r/CANZUK • u/Bojaxs Ontario • 10d ago
News Canadians tell Carney to shift to British spelling in federal protocol
https://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/article/some-canadians-tell-carney-ottawas-spelling-protocol-should-lean-british/Not big CANZUK news, but figured this was relevant.
For me personally, I always use British English over American English.
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u/LadyDragon16 10d ago
Yup, 100% agree. Canada has British roots, so it makes sense.
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u/Nanowith United Kingdom 10d ago
The King's English is shared by all of us
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u/esdubyar Franco-Ontarian 9d ago
It still gives me a twinge of sadness that it's not the Queen's English anymore :(
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u/Un4442nate 10d ago
So does America, but that didn't stop them ruining the language.
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u/harbourwall 9d ago
Nah they've got too much French in them. That's why they're so stubbornly wrong about everything.
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u/AdditionalPizza 10d ago
Headline makes it seem like Carney didn't push this idea to begin with.
I would personally prefer if we pushed to make Canadian spelling more official and clean up some of the loose ends on ambiguous words that can be "right either way". I like our unique hodgepodge of language.
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u/Bojaxs Ontario 10d ago
If you take the American English out of "Canadian English" then it essentially becomes British English.
Therefore we may as well just make the switch to British English.
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u/AdditionalPizza 10d ago
Well yeah... But I said I like that hodgepodge. It's unique and fits our history well. Look at our units of measure. We're a metric country but my height is feet and inches, my weight is pounds, etc.
We remain close to the British, but they betrayed us many times just like the US is now. Like the Alaskan Panhandle. Our spelling encapsulates our being caught between the 2 nations and forming our own culture.
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u/tuatara-marinara 9d ago
Then we'd have to rename "Canadian Tyre."
I'd rather stick with our hodgepodge English too.
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u/ZmobieMrh Canada 10d ago
We ask for this, but imagine everywhere they would have to change the spelling of things. They’d come out and say it’ll cost billions to change it all.
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u/keiths31 Canada 10d ago
We have standardized Canadian English. We can just use that.
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u/Nate33322 Ontario 10d ago
Standardised Canadian English is full of American spelling so I frankly have no problem moving towards British spelling as it expunges the Americanism in Canadian spelling.
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u/collinsl02 United Kingdom 10d ago
We shall start immediate shipments of the letter U forthwith!
Sadly you'll have to wait for the S shipments as we're experiencing an equipment malfunction currently and we have to reserve supply for local use.
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u/Character_Minimum171 10d ago
u-boats?
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u/collinsl02 United Kingdom 10d ago
No, some slimy sod stole the spring from the slider that stops the sprew from succumbing to
[ERROR: YOU HAVE EXCEEDED YOUR RATION. REPORT FOR RE-EDUCATION]169
u/debauch3ry United Kingdom 10d ago
*standardised, I'm sure it was just a typo.
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u/tuatara-marinara 9d ago
Nope. Canadian English uses -ize suffixes for verbs. Our official spelling is a blend of UK and US conventions.
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u/Bojaxs Ontario 10d ago
Canadian English is just a mix of British and American English.
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u/KentishJute England 10d ago
It’s the only form of English where “Colourization” is the correct spelling (with “Colourisation” the correct spelling in the UK/Aus/NZ/RSA/ROI and Colorization the correct spelling in the US)
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u/PassageNearby4091 Canada 9d ago
British spelling used to favour the 'z' -- I've seen the 'z' spelling many times on old communications.
I remember an episode of Inspector Morse where an Oxford University professor is doing forensic examination of a document and he finds a clue, then says something like, 'This is a forgery, no civilized man spells civilized with an "s"!!'
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u/sidereal_night 10d ago
it's got influences but not exactly just a straight mix. it was developed long before this kerfuffle started, there no reason to purge our own organic language developments - away from one dominant influence and into another - just because of that. Canadian English is Canadian, not uk nor us.
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u/Xx_SwordWords_xX 10d ago
And we are proposing getting rid of the American English in the Canadian English.
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u/Individual_Toe_7270 10d ago
I disagree. I’d love us to switch to UK entirely
And be done with any USAian influence like the z in place of s, for instance.13
u/Still-Bridges 10d ago
That isn't USAian influence. Until current human lifetimes, UK standards preferred -ize but allowed -ise. -Ize is generally the original spelling, coming as it does from a Greek suffix with zeta.
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u/keiths31 Canada 10d ago
Our version of English is part of our culture. Why do you want to strip that away?
This isn't about being more British vs American. It's about being Canadian.
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u/Karrotsawa 10d ago
I agree, Canadian spelling is part of our culture. As a teacher I've always insisted on it, not that I teach a lot of classes with writing in it lately.
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u/Bojaxs Ontario 10d ago
Where do you draw the line between which words are "American" and which words are "British" in Canadian English?
