[PRCo] Re: English

[Fred Schneider]

Remember the lyrics from The King and I ..."Why can't the English learn to
speak?"  I've never heard any well spoken English man or woman butcher number
and case like you mentioned.  Of course, the British are known for many years
for discriminating in employment if a person cannot properly speak the
language.  The them of The King and I  has not changed a bit.  If you listen to
the morning or evening news on BBC in England, the language is so close to what
we understand that you would hardly know you were in Britain.

In the same song there was a line, "The French really don't care how they
speak,  as long as they pronounce it correctly."

And then there was there were the two stanzas, in speaking of English, "Some
places they really don't know how to speak English.  Why in America they haven't
used it for years."

And I love the fact that you spoke of American's using a totally separate
language called American.      Perhaps Eubonics (remember that one?) is as close
to American as the latter is to English, and as English is to Cockney or
Bristolean.

Bob Rathke wrote:

> I just returned from a week of meetings in New York City.  The business
> sessions featured three British speakers, and it was two days before I got
> used to their handling of singular and plural verb forms.  Example: "The car
> are on the street",
> "The subway stations is uptown"...  The lone Frenchman spoke slowly and with
> an accent, but he used proper English.  Same for the Swedes.
>
> The Americans spoke perfect American.
>
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