Apr 06 2010

Mid Atlantic S and Z

Category: Personal — ChrisM @ 2:53 am

I finally remembered to change the dictionary Firefox uses to check my spelling. I am not sure at which point Mozilla decided I wanted the US-English version installed, but I am hoping I will start to look like I know when to use an S or a Z in certain words. Harmonise and harmonize. Arrrgh, no, neither of them has some red underlining. However less debatable words and spellings are highlighted nicely. If I type in faucets, Firefox refuses to offer any alternatives at all, meaning I have to remember to use the word tap all on my own! Sidewalk triggers the same spell check alert, so I’m guessing that S and Z have become more interchangeable than I realised?

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6 Responses to “Mid Atlantic S and Z”

  1. Alex C says:
    April 6th, 2010 2:51 pm

    Disgraceful. I fear the US is having more and more of an influence over the British language. I had a “discussion” with Mat the other day about how “off of” is quite simply grammatically incorrect, though I am by no means an expert.
    Then again I should get off my high horse as one day, with any luck, we shall all be united under one nationality; Planet Earth. Only then do I think we can start to achieve world peace in the true sense.

  2. ChrisM says:
    April 7th, 2010 3:33 pm

    World Peace? How does one nationality tie into language, surely many nations have multiple (often indigenous) languages in use?

    Save me a puff 🙂

  3. Alex C says:
    April 8th, 2010 3:50 am

    Haha very funny. I mean we have to accept that with the ammalgamation of nations then it follows that there will be a natural merging and cross over of languages. I’m not saying separate languages will cease to exist, just that they may become less divided.

  4. ChrisM says:
    April 9th, 2010 12:58 am

    Amalgamation of nations?
    Sounds a little end of the world, mark of the beast, all nations under one ruler type thing to me 🙂
    I’m also not so sure about languages becoming less divided, the very construction of so many of them varies so much.
    Who knows, but I doubt either of us will be around to discover the outcome 🙂

  5. Alex C says:
    April 9th, 2010 6:26 am

    When I say less divided I simply mean there will probably be a greater understanding and use of foreign words, like the English language incorporating so many French words. And if (or when) this happens people will be accepting of others and differences will no longer cause division.

    It will be the end of the world as we know it, but will give birth to a new era. One that is beautiful and harmonious and loving. There will be no one ruler but true pure communism as it was originally intended, not the fukced up twisted authoritarian governments of history so far.

    Division = War Unity = Peace

    Read The Fifth Sacred Thing by Starhawk; it’s one of the most inspirational books I’ve read in a long time.

  6. ChrisM says:
    April 9th, 2010 1:01 pm

    True and pure communism as it was originally intended. Intended by which group or person though? The amount of splits within the broad ideology of communism (and the (usually thought of as) necessary stage of socialism to get there) can sometimes be overwhelming. Council communism always seemed like an ideal, however as so often happens, only workable in theory – human nature will sadly always mean people (no matter how statistically minor) will take whatever advantage they can seek and then eke out of any situation.
    And at this point, I’m going to bow out, as we’ve somewhat veered off topic, and I normally need a few pints or schmokes to motivate me for this sort of discussion 🙂

    EDIT
    Corrected spelling of thought above, and wanted to quickly insert two images that I found interesting. Obviously you can run through some of the countries that have dropped communist/socialist approaches from their doctrines, but until you see it on a global scale, you don’t realise the enormity of it.

    1980 Wikipedia Image Of Countries With Left Leanings

    2008 Wikipedia Image Of Countries With Left Leanings

    EDIT 2

    OK, looks like you can’t embed Scalable Vector Graphics images, so check out

    http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/54/Sino-Soviet_split_1980.svg

    and

    http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/32/Sino-Soviet_split_2008.svg