Are you becoming more British?

<< You obviously could give a "hoot" otherwise the fist post would have contained vague, but polite curiosity rather than rude, opinion fuelled anger. >>

You see to find it hard to imagine that anybody could possibly disagree with you without being "angry", "rude" and as obsessed with national identity as you are yourself. Try imagining that they weren't. How would somebody appear to be if they found the entire subject tiresome. Rather like me, they'd be, wouldn't they?

<<Now, as I've said, this is a language forum>>

Like I said, it's *you* that has spent pages arguing about unrelated issues. If you want to stop, please feel more than free to do so but,please, leave off with the laughable pretence that it is me who is going off topic.

>>I've never had to use anything but a first name when speaking with senior colleagues or even senior corporate clients, and I work for a fairly conservative bank in the NY area. The only exception has been for foreign clients. Maybe it's different in other parts of the country?

When I was first applying for corporate jobs my senior year, given my European background, I was very much inclined to call everyone "Mr." that and "Ms." this, but I soon found that my fellow undergrads were calling senior managers by their first names even at that early stage, and no one seemed to mind.<<

Here in Wisconsin at least, that is definitely the case. While people from outside the companies at which I have worked may be referred to by last name, practically everyone within them is referred to by either first name alone or sometimes first name followed by last name, regardless of their position, with the use of last name alone being relatively rare.

>>Incidentally, students called professors by name at my college all the time - I never, ever heard anyone address a professor as "Professor This" or "Professor That". I understand this is not usual, however.<<

At least here, teachers or professors seem to be the primary exception to the above; they are normally referred to by "mister"/"miss"/"misses"/"professor" followed by last name, without any mention of first name to begin with. This is to the point that I myself have known practically all of my teachers and professors by last name alone, and simply have never known their first names to begin wiht.

>>At least here, teachers or professors seem to be the primary exception to the above; they are normally referred to by "mister"/"miss"/"misses"/"professor" followed by last name, without any mention of first name to begin with. This is to the point that I myself have known practically all of my teachers and professors by last name alone, and simply have never known their first names to begin wiht.<<

I should have noted that teachers in daycare or early kindergarten environments are a key exception to such, though, as they are normally referred to by first name, and often a shortened or diminuitive form of their first name, rather than by last name.

Aye, Jago - I do feel we get a wee bit carried away with our respective ramblings of Celtic Britannic pride, illustrated with appropriate video/audio links (nobody has ever told me these are not really permissable in here) but we do at least pepper them with pardonable snippets of relevant linguistic content. Surely references to our various regional accents and dialects in these UK/British themed threads, for example) are sufficient grounds for excuse. ;-)

Jago - I've got one over you, big time.....you haven't (yet) been up here to Scotland! !What! have you been doing with your life??? Get on the next train direct to Edinburgh Waverley starting from Penzance.....or board it at St Austell (it stops there). I guarantee the pipe band of the Argyll and Gordon Highlanders in full resplendent kit will be there to welcome you.

I've never been down to Twickenham to see Scotland play England but a few of my mates have, and they've also been to see Scotland play at the Stade de France in Paris...my ambition is to go with them the next time. I've only seen them play here at home, and Murrayfield is almost within roaring distance of where I live anyway.

The Cornish Language - how great it would be if the teaching of Cornish became compulsory in the schools of Cornwall at primary level - up until a certain age, as the teaching of Welsh is in all of Wales (or so I'm told) and Gaelic in certain schools only in Scotland. But unfortunately the status of Cornish, and interest in the Language, in Cornwall is not sufficient to make this viable - or at least that's what it seems to me. It does not have the same punch power as Welsh has in Wales, and to a lesser degree - Gaelic here in 95% of Scotland.

As I said, I could immediately feel the change in atmosphere once we had crossed the Tamar from "alien England" into Cornwall, and it became more palpable the further away we got from the "English" border...ha! - did you like that? The change in the character of the placenames had a strong part to play in that (almost, but not quite, as significant as when travelling out of England and into Wales - there the names change completely once you are further into Welsh territory with Offa's Dyke well behind you).

Then the appearance of forbidding looking Methodist chapels and the familiar Celtic crosses (abundant also in Scotland and Wales) as well cromlechs on the megalithic prehistoric sites, like that one overlooking Penzance....all these justify Cornwall's claim to be a Celtic "nation" in its own right.

