“Foto Booth”, “Lite meals”, “Drive Thru”, and so forth.
I can’t tell you how angry these kind of things make me. Do they exist because Americans are stupid, lazy, or both? (Not directed to anyone specific, just the population of the United States of America as a whole.)
The only reason why this stuff is in Canada is due to the fact that it has seeped through the Canadian-American border. I blame you, lazy Americans, for these stupid things.
Sorry, I’m in a foul mood (which has occured because I just ate a “lite” microwave dinner).
Studi
When I grow up, I want to be the Minister of Silly Walks.
Well, on the other hand, we go out of our way sometimes to ADD a letter to an otherwise shorter word, like fat becoming phat (with a different meaning, of course). Does that make you feel any better?
“Are you now or have you ever been a member of a communist dishwashing organization?”
Frank Burns, MAS*H
It bothers me too. My personal “favourite” is “Valu”, used in the name of some store chains: Valu Plus, Top Valu, Valu Mart… I pronounce it “valoo”, in spite of what marketing experts want me to say.
Oh, and this American almost never writes “through” as “thru”.
I’ll bet some of you can think of other differences between British and American spelling. Studi, I sympathize, but those odd spellings are sometimes necessary so that a name or phrase can be trademarked or copyrighted. One cannot trademark an already-existing word, you know. That’s why we have Kodak and Kleenex, for example.
1)either. I use “colour” for the noun, “color” for the verb.
2)“favour” is to give preferential treatment.
A “favor” is something you do for someone. Again, verb and noun.
3)This one is tricky. “licence” is the actual permission, “license” is the card that you carry around to prove that you have licence.
4)either one. Just take your pick
5)“magick” is more mystical than “magic”. People believe in the former, people pull rabbits out of hats and call it the latter.
6)definitely "
Of course, this is all just my opinion. But hey, who’s with me?
From what I have observed, in general words that are changed to different spellings are intended to indicate an accent, most prominently eubonics, or in advertising, as jab1 said. Besides, the average American is not stupid, they just watch too much tv and rot that … thing… used… for … you know!.. think-eng?.. :rolleyes:
I have never seen “foto” anywhere except Fotomat, which is a trademark and therefore merits a qualified exemption.
I believe that “Thru” first appeared on traffic control signs (No Thru Trucks) and was justified because signs had to be kept small but the words had to be large enough to be visible from a distance.
I don’t know where “lite” came from, unless it was Bud Lite or some such nonsense, in which case it is hereby granted an exemption under the Fotomat clause.
I try to expose myself to a fair amount of publications & periodicals on a day-to-day basis, and I will also confess to residing in the offending country. I have never seen these spellings in any newspaper, magazine, flyers or received correspondence, and if I do happen to see this in the future I will probably just overlook it as a simple mistake. I will also refrain from issuing slanderous remarks about the general population of the author’s entire country.
Don Ho can sign autographs 3.4 times faster than Efrem Zimbalist Jr.
Anyway Studi, you fighting a phenominum (sp?) that has more than one source, depending on what word you mean. Like “Thru”. Someone mentioned earlier that probably came about because of highway signs. “Through” would be very long and distract the driver (WAG). The dumping of the “u” from colo<font color=purple>u</font>r and hono<font color=purple>u</font>r came about from Webster. And I have no clue how <font color=purple>gaol</font> equals jail. (I’m off to www.m-w.com ) I guess it’s British.
Many more come from corperate marketing geniuses, the folk behing prefixing “i” or “e” to anything in high heaven to make it "high tech"y.
It’s the new <font color=blue>iEnglish.com</font>
Tell a man that there are 400 billion stars and he’ll believe you. Tell him a bench has wet paint and he has to touch it.
I find ‘lazy spelling’ as annoying as I find lazy speech, but as pointed out above most what you cited is trademarked. The problem as well as the advantage is that English is a living language - it changes. It will continue to evolve and change (and certainly not always for the better) no matter how much it annoys people who actually know the correct pronounciations and spellings of words, or even Canadians
All you need to start an asylum is an empty room and the right kind of people.
I’ve been inspired by the original post. I’ll think I’ll stop by Winchell’s from some donuts today.
But I do agree that many of these short spellings occur for no good reason other than to save space on a sign. If you don’t want to have that many letters on the sign, then use a picture!
I think ‘Lite’ was started by the Miller Brewing Company, as they were the first to market ‘light’ beer. (My recipe for light beer? Take a 16 oz. glass, empty a 12 oz. can of beer into it, top off with water).
I think they tried suing other companies when they started using that spelling. They lost.
