Re: [seul-edu] Seul.edu through-and-through American

[Rasjid Wilcox <rasjidw@openminddev.net>]

Firstly, as a long-time lurker, let me say that I have always found seul-edu 
to have quite an international flavour.  I am personally from Australia, and 
I know there have been / are quite a few other Australian's on the list.  
Yes, the primary language of the list is English, but on a number of 
occasions there have been posts in another language, with a request to 
translate.

On Sunday 01 February 2004 07:03, Alex Heizer wrote:
> Perhaps being an American, and you not, it seems obvious to me, as it may
> not to you, that English and American are not the same thing. English is
> the language of England. That the language America speaks is remarkably
> close to English shouldn't make you prejudiced against America. It just
> means we have failed at creating our own distinct language as many sovreign
> nations have done, like Holland. We were very close at one time to having
> German as our official language when our counrty was formed. I can imagine
> the Queen Mum's reaction at hearing that the language of her country now is
> equated with being only an American.

I must say this was my first response.  The English language *is not* 
American!  Besides, they don't really speak English in America, since they 
don't seem to know how to spell words like colour over there.  ;-)

> Nonetheless, all programming languages need a common base language or a
> program I write will not work on your computer. What lingua franca do you
> propose all programming languages migrate to so as not to taint them with
> undesirable Americanism? I believe that because most modern computers have
> their physical roots in ENIAC, which, unfortunately was developed in
> America, most programming languages have also shared this American
> heritage.
>
> Next, we can dicuss the problems with the overtly-American airline
> industry, since all pilots and flight tower personnel must learn English in
> order to ensure safety by eliminating miscommunications.
>
> Perhaps your complaint is not with America, but instead with the
> programmers of the world for not programming in their native languages.

I agree.  For better or for worse, English (in its various flavours - British 
English, American English, Austrailan English etc) is the primary language of 
the internet, and I really don't see much that can be done to change the 
situation.

Rasjid.

-- 
Rasjid Wilcox
Canberra, Australia (UTC +11 hrs)
http://www.openminddev.net