I’m a fan of Simon Heffer, author of several books and a columnist for the Telegraph newspapers. His book, Scarcely English: An A-Z of Assaults on our Language (Penguin) is a wonderful catalogue of assaults that have been made on the English language in recent years, egged on by social media and the internet. Anyone can be a published author, unedited and unregulated, but this often has dire consequences for the English tongue.
Amongst these assaults is the annoying infiltration of US imports into the language we use on a daily basis. Here are some of Simon Heffer’s examples, which annoy me too –
I’m good – now the standard response to the question ‘How are you?’. Actually, what this describes is your moral condition, not your state of health.
Get – this is part of American fastfoodspeak. Instead of saying, ‘I’d like a burger’, if you say, ‘Can I get a burger’ it sounds like you’re heading into the kitchen to fetch the burger yourself!
Stand in line – while they may do this in the US, in Britain we queue.
Take the stand – in Britain, we go into the witness box.
Start over – in Britain we go back to the beginning, but in America they ‘start over’.
Named for – over here, we name buildings, streets or children after someone ese. In America they are named for them.
I recommend this book, in which you will find many other Americanisms as well as other heinous assaults on the English we speak in this country.
