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20: Speaking Canadian and Australian English in a British-American binary (Patreon)

Published:
2018-05-17 21:43:02
Imported:
2026-06
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Content

Australians  and Canadian English don’t sound much alike, but they have one big  similarity: they’re both national varieties that tend to get  overshadowed by their more famous siblings. 

In this episode of Lingthusiasm, your hosts Lauren Gawne and Gretchen McCulloch use Lynne Murphy’s new book The Prodigal Tongue  as a guide to the sometimes prickly relationship between the globally  dominant British and American varieties of English, give a mini history  of English in our own countries, and discuss our national quests to find  space between and around US and UK nationlects. 

On the way, we  ask the big, country-dividing questions like, is soup more likely to be  brothy or puréed? Does “please” make a request ruder or more polite?  What’s a prototypical bacon? Where on your face is a frown?

To see this episode's shownotes, go to https://lingthusiasm.com/post/173999864106/lingthusiasm-episode-20-speaking-canadian-and

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20: Speaking Canadian and Australian English in a British-American binary by Lingthusiasm

Australian and Canadian English don't sound much alike, but they have one big similarity: they're both national varieties that tend to get overshadowed by their more famous siblings.

Comments

Brian Quirt

With respect to Canadian english, Joe Clark has written a book, "Organizing Our Marvellous Neighbours", on the differences between Canadian English and both UK and US English(es) (at least with respect to spelling).

Minchowski

I would like to point out that even in the States, whether you say please depends on where you are. I grew up in the south and I would never go through any of the interactions discussed without saying please. It’s always ‘Could I please ...?’, which makes it really odd to hear people saying that Americans perceive please as rude.

thnidu

@Minchowski: As I hear it, it depends on tone of voice.

Anonymous

American Midwesterner here and I say please all the time! Honestly I've been so confused when this has come up here and on The Allusionist. Maybe it's more true in New England? That seems more plausible to me.

lingthusiasm
>>12442819

Yeah, I wonder if it's regional even within the US, that's always an issue with nationlect-level generalizations like this

Lauren Fotiades

I'm late to this party, but I just listened to this episode in the past week. The "please" thing struck me too. I'm northeastern US (about equidistant between Philly and NYC, so you can choose your stereotype for our region), and I didn't find the idea of "please" being rude fit quite right for me, either. However, I can't put my finger on the difference. At home, we absolutely say please. Maybe not all the time? "Hon, could you grab the mustard out of the fridge?" wouldn't be weird to hear, but then neither would "Could I have the mustard please?" said to someone sitting across the table, next to the mustard. The first would likely be directed at someone already going to the fridge for something else. At a coffee shop... I think I use both, as well. I would have to have somebody record me for a while, but I think it depends on whether or not there's a verb in the sentence. "Could I get a medium decaf?" would probably not get a please, but "A medium decaf, please," is never going to NOT get the please. That said, when I was listening to the podcase, I certainly could hear in my mind's ear the rude "please". It's sort of like, if you're asking someone to do something that they're going to do anyway, (like the barista is going to make you the coffee; that's why they get paid; they're not going to be like 'no i don't want to') then the "please" almost pushes the request over into a demand? Like, it comes across as that passive-aggressive customer who uses exaggeratedly polite language in a way that's trying to shame the clerk for not giving them the service they feel they deserve. I am not sure if this is at all clear; I was getting images and emotions during the podcast and they are proving difficult to translate into text.

lingthusiasm
>>14317137

I think the thing for me (this is Gretchen trying to puzzle out the Canadian side) is that I can use "please" along with other politeness strategies like asking a question (Both "Could you please pass the salt?" and "Could you pass the salt?" read as polite to me) but by itself it's not sufficient to indicate politeness for me ("Pass the salt, please." reads as ruder to me than "Could you pass the salt?"). But of course, tone of voice is huge here too.