Overestimating the British Public

A famous newspaper owner once said something to the effect that he would never go bankrupt by underestimating the intelligence of the British public.

A piece in the Guardian the other week took the opposite view. The author is a Polish journalist who is obviously intelligent, well-educated and has a good command of English. Unfortunately she has chosen to live in the UK where this combination of attributes makes her one of the minority.

The author is a bit snobby about the average British person whose vocabulary isn't as rich as hers and whose grammar isn't as accurate. I can sympathise with her to some extent; as she didn't go through the British school system she didn't learn the hard lessons about not showing off your knowledge to an unsympathetic audience.

It seems to me that her English teachers didn't advise on tuning her language to her target audience. I suspect that her teachers felt that accuracy was more important. I try to take a less lofty view with my classes and would point out elements of language which were grammatically correct but not used by, say, 99% of native speakers.

If she does persist in complaining about poor English among the native speakers, given Lynn Truss's success with "Eats, Shoots and Leaves" I wonder if there is an opening for a pedantic book on English usage written by a non-native speaker...

Newsbiscuit

One of my work colleagues sent me a link to Newsbiscuit the other day. This is a satirical news site, I guess it is the UK's answer to The Onion.

Here's a taster - Doctor's receptionist awarded honorary medical degree.

Tart Fuel and Arse Antlers

Every English teacher knows how important it is to have a good dictionary. Students whose first language is not English can have difficulty with slang, jargon and new usage of existing words.

They can try looking up words in a dictionary, but an older dictionary may not be any help.

I was pleased to read that the McQuarie Dictionary, Australia's National Dictionary, is running an on-line poll allowing readers to select their new word of the year for 2007 from the words which the dictionary has just included fpr the first time.

My favourites are:

arse antlers - a tattoo just above the buttocks, having a central section and curving extensions on each side.

floordrobe - a floor littered with discarded clothes, viewed ironically as a clothing storage system.

tart fuel - wine coolers and alcopops, viewed by men as deceptively alcoholic drinks that will lower a woman's resistance to sexual advances.

Another one which I need to watch out for is boomeritis - the range of sports-related injuries incurred by baby boomers as they pursue health and physical fitness programs into their old age, such as bursitis, tendonitis, sprains, strains and stress fractures.

The full list is here.

I hope that Angela is reading, I would like her perspective on this as an Australian.

Fame at last!

Happy New Year to everyone, particularly Arno, my faithful reader.

I was surprised and delighted to receive e-mail from an editor at Schmap.com, an online tourist guide. They were looking for pictures for the latest edition of their guide to Prague, and asked if they could use one of the pictures on my Flickr site.

I said that they could, and the picture is now linked in their guide.

OK, it's hardly a commission from National Geographic, but it's better than no recognition at all.