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Whingeing and cringing
Author(s) -
CAMERON DEBORAH
Publication year - 2005
Publication title -
critical quarterly
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.111
H-Index - 17
eISSN - 1467-8705
pISSN - 0011-1562
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-8705.2005.00678.x
Subject(s) - complaint , history , state (computer science) , anxiety , metropolitan area , literature , psychology , law , political science , art , archaeology , psychiatry , computer science , algorithm
Any list of the top ten British grumbles about the current state of the English language would certainly have to include the complaint that linguistically, as in other respects, Britain is turning into an outpost of the USA. Although it isn't exactly new, this anxiety about American influence does not go back as far as we might think. Initially, 'Americanisms' were regarded by the British as merely quaint rather than threatening; the most vigorous denunciations of them came from colonists worried that distance from the metropolitan standard was corrupting their English along with their manners.