# American English in Harry Potter? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 7, 2004, 4:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-english-in-harry-potter/238687 "2004-04-07T04:19:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Flutterby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/6f9a4e/32.png) [@Flutterby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Flutterby)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2004, 6:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-english-in-harry-potter/238687/41 "2004-04-10T06:32:00Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Ooh, is that where you get antipasta, too? > > And strange though it may seem, I actually don’t have a problem with technology not working around Hogwarts. It’s totally illogical, but somehow it just… works. I don’t have a problem with it either… I suspect it has something to do with the fact that only wizards can get to this place/see it (I don’t recall anything saying different). It’s probably the huge magical field that protects it from curious muggles (Hey look at that castle up there! Let’s go check it out!) that interferes with the working of electrical fields. ---
**Author:** ![Tenar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/35a633/32.png) [@Tenar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tenar)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2004, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-english-in-harry-potter/238687/42 "2004-04-10T14:39:17Z")
The “Americanization” (or “Americanisation,” I suppose, if you are British) of books for a U.S. audience does nothing but diminish their flavor and the fun of discovery. I always loved coming across an unfamiliar term in a British story. It made things seem so exotic, and it made me feel rather sophisticated, as if I were being introduced to mysteries that eluded my peers. No, I haven’t read the British editions of Potter, unfortunately, but I doubt they included phrases like “the girl’s toilet” and “Stonewall High School”! Sheesh. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Fish](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/bc8723/32.png) [@Fish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fish)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2004, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-english-in-harry-potter/238687/43 "2004-04-10T16:45:40Z")
> [@TJdude825](#): > > “Lumos” > I assume it’s Latin… Yeah, well, _lemons!_ is so much more useful. ---
**Author:** ![AngelicGemma](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/439d5e/32.png) [@AngelicGemma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AngelicGemma)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2004, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-english-in-harry-potter/238687/44 "2004-04-10T18:52:00Z")
> [@Guinastasia](#): > > Another thing that got me was the students buying their books for school-do kids in the UK really have to buy their own textbooks? We didn’t in my school. I don’t know about the rest of the country though. ---
**Author:** ![SciFiSam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/47e85d/32.png) [@SciFiSam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SciFiSam)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2004, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-english-in-harry-potter/238687/45 "2004-04-10T23:25:50Z")
Some of those changes are perplexing. ‘Bollards’ are not ‘wastebaskets,’ they are four-foot tall concrete blocks in road or gateways to stop cars passing by. ‘Revision’ is not ‘research.’ Crumpets and muffins are different kinds of confectionary, aren’t they? Some of the other changes seem to be proofreading corrections that never made it into the UK editions (like changing a character’s name, or having Sprout lead them instead of Snape). Many of the grammatical changes make sense because, if you come across them while reading the book, they trip you up, make you focus on the form of the text rather than the content. I agree that ‘keep our peckers up’ would be rather distracting in the US! (To **Dung Beetle** , no, that phrase has never had a connection with penises in Britain). But changing Mummy to Mommy (and certain other changes) has the opposite effect - most people, even kids, know that British people don’t say Mommy, so that creates the same kind of linguistic obstacle it’s trying to avoid. It also gives the impression that everyone in the world speaks stand American English, thereby homogenising the world, which is not a Good Thing, and is less fun to read too. ---
**Author:** ![SciFiSam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/47e85d/32.png) [@SciFiSam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SciFiSam)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2004, 11:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-english-in-harry-potter/238687/46 "2004-04-10T23:31:24Z")
On the mater of textbooks - AFAIR, we were given some textbooks, and had to by others. ---
**Author:** ![SciFiSam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/47e85d/32.png) [@SciFiSam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SciFiSam)\ **Post date:** [April 10, 2004, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-english-in-harry-potter/238687/47 "2004-04-10T23:48:25Z")
> [@](#): > > had to by others Buy, buy! Preview is your friend. :rolleyes: The character that was mentioned earlier is Dean Thomas, btw, not Thomas Dean. They were just reading the names out surname first. ---