Is the chough Cornwall's "national" bird? It seems to feature in several Cornish vids and fits the Cornish environment - cliffs and rocky escarpments.

We liked everything we saw and did when we were down in Cornwall. We stopped at Helston on the way to Lizard point - the southernmost tip of the entire UK mainland - we learned about the famous Helston Flora and May Day dances there and the Furry Dance, or Floral dance - not sure of its correct title. Of more interest to me was the Lighthouse and museum at Lizard point.

They start the Furry Dances at 7am on the day - there's dedication for you, and there are dances throughout the day apparently.

Helston May Day Early Morning Dance
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Grw4mquKeI&feature=related

Cornwall is exactly the same as Wales is for choral signing and it's male voice choirs, or even just spontaneous outbreaks of singing by groups of men mainly....usually in pubs! Of course! If that isn't male bonding then what is? ;-)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=guj1lLZRREI&feature=related

Song of Trelawny and the Western men. Male bonding again.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iMJYzyty2Z8&NR=1

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JBwfAYva9F4&feature=related

Until the next time I am down Kernow way...I cannae wait! ;-)

Now you come up here and we'll extend the same warm welcome of Celtic Brotherhood of Nations in One...under four flags...under one!

I am actualy planning on moving up to the Cairngorms so I'm getting the other bits of travelling out of the way first. But as soon as next years' snow falls I'll be up in a flash to get out my snowboard!
I've been wanting to go there for a long time and have actualy started learning Acottish Gaelic, although I'm not sure how much it's spoken in the Cairngorms!

There are so many campaigns, court battles and fighting funds set up to get the European Court of Human Rights to move Cornwall's language and culture status up another notch so that we can make it mandatory to teach the real history (instad of the English one) and language at all levels of Schooling. At the moment it's voluntary, but many schools are now teaching the language from primary upwards. This is the reason for the surge of language users from 200 in 2003 to around 6000, of differing levels, in 2008.
How is Gaelic dealt with in Alba? Is it taught in the schools up there?
With the new government in Cornwall we are now seeing each new road sign being replaced in dual language, so that's a fantastic start!

I realy can't wait to go to Scotland, Ive been thinking about it for years, but I just need the excuse and I need to know where to go, off the beaten track. When in Wales I've often noticed that you walk into a pub and the English conversation suddenly switches to Welsh when they hear the accent (I've had to force an accent change to an English one due to my job in Television) but due to the comradery between the Cornish and Welsh this situation is easily solved by saying "nyns Sowsnek ov vy, My a wra Kernewek" (Cornish for "I am not English, I'm Cornish) and at that point they quickly apologise and start speaking in English again. It's a great conversation starter as well! Would I come across this in Scotland?

The chough is the national bird of Cornwall. It had become extinct in Cornwall untill last year. It was said that when the chough returned to Cornish shores that Cornwall would once again regain it's nationhood!! ;-)

Better than the furry dance are the Boxing day and May day parades through Padstow (or Padstein as we call it now, thanks to Rick Steins influence on the town) where they dress up in Cornish kilts (Sorry, sore subject seeing as you lay claim to these, but hopefully the moden celts can share rather than continue the in-fighting) and black up their faces for Darkie day and white-up for the 'Obby 'Oss to welcome in the summer and winter respectively.

**winter and summer respectively** of course!
Do excuse my terrible spelling tonight. I put it down to 4 pints of Skinners Ale and a dodgy 'e' on my mac!!

Jago - let's hope there's one massive outbreak of breeding among the chough population of Cornwall in that case. Do you think these birds are truly Celtic in origin themseves? They only seem to flourish on the cliffs and rock faces of the Celtic fringes of the UK...apparently they are quite numerous in Snowdonia and on the nearby cliffs of the North West Wales coast, and on the cliffs and scattered islands of western Scotland and the Hebrides, and virtually unknown in England.

Here is a link from one of the UK's national newspapers today 20/02 - Daily Telegraph....quite apt in view of what we've been discussing in here about the Celtic Languages of the UK and Cornish in particular. I take issue with the hack's reference to them as dialects and not the Languages they really are in their own right.

