I love the English. The best vacation I have ever had is when I spent 8 days in England my senior year of high school. If I were ever going to seriously consider relocating to another country I would live in England in a heart beat.
The history is amazing. The literature is wonderful. The food isn’t bad. The culture is great.
I met the nicest people during those 8 days. People spoke to me on the Tube, in the parks and at different shops. Very friendly.
In fact, one of the things I want most to do before my life closes is to go back to England and take my sons to expose them to what I enjoyed so much.
You can ask us, but I think, while we are talking about the general opinions of Americans towards Brits, that you’ll find that the distinction is almost entirely meaningless. To the average American, England is the UK is Great Britain. Many simply aren’t aware of the difference, don’t understand it, or don’t know that, given that there is a difference, it’s of a good deal of importance to the peoples involved. Thus, asking the opinion of Americans specifically towards the English isn’t going to narrow it down to just England.
Since we’re all about fighting ignorance, may I alter my plea, then, to “find out the differences”. If we’re looking for stereotypes, think a) mountains, Loch Ness monster, kilts; b) teacakes, language with lots of consonants, Tom Jones, Anthony Hopkins, Richard Burton; c) The glens, the Reverend Ian Paisley, the fact that it’s on a different island; and d) all the other stuff we’ve been talking about.
Once I spoke at a conference immediately after a very refined-sounding English gentleman. I’m from Texas, and although I don’t sound particularly Texan, I still felt like a bumpkin in comparison. Not that there’s anything wrong with Texans or bumpkins, but I think a lot of us are secretly a little envious of that accent. Same for the Scottish accent. The only native English speaker I’ve ever had trouble understanding was an Irish woman, but I think it was her mumbling that caused the trouble.
In general I like Brits a lot. I sometimes get the feeling that lots of them don’t particularly like Americans, but that may just be their generally more reserved, understated manner. Anyway, I get that feeling from lots of nationalities. The more intelligent people assess individuals as individuals, regardless of what they think about a country’s leaders and politics. So put me down in the positive group.
Well, I certainly know the difference, and I fully support your quest to educate us ignorant foreigners , but I just thought I should point out the ignorance of my countrymen with regard to the cultural, political, and historical divides within the United Kingdom.
Sorry about the crazy time-delay double-post. I think it was while the thread was being moved.
Something that’s been tickling me…Spogga never said the Brits were our little brother…he called us little brother. As in: “So, little brother, what do you think?”
Spogga: I thought the wall was across Northern England, but still England proper.
As UI’ve noted before on the SDMB, this term sounds incredibly unappetizing. To an American, it sounds like what you get when you leave the milk out of the 'fridge too long. I could never understand why people in novels were ecstatic about “clotted cream”. At best, it sounded like crude cheese made by letting milk spoil. Yecch.
Then I got some in a little plastic container on British Air to go on my bread. It wasn’t at all the way I’d imagined – more like sweet butter. Except I still can’t get past the name – “clotted” applied to spoiled milk and to blood, and in neither case is the image it conjures up appetizing.
As someone (Shaw? Churchill?) is supposed to have said: “Americans and British are two people separated by a common language.”
Dude, we must be hate twins. I hate the words “diaper”, “pacifier” and “mom”
I don’t like how you call a “pram” a “buggy” either -
You guys might refer to such a vehicle as a " buggy ", but then, you are all crazy Americans.
**" Dude whats that?"
"It’s for pushing your kids around in, my moms grammy said it’s called a pram "
" A pram? What a weird name dude, it’s bugging me out. Yo check this, we should change that name to something crazy like we do to all the stoopid English words "
" I know, lets call it a Dinky or a Buggy or a Braberheimen or something"
" I’m so there dude " **
Oh and what the f*ck is chicken fried steak? Is Chicken the name of the chef or something? He must do a good fried steak then, he must helicopter from place to place to cater for the demand of his skills.
Or is it steak that’s cooked by an actual chicken? If it is then that is just so unhygenic.
Or is it that you guys are now calling chicken meat ‘steak’?
But I really love America, I would mention a few reasons why but this is not the thread for it.