**Author:** ![pokey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ebca7d/32.png) [@pokey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pokey)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2004, 12:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-english-in-harry-potter/238687/48 "2004-04-11T00:41:21Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > Yet I didn’t see Canadian kids getting confused with the language. I wonder if Canadians use the British terms more than Americans ever do though. I always hear “dressing gown” and “going on holidays.” They sell crumpets right next to the english muffins here and you know I think a biscuit is a type of cookie that isn’t very good, like they type you would have with coffee The only thing I know about American biscuits is that they are some type of dinner roll. I’ve never seen one, but I guess I read the word biscuit in American books as a child and somehow figured out that Americans don’t eat oreos with chicken. Why would they change treacle toffee to treacle fudge? Americans never heard of toffee? We have always had toffee here. So many of these things sound totally interchangable to me and I can’t imagine anyone never having heard the alternate. Like tin versus can, timetable versus schedule, cupboard versus closet, wastebin versus wastebasket. Even still, it’s not like a kid can’t say, “hey mom what’s a que?” I mean, maybe they changed it because they didn’t want American moms to feel dumb, but I think most kids expect there to be things they don’t understand in a book. ---
**Author:** ![Saint\_Sparky](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ac91a4/32.png) [@Saint\_Sparky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saint_Sparky)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2004, 4:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-english-in-harry-potter/238687/49 "2004-04-11T04:25:26Z")
> [@SciFiSam](#): > > Some of those changes are perplexing. > > But changing Mummy to Mommy (and certain other changes) has the opposite effect - most people, even kids, know that British people don’t say Mommy, so that creates the same kind of linguistic obstacle it’s trying to avoid. It also gives the impression that everyone in the world speaks stand American English, thereby homogenising the world, which is not a Good Thing, and is less fun to read too. You know this is the one big thing that got me to. I noticed they corrected it for the latter books at least in the last couple everybody says “mum”. Oddly when I was 10 I read “The Rescurers Down Under” (the novelisation of the Disney movie) and the Australian kid in the book saying “mom” highly annoyed me even as 10 year old. ---
**Author:** ![auliya](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/90db22/32.png) [@auliya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/auliya)\ **Post date:** [April 11, 2004, 11:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-english-in-harry-potter/238687/50 "2004-04-11T11:08:27Z")
> [@Shalmanese](#): > > Not only was there an American version for Harry Potter 5, there was an Australian version which had Ron constantly spouting “mate” to everyone. I have no idea why this is but it was highly annoying. Are you sure? I just had a look at my kid’s copy, bought at the local Woolies or where ever, and although it says printed in Australia it is typeset and published in Great Britain. Also says its a first edition. I think you will find the use of the term “mate” is as British as it is Australian, so Ron using it isn’t unusual. from this [link](http://www.anu.edu.au/ANDC/Classroom/mate) > [@](#): > > The Australian National Dictionary explains that the Australian usages of mate derive from the British word ‘mate’ meaning ‘a habitual companion, an associate, fellow, comrade; a fellow-worker or partner’, and that in British English it is now only in working-class use. ---
**Author:** ![Shalmanese](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shalmanese](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shalmanese)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2004, 1:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-english-in-harry-potter/238687/51 "2004-04-12T01:54:41Z")
> [@auliya](#): > > Are you sure? I just had a look at my kid’s copy, bought at the local Woolies or where ever, and although it says printed in Australia it is typeset and published in Great Britain. Also says its a first edition. > I think you will find the use of the term “mate” is as British as it is Australian, so Ron using it isn’t unusual. > > from this [link](http://www.anu.edu.au/ANDC/Classroom/mate) I know that mate might be british but I asked several british people on the boards if they recalled mate in their versions and they all said definately not. ---
**Author:** ![mkl12](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b4bc9f/32.png) [@mkl12](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mkl12)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2004, 10:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-english-in-harry-potter/238687/52 "2004-04-12T10:31:31Z")
I’ve got the British version. Could you find one or two uses of mate in the Australian version? Then we would know for sure. ---
**Author:** ![auliya](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/90db22/32.png) [@auliya](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/auliya)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2004, 11:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-english-in-harry-potter/238687/53 "2004-04-12T11:56:23Z")
> [@mkl12](#): > > I’ve got the British version. Could you find one or two uses of mate in the Australian version? Then we would know for sure. From Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix: " “we wanted to give them to you, mate” said Ron" - bottom of page 61 " “All thanks to you, mate” said George" - middle of page 98 ---
**Author:** ![mkl12](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b4bc9f/32.png) [@mkl12](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mkl12)\ **Post date:** [April 12, 2004, 12:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-english-in-harry-potter/238687/54 "2004-04-12T12:17:59Z")
Thanks, auliya. Both of these “mates” are also in the British version, on the same pages even. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-english-in-harry-potter/238687.md?page=2)