just think of it as the website showing all you english language abusers how to write, spell and use grammar properly.
Actually
Interestingly enough, in most instances American spellings are much closer to the original Middle English spellings. It's the English who started tinkering with the spelling not us silly Americans ;)
Besides, I've always found that in most instances American spellings are simpler and a better indication of how words are pronounced, regardless of accent.
Have a delightfully devious day,
Hmmm
Lets look at one word.
Centre or as you colonials prefer Center.
The root of it is French so Centre is more correct than Center IMHO.
Remember that the Normans invaded England in 1066 and the French influence on our language continued for 400 years (or thereabouts) which is far longer than the US has existed.
The Language taken to the US by the first settlers was adopted and made simpler (Hence the Centre-->Center, Colour-->Color etc etc).
And there it has stayed.
English (As spoken and used by the rest of the world) has evolved and is continuing to evolve where it is used.
Oh, and the English spellings are in Chambers but try stopping American PHB's from correcting your supposedly bad English!
It is not a simple as it may seem.
Exceptions
There are many exceptions, but if you look at etymology of many of these words. The American spelling of color, for instance, is a rather interesting one. 'Color' actually pre-dates the colonization of the Americas. I concur that Americans did in fact simplyify many spellings, but many (but certainly not all!) are closer to their Middle-English and/or Latin roots. 'Color' was spelt 'colour' in Middle English, but in Latin the spelling was 'color'. There were a number of variations in British English until about the 17th century when 'colour' become the more prevalent spelling. I tend to use primarily American spellings, but there are a few British English spellings I favor. Not really saying one spelling is better than the other, but merely stating my own preference.
Another side-fact most people don't know, the 'American' accent is actually closer to the pre-colonization English accent than the current day English accent. During the Revolutionary war British and American accents were virtually indistinguishable, but it wasn't the Americans that made drastic changes to the way we spoke (well for the most part anyway) it was the English. This article does a rather good job of explaining it.
Have a delightfully devious day,
spellin
Hey I am a Canadian and we allready spell right ...i think ...maybee ...mmmmmm colour tyre dumb ...right now my comp is havin a fit !
Which English is right?
^_^
Which begs the question which English is right? All of them of course. ;) That's why they're classified as separate dialects.
Have a delightfully devious day,
Which English is right?
While I've seen many people spell the word 'centre', I've almost never heard someone pronounce the word that way (except to make a point).
And the word 'colour', the only people I've heard say that word speak French primarily.
While I have no problem with differences between English (UK), and English (US), I feel that if you pronounce a word AS SPELLED you should get the word as spoken (taking in to account local variations for pronouncing those letters).
I'm told that it was Noah Websters fault.
Until Noah Webster wrote his first dictionary, people spelled pretty much however they wanted and it was up the reader to phonetically figure out what was meant. Mr. Webster was adamant that we separate ourselves from Imperial England and so "simplified" the spellings to be different in as many ways as he could. Since his dictionary became accepted in schools, we now have to spell the way he decided it should be.
See "Why Do Brits and Americans Spell Words Differently."
Hugs
Patricia
Happiness is being all dressed up and HAVING some place to go.
Semper in femineo gerunt
Ich bin ein femininer Mann
Is it central to our enjoyment?
Actually, the word centre in the UK and center in the US has its roots in Latin .... Not French!
The Latin word for it was "Centro", perhaps unsurprisingly very very very similar to the modern Italian word.
The US spelling is simply a bastardisation of the English word that was carried across to the States with the Pilgrims.
So do the US use the word 'central' or is it some strange contraption like 'centeral'?
What for me is unforgiveable in a writer is the use of wrong words, but still valid as words in and of themselves.
Women wear high heels - and NOT high heals. Doctors heal people (mostly), they do NOT heel them.
'Their', 'they're' and 'there' are frequently interchanged, and usually consistently - i.e. (which incidentally is also from Latin, it stands for 'id est', meaning in modern usage 'that is') many writers use 'there' when it should be 'they're' (short for 'they are'), but at least they do it every time.
Some here I have taken issue with, are inconsistent in their inaccuracies which just indicates a certain mental sloppiness to me. Why get it right once and then get it wrong only to get it right again later and then wrong again and so on?
One I saw recently was about a car being driven, and the driver applies the breaks. Excuse me??? I think, the writer meant brakes.
And the confusion between loose and lose. If you think that loose, meaning not tight, requires more space to be not tight then it's easy to remember which is which, since loose needs more space than lose (which means to not win, or to misplace something, or take something away as in losing weight).
All these examples are of words that pass a spellchecker but are still wrong in terms of language.
And then there's the frequent misuse of the apostrophe......
The ones who do not understand the reasons for the 'proper' use are quick to poo-poo the need for spelling, punctuation and grammar - and some even boast of the speed with which they have written their story, when spending some time on research might have helped make the story flow better for the more discerning readers.
I myself am not perfect, and I have never ever claimed to be, and I maybe spend too much time checking and double-checking, but still errors creep through (not threw!!!!). At least I edit the story when I see something wrong, or when someone is good enough to point it out to me.
Yes, there are usage differences between US and UK English, just as there are between Australian and Indian English usage. I don't think that we can have a spellchecker for all these, can we?
Wow - this turned out be more than just some gentle fun attempting to avoid any confusion that may have arisen from a potentially inaccurate statement.
Sorry for the verbiage.
Julia.
Browser setting
The setting is in your browser, not the website. In some cases, the setting is in your operating system though it may be overridden by the browser. There is a spellcheck for the editor in BC but it is not turned on and even if it were, it would use your browser setting. The spell checker you are seeing is running as part of either your browser or your OS.
Hugs,
Erin
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
Why use a spell checker at all?
I dislike spell checkers, auto-correct, and all that type of excessively helpful software.
The worst, of course, for unwanted helpfulness was Microsoft's talking paperclip.
If you have trouble spelling, then yes, spell checkers can help. But if you are smart enough to know that aluminum and aluminium are variants, then you probably don't need a spell checker. They aren't obligatory.
Kaleigh
To address the original issue...
If you're using FireFox, right-click in a text box where spell-check is active (if it's showing squiggly red lines, it's active), and select "Languages". It should give you a list of installed dictionaries. You will, of course, want to have "English (US)" selected.
For Chrome, again, right-click in a text box with spell-check on, then select "Spell-checker options", and make sure "English (US)" is selected.
I don't have Internet Exploder installed on this machine, so you're on your own there. Google might be able to help. ;-)
I happen to approve of the Queen's English.
For a time I was writing in that dialect in spite of the fact that I am a bloody colonist. I published a couple stories using it, but someone "helpfully" fixed it. :( I did not desire my writing to be fixed. HMPH !