My sincerest apologies. Lazar is a male name, by the way.
"An" historical...
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Hey, now, don't be hatin' on my buddy Lazar. He's usually one of the more reasonable people here! Even if he is a descriptivist....;)
Anyway, re: "an historic" -- I've got no beef when British broadcasters say it because they say all kinds of unusual Britishy things and it seems to go with the territory, but it does tick me off when Americans do it. It just sounds unnatural coming out of an American mouth, unless they truly drop the H as part of their normal accent. Otherwise it comes off as old-fashioned or as trying to copy the "superior" British usage -- in other words, pretentious and hoity-toity. Linguistically there may be nothing wrong with it since the precedent is clearly long-standing -- I can recall seeing it in American Civil War era writings as well -- but socially it conveys certain connotations that hit a nerve, and that's more the crux of the matter. Brits don't sound pretentious when they say it because that's really the way they talk, but it's a whole different matter when Americans break their own speech norms to copy it. It gets the same raised eyebrow out of me that an American would get if they suddenly started saying "whilst" or pronouncing "zebra" with a short E.
I'm sure Caspian and Damian can relate; many British people seem to cringe inwardly when they hear "Americanism" creeping into their dialects, like "can I get" for "may I have", etc. Sounds perfectly normal and ordinary to me, but to them that would be the point -- that's MY norm, not theirs. It'll take time to adjust and embrace it.
Anyway, re: "an historic" -- I've got no beef when British broadcasters say it because they say all kinds of unusual Britishy things and it seems to go with the territory, but it does tick me off when Americans do it. It just sounds unnatural coming out of an American mouth, unless they truly drop the H as part of their normal accent. Otherwise it comes off as old-fashioned or as trying to copy the "superior" British usage -- in other words, pretentious and hoity-toity. Linguistically there may be nothing wrong with it since the precedent is clearly long-standing -- I can recall seeing it in American Civil War era writings as well -- but socially it conveys certain connotations that hit a nerve, and that's more the crux of the matter. Brits don't sound pretentious when they say it because that's really the way they talk, but it's a whole different matter when Americans break their own speech norms to copy it. It gets the same raised eyebrow out of me that an American would get if they suddenly started saying "whilst" or pronouncing "zebra" with a short E.
I'm sure Caspian and Damian can relate; many British people seem to cringe inwardly when they hear "Americanism" creeping into their dialects, like "can I get" for "may I have", etc. Sounds perfectly normal and ordinary to me, but to them that would be the point -- that's MY norm, not theirs. It'll take time to adjust and embrace it.
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