To hate Americanisms...?

[Groof]

I think maybe because it feels like all English-speaking cultures are becoming boring and homogenous.

New ones I've noticed that people in the UK didn't routinely say five years ago but are now EVERYWHERE:

• birth control (instead of 'contraception' or 'the pill')
• wait list (instead of waiting list)
• reach out

Which ones do you hate or AIBU?

So in fact nothing to do with how your parent spoke then and everything to do with the media you consumed i.e. your environment.

In my very first post on this thread I said that I had no objection to Americanisms and find it interesting to observe how they are entering British English. So I don’t need to be given hope for the sturdiness of British English as I am firmly in the “language evolves” camp.

I was pretty surprised that you proceeded to question what I said I had observed and tell me what I mean when I say the word “normal”. But if you will accept that experiences differ then I will too. Truce.

Yes! That expression does work much better with the American kind of torch, doesn’t it? Works like the expression ‘old flame’ does.

That’s the older meaning of torch in the UK too of course. Flashlights were first invented in America the and original flashlights had poorer batteries and bulbs and just gave flashes of light hence the name. The very slightly later and similar devices in the UK didn’t flash so the flash part of the name wasn’t appropriate. They were called electric torches but the electric bit was dropped from the name over time.

My children needed no explanations for vocabulary in literature classes and unlike many of their friends, they watch British TV with no need for subtitles.

Yes mine too. They can even watch Derry Girls and keep up or watch Tommy Tiernan live and get it all. But, naturally, they speak with american accents (god the embarrassment if they tried to change to an Irish accent in Ireland!) and they wouldn't have the same knowledge and facility with hiberno-english as their Irish cousins do - why would they?

You're inserting a good few unnecessary absolutes there.

Being a native speaker of any given code or language doesn't imply that that is the code or language that will always be used, instinctively and without variation. Some of my father's expressions and cultural references would be considered rather archaic nowadays, and as we are discussing on this thread, language evolves. It does mean that one can easily switch to that code or language as needed.

It also means that translation from one code to another is entirely possible. The beauty of code switching is understanding the nuances and shades of meaning of each code.

So in fact nothing to do with how your parent spoke then and everything to do with the media you consumed i.e. your environment.

That's a bit of a straw man - it's not what I said, and it wouldn't be an accurate extrapolation at all.

I wasn't telling you what you meant when you use the word 'normal'. I was telling you that Americans don't use the phrase "I'm a normal guy", that they use the phrase "average guy", and I explained why the word normal isn't used in that sort of context in American English.

Anyhoo, onwards and upwards.

That’s not what I said but I’m tired of arguing.

I've had posters tell me I couldn't possibly have attended a High School.

I have seen this notion that "high school' is an Americanism on MN from time to time. Tell that to the Royal High School in Edinburgh, which was the first school to call itself "high" many centuries ago and which was the direct source for the use of "high school" in the U$.

@CulturalNomad
I started reading British crime fiction/police procedurals in the early 1980's and had to rely on context when running across an unfamiliar word. Most of the time that was easy enough to do, but occasionally it wasn't so obvious. The word "jumper" always conjured up visions of a female character in a pinafore-style dress which could be quite comical in certain situations

I remember seeing, in multiple books, a character referred to as a “product of a typical public school education” and couldn’t see that it resembled the education I received in my Canadian primary school, which had “public” in its name.

"Public" is a good one. It still causes lots of confusion. A public school in the US is a state school.

"Prep school" is another confusing one. In the US, prep school usually means a private high school that prepares pupils for university.

Feeling like the opponent of the proverbial chess playing pigeon here...

How odd - it was, and still is, commonly used in the U.K. both in the names of schools and as a general term for secondaries.

The use of 'public school' at first glance seems more logical in the way it's used in the US, but if you think about other uses of 'public' they don't all mean state owned or funded. Think of public companies, public houses, public transport - open to anyone who can pay - and 'public school' in the U.K. meaning does make sense too.

I am now recalling the time we had a British author of children's books to talk to our junior children (7-11) and he talked about having books published in the States, with a particular problem about vocabulary. It seems he was over there discussing the issue with the publisher who wanted to rewrite a critical character, a milkman. American children would not understand that. He had argued that it wass necessary for the plot, and could be explained some way, but the publisher was insistent that they just did not have milkmen as part of their life. At which point a sound familiar to the author was heard from outside the house, the sound of milk bottles in a metal crate. But the publisher did not want to acknowledge that he had milk bottles delivered. (Not sure how this ended)
But Diana Wynne Jones met a similar guy publishing the British edition of "Archer's Goon" which had a British location full of sidewalks, tires, trunks and other things so to make it available to my class I had to go though with Tippex and a fine black pen.
I think there may be a plan to eliminate variation in global English for the convenience of publishers.

Interesting. I’m not sure many young children in the UK would know what a milkman is either.

Do American authors have to rewrite their books for a UK audience?

I've read quite a few books by a British crime writer set in England yet they had the trunk and hood of the car, faucets, sidewalks and various other Americanisms.

Yes! I did not know the word ‘jumper’ outside of athletics when I moved to America. I remember being very puzzled reading about Harriet Vane wearing ‘an old jumper’ to picnic with Peter Wimsey. I couldn’t picture her in the American version of a jumper, which can be a pinafore or a hybrid pinafore-shift dress worn with a shirt of some type underneath.

At the time, milkmen were quite common. They are now being reintroduced in some areas, but are largely nocturnal. So you are probably right.
I note that the style of this post is influenced by the article I have just read on rewilding areas of Britain!

As to looking things up in dictionaries, I, pre-internet for this purpose, had to hie down to the local library and the 20 volume Oxford to find meanings for some words used by Steven Donaldson, with a list of those he did not allow to be deduced from context = used in exactly the same way whenever they occurred! I remember only one, roynish. As I seldom need to refer to orcish things, I don't know why it stuck. I found a 2 vol Websters* in a secondhand bookshop which covers most US usages!

*Not Morocco bound though.

I think some do and some don't. Or there is an editor at their American publisher who goes through and changes some expressions. I think it happens less often now. Years ago, the books of one of my favorite British authors was Americanized, and I went to the trouble and extra expense of ordering the books from the UK to avoid that. This happens less often now, in part because of more global understanding, but also I suspect, because of cutbacks in publishing houses.

I think it's interesting to find out about other countries' customs etc eg the milķman.
We had a story about all the children going to school in big yellow buses in the US. My pupils found it interesting as they all walked to school.

Likewise where I live the girls' grammar schools are called 'High Schools' - so Aylesbury High School, Wycombe High School, Dr Challoner's High School etc

I would welcome standardization of English across the board. Different spellings, where the comma goes with punctuation marks, etc are real pains in the toga if you write for both US/UK audiences.

The scientists have it right...an agreed code of taxonomy for the flora and the fauna on the planet...uniform names to stop confusion.

We have a milkman who delivers twice a week with glass bottles and a fishman who delivers every couple weeks. MIght be more common in rural areas in the UK, not sure.

In our area, I went to High School, there is also an Academy (long before they became a thing) and a Grammar school (nothing to do with being selective). They're all just names - no meaning behind them whatsoever.

We have a milkman who delivers twice a week with glass bottles

This was common in the US up until the late 1970's. My parents had milk delivered to the house until the late 80's (but we happened to live close to a dairy farm).

Same for me. And they also delivered ice cream, but that was a bit of a challenge in the summer in Georgia.