I love British humor. You can draw a line from writers like P.G. Wodehouse all the way through to Frank Parkin and Douglas Addams, and all along the way find examples of the same sort of verbal wit. If I had it to do over again, I think I would have majored in English and gone on to a Ph.D., specializing in British literary humor and becoming a word authority therein.
Oh, please ignore the line that says - You guys might refer to such a vehicle as a " buggy ", but then, you are all crazy Americans.
I was mentioning in another forum web-site yesterday how I disliked the words I mentioned above, so I copied some of that and pasted it here. I meant to delete that line though because we were winding each other up in a friendly sort of way, and obviously it does not make sense here.
Well let’s see. Both of my maternal grandparents were Brits (short story… from what I remember, both of their sets of parents had moved over from England to Boston where they, my grandparents, met and married).
Some Brit on the paternal side, but mostly Scandanavian and Scottish.
I’ve met a few people from England and one from Wales when I’ve gone to “Triv Travels” (sort of like Doper meets, only with folks from another board).
Otherwise, all I know is what I’ve seen in the news, and Media. Like everyone else has said, LOVE the “accent” (though technically we’re the ones with the “accent” right? :D).
Love the “British invasion” bands. Wasn’t crazy about some of the foods (things Grandma fixed), but then that was as a child, maybe I’d like them now who knows?
I think the royalty thing is interesting and cool. And then of course there’s James Herriot!
I can’t think of anything I don’t like about Brits.
I don’t get it?.. Doesn’t make sense because I didn’t say “pram?” I don’t know why I didn’t, it was next on my list since I was talking about baby-related words. We don’t say buggy, we say stroller, at least where I’m from. Buggy sounds to me like… well, some lame British word or something.
Sometimes without Chinese signs I would be lost here. I had no clue what a “Schroff [sp] Office” was until I saw the Chinese.
I have no idea what chicken fried steak is either, but it sounds good. I think it’s southern or something. Maybe steak fried in chicken grease? More animal products make anything better.
Fried chicken is chicken parts, dipped in a batter and then fried. So chicken fried steak is steak fried up like you’d usually fry chicken. Essentially a new heart valve waiting to happen. But I think the full English breakfast has the same artery hardening capacity so we’re tied there.
But just so it’s not all hate, “lift” and “flat” are shorter than the American equivalents and sound kind of “hip.”
I would like to thank those from the UK for their obviously holding back on the use of local slang on this board as it would be chaos otherwise. When people start using words like “minger” and “innit” my eyes start glazing over.
I believe “minger” is relatively new slang for an ugly woman. “Innit” is, theoretically, how they write their pronunciation of “isn’t it,” but apparently it’s taken on a life of its own and doesn’t simply mean “isn’t it” in the way we would use it. I think. (Or is “innit” an Aussie thing? Sorry, with no voices, faces or location space I get confused.)
Trust me, Brits online when they’re not trying to make themselves understood by Americans… between the slang and the weird sense of humor (the idea that “Americans don’t understand sarcasm” seems to come partially from the idea that part of the British sense of humor is to simply say things that are totally false, or something) I’m totally lost.
First, in the U.S. a baby buggy and a baby stroller are not the same things. A buggy is a baby carriage having four wheels and a little half-canopy lid you can flip up on one end. The baby lies in it. Buggies are rare in the U.S. these days, and are generally just called “buggies” anyway, not “baby buggies,” because that distinction (between a pram and a horse-drawn carriage) is one we haven’t needed for many a moon. Strollers are the lighter, canvas-and-small-wheels conveyance you push a baby around in. The baby sits up in the stroller (strapped in), and most strollers collapse for storage in a car or in the house. Strollers are everywhere; I can’t remember the last time I say a buggy.
Anyhoo – Agree that British accents are sexy. I think Americans consider Britian to be a loyal ally – whether we’re right or whether we’re wrong, there she is, God love her. Britons do not know what “mountains” are, and seem a little confused on what constitutes a “long way” in terms of distance. But you have much more history.
But I don’t think Americans think of Britian as a younger brother. That would be Canada.
, but I just thought I should point out the ignorance of my countrymen with regard to the cultural, political, and historical divides within the United Kingdom.