Everyone knows that there is only one proper English, with the rest being mere derivatives that bastardize the spelling and grammar. Despite this, the hoodlums who staged a violent uprising against British rule in the American colonies have somehow made their uncouth dialect dominant in the information technologies that have taken the world by storm these past decades. In this urgent mission to restore the King’s English to its rightful place, we fortunately have patriotic British citizens who have taken it upon themselves to correct this grave injustice. Brave citizens such as [Declan Chidlow], whose BritCSS project is a bright beacon in these harrowing times.
Implemented as a simple, 14 kB JavaScript script to be included in an HTML page, it allows one to write CSS files using proper spelling, such as background-colour and centre. Meanwhile harsh language such as !important is replaced with the more pleasant !if-you-would-be-so-kind. It is expected that although for now this script has to be included on each page to use BritCSS, native support will soon be implemented in every browser, superseding the US dialect version. [Declan] has also been recommended to be awarded the Order of the British Empire for his outstanding services.
Sophistry.
Sounds like an April 1st article? Getting a jump on the day?
I didn’t think today was April Fools day.
This reminds me, I had something a long time ago and I’ve been meaning to talk about making a project of it so I’m going to post about thinking about maybe looking for it.
Jolly good. About time those letter U deniers were brought to heel. Life will be more colourful now. :)
As a Brit myself, the best explanation of the spelling differences I ever heard was from an American colleague, talking to me once; he said, “what happened was, we declared Independence in 1776… and got rid of U.”
“such as background-colour”
Does that rhyme with “sour”? LOL
If you can make background-colour rhyme with sour then you really are butchering the English language.
Although if you cough rough enough you’ll get put on furlough from your job driving a snowplough through Foxborough. You’ll slough hanging from a bough near the lough and eat sourdough from a trough – but watch out for the hiccough!
For bonus points, figure out the correct pronunciations of “Cholmondeley” and “Featherstonehaugh”.
The -ough disaster is the worst one I can think of in English. Noah Webster helped a lot to promote the simpler, more-sensible spellings; but he didn’t go far enough. I don’t have anything against mere accent differences, but I do have something against consistent mispronunciations like the Brits leaving the r out of my name and putting it in “China,” “Cuba,” and “idea,” and leaving it off of “drawer” but putting it on “draw.” That’s not just a matter of accent. It’s just plain wrong! In the US, people in the Midwest put an r in “wash,” so it comes out “warsh.” If you point it out, they know it’s wrong, but they quickly forget and go back to their bad habit. My sister has a friend who’s an elementary teacher who when she started teaching here in the US, found her kids spelling things strangely on their spelling tests, and then it was pointed out, gently, that that’s the way she was saying them. After thinking about it a few seconds, she exclaimed, “Oh my goodness! I do talk that way, don’t I?!”
I know you’re just trolling, but: American spelling was standardized separately from British spelling, but it is not a derivative standard. There wasn’t really one true way to spell these words at the time.
we know… but we still like top moan about it :)
Yes but so many “American” things are copies of existing models with a few changes to make them ‘merican. It invites trolling.
Jolly good show ol’ chap.
As an American; all I have to add to the conversation is
“WHUT? RILLY? NAH!
Our tech, our spelling 🤷♂️
Having said that… for some reason, a lot of words I spell tend to come out with the British Spelling. I even have to use British dictionary to keep programs from telling me that I misspelled something. No idea why or where I picked up that habit.
CSS was actually invented by a Norwegian working in Switzerland.
lol this article gave me a good chuckle.
always appreciative of Maya’s writing.
The English spoken in America is actually closer to the English spoken in Britain in the 1600s. The brits absorbed a lot of performative french inspired accenting resulting in extra U’s all over the place. So, American English is actually the uncorrupted version.
I did recently hear a British English professor saying that American English probably sounds more like Shakespeare’s English than British English does.
That’s a common myth. There are aspects of American English that are closer to some of the 1600s British English accents, and there are aspects of current British English that are closer. The reality is that language has continued to evolve in both countries.
Please spell it right in memory of Alan Turing ;)
I’ve heard rumors they have now elected a new King in those colonies.
The rumours are true, and he put out a proclamation the other week that the Colony start to useth English as its official language.
https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2025/03/06/2025-03694/designating-english-as-the-official-language-of-the-united-states
However, King Donald the Second (for it is he) neglected to specify “American English” in the proclamation.
So now y’all have to speak the King’s English (i.e. the proper one!)
Toodle pip!
Not being an American, every time a Youtuber from there says ‘Yawl’ I look around the room for the sudden appearance of a two-masted yacht.
That’s in the deep south—although I couldn’t draw a boundary on a map of the US for you. I only recently found out that “y’all” (from “you all”) could be used when speaking to a singular person, and it sounds like it’s to specify that you’re not excluding the person’s feet, knees, or any other part—LOL—but that when referring to multiple people, it’s “all y-all.”
I’ll have you know a yawl is a type of small boat.
Apple has a new product featuring this called the “I-say!”
“Everyone knows that there is only one proper English, with the rest being mere derivatives that bastardize the spelling and grammar.”
Yea. Þæt is soð. Hwæt is þīn pointe?
Well, the etymology of colour and centre is French, so the “King’s or Queen’s English” belongs to the Normans.
The French got the words from Latin, but I don’t know where the Romans got the words from.
I like the attitude of the Oxford English Dictionary which does not try to define what words should be used, it just records what was meant by the people that use, or used, those words.
Of course, French is a Latin language. However, colour and centre did not come in use for English during the Roman occupation. At that point, English did not exist. Trying to claim an ultimate way of using language is a bit absurd as language is a mongrel. There is Germanic and Nordic in English as well. But, using colour instead of color is a personal matter. Go for it if you so desire.
grAy: American grEy: English
colOr: ours colOUr: also ours
Easy mushy peasy.
Add all the unnecessary letters you want… just don’t forget your stab vest when you go in public.
Thass’ raciss’!
Or the bullet proof one in the US.
bastardise