In my opinion a dialect is just a variation of a given Language....the fishermen/trawlermen of any Cornish village all speak in a dialectal version of the English Language, unless of course some of them actually speak in Cornish - unlikely I would say. According to this article there are only c. 300 fluent speakers in Cornwall and far fewer than that you are able to speak Manx, in the Isle of Man. For those who don't know the Isle of Man lies in the Irish Sea, about equidistant from the coasts of South West Scotland, Northern Ireland and North West England. On exceptionally clear days the IOM can be seen from all three countries, and if it is mega, mega, super duper clear from the coast of North Wales as well.

To my mind the Scottish Assembly isn't doing enough to promote the interest in Gaelic in Scotland....just follow the relative link in the main link below, but I doubt very much that the numbers of Gaelic speakers will decline, as there seem to be more and more primary schools, especially, introducing the study of Gaelic - even in schools here in the main population belt of the Forth/Clyde Valley - the geographical waist line of the Scottish mainland so to speak.

Some interesting side links regarding the UK's Languages as well in here:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/4699960/Celtic-dialects-declared-extinct.html

PS: Thanks for using the word Alba! ;-) Have a Skinners on me.....slains!

Och...wow!....the Cornish infantrymen have now occupied Bristol! Go guys go....next stop Swindon.....then Oxford....Reading....and finally London! The Cornish are taking over England! Go Kernow, go!

How soon will it be before the BBC news is delivered in Cornish and Skinners becomes the national brew? I love it!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L_5AZO270k8&feature=related

;-)

So that's a Cornish accent, huh?

To me, it sounded not terribly different than any other English accent, so in the spirit of learning, I also watched this one, where the poster offers a virtual accent tour of the British isles, starting in Scotland and working around clockwise to Northern Ireland:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kn3_bYcAnWI

Very funny! Is he any good? To be honest, the only way I can easily tell one British accent from another, especially all the English accents, is to hear them next to each other for comparison -- because, really, they all sound like they come from the same close family. But in quick succession they become distinguishable to me -- even if I would still flunk any quiz at the end of the flick!

<<Very funny! Is he any good? >>

I think he's aiming at "funny" more than "good". What you see is, for the most part, a lot of comedy stereotypes, none of them done particularly well. I'm still confounded as to how they'd come across as being similar, though. I really can't see anything linking them.

Most "Brittishisms" I hear are used for comedic effect or because it's a profanity that is less vulgar here, "bloody, bollocks, wanker". Other than that I don't see much widespread dispersion of English sayings, and frankly the minute I hear someone say "snog" here, I'm emmigrating...



*most English colloquials don't bother me or even sound cool, but that is the worst word I've encountered in any language.

Yeah ... it sounds a little too much like "snot" for my taste, too. Certainly doesn't put me in mind for kissing!

***So that's a Cornish accent, huh?***

Not that you would immediately recognise as such, no - but as with so many other parts of England (excluding Scotland as this doesn't apply up here and at the risk of being taken up to the very top of Brown Willy to be hung, dawn and quartered I include Cornwall in England here!) much of the original local accents and dialects are dying out. This guy is obviously of our generation and as with other areas, Cornwall is no different in that most of the younger people have much more in the way of a standardised English English accents, just like the bloke in this audio clip.

From my own observation when down in Cornwall he speaks pretty much like many others down there, and even though he is now part of the Kernow Militia Forces occupying the former English city of Bristol, now firmly held by them and proclaimed as a Cornish colony, and he is now resident in that city, he may well have been born and bred in somewhere like Wadebridge or St Ives or Come To Good....yes, there really is a place by that name in Cornwall...a reminder of the strong Methodist cuture of Kernow in times past.

PS: Great link, Uriel! Thanks for posting it....his accents wre spot on - I'm so proud of my fellow Scot...very versatile (rhymes with smile!) ;-)

He missed out East Anglia - though! A very distinctive accent in that English region. Never mind - he may cover that in Part 2.

<<Och...wow!....the Cornish infantrymen have now occupied Bristol! Go guys go....next stop Swindon.....then Oxford....Reading....and finally London! The Cornish are taking over England! Go Kernow, go!>>


Thankfully those Cornish will never take Kent. Once they realise our pasties have unnatural things like carrots (shock! horror!) in them they'll flee back to Cornwall.