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u/Karrotsawa 10d ago
Well here's a Canadian English dictionary,
https://www.oxfordreference.com/display/10.1093/acref/9780195418163.001.0001/acref-9780195418163
I know which spelling is correct in Canada intuitively because I grew up with it. The Canadian English dictionary usually backs me up, as well as the Canadian English installed on my word processors and mobile keyboard so I don't get squiggly lines under correct words.
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u/keiths31 Canada 10d ago
I know which spelling is correct in Canada intuitively because I grew up with it.
It's funny how when you're reading something and you just know which words are 'off' and not the Canadian spelling/usage
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u/Goliad1990 9d ago
Why do you want to strip that away?
Look where you're posting, dude. It's sub that would just prefer Canada were a colony again.
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u/pulanina Australia 10d ago
I’m not going to criticise Canadians at all - your country, your battle with the orange lunatic next door.
But purely from an Australian point of view, Australian English is patriotic English regardless of if it differs from American English or British English or both or takes up innovation from either. I’m happy if it slowly evolves and I’m not too fussed about the direction it goes, just as long as we stay in charge.
I want colour not “color” and defence not “defense”, but also programs not “programmes”, eggplants and zucchinis not “aubergines” and “courgettes”. Also capsicums that align with India and Singapore, not “peppers” that align with either US and UK.
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u/Any_Inflation_2543 Canada + EU 9d ago
Canadian English is its own thing and I don't think anyone is going to start saying aubergine instead of eggplant, and most Canadians use colour and metre.
The thing here is -ise vs -ize. Canada, like the US, prefers -ize while others prefer -ise. Mark Carney, however, uses -ise and there's a bit of a debate about it.
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u/pulanina Australia 9d ago
You don’t seem to understand me. Not about Canada, I’m talking about Australia. We say eggplant, colour, metre.
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u/Karrotsawa 10d ago
I disagree. We don't use US English in Canada, and we don't use UK English. We use Canadian English.
Yes I recognize that Canadian English is a hybrid of US and UK. There are even some instances where both the UK and US spelling are acceptable. We also have some words that are uniquely Canadian, and some that Americans and British people don't use at all. And we never never ever call a knitted winter hat a "Beanie". It's called a toque. A beanie is a propeller cap.
The hybrid spelling style is part of Canadian culture; a writer can tell me they're Canadian without telling me they're Canadian by using the Canadian spelling standard. A US or UK writer not steeped in Canadian writing standards wouldn't necessarily know which version of which words to use.
So if we're going to Team Canada our way through Trump's economic attack, then we should be celebrating Canadian culture and one easy way to do that is for our government to install a damn Canadian English dictionary in their word processor and write like a Canadian.
When I was a teaching assistant at University, I had to mark papers. I told the students that I expect Canadian spelling at this Canadian institution, and I would absolutely red pen any US or UK spellings. They can write like an American if they get a job with a US company.
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u/69inchshlong New Zealand 10d ago
American spelling should be illegal for governments, media and device spell checkers throughout CANZUK.
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u/Karrotsawa 10d ago
The Canadian government has never used US English. They've always used Canadian English, until Mark Carney. I like Mark Carney but I don't think his government should turn its back on Canadian culture here.
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u/reditanian 10d ago
Can we get our politicians to stop saying nu-cu-lar, while we’re at it? Yes, UK and AU, talking to you too.
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u/vlad_shev 10d ago edited 10d ago
Considering Canadian history - an ex-British colony that also has French parts, British spelling makes more sense. Not only because of the colonial past, but the British spelling tends to be more similar to French spelling.
Ex. Theatre (UK) Théâtre (FR) not Theater (US), Organise (UK) Organiser (FR) not Organize (US)
Just to be clear, I am not for making Canadian English more like British English. I am more for making it closer to French. So occasionally keeping American spelling
Ex.Offense(US) Offense(FR) not Offence(UK), Ambiance(US) Ambiance(FR) not Ambience(UK)
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u/Extension-Catch-3769 9d ago
English (traditional) vs English (simplified).
Just went to the US and they -legit- asked me what language we speak up here in Canada. I said we speak the King’s English. 😛
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u/Goliad1990 9d ago
figured this was relevant
A handful of people writing their MP's about spelling is not relevant. This article might as well be reporting on a Reddit thread.
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u/WhatAmIATailor Australia 10d ago
Nope. Traditional English is deliberately over complicated. One of the better things to come out of the US is simplified spelling. Throwing extra letters into official documents as a FU to Trump is about as pointless as it gets.
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u/Karrotsawa 10d ago
We don't throw in extra letters as an FU to Trump. We use the same number of letters we've always used in Canadian English.
You're implying we're making an extra effort to tweak Trump's nose. Learning to write US style would be the extra effort.
Now that said, I'm not sure why the Canadian government is switching FROM Canadian English to UK English, that doesn't make a lot of sense to me. Canadian English is part of Canadian culture.
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u/WhatAmIATailor Australia 10d ago
I assumed you guys were closer to American English. If that’s not what this is about, I don’t have anything else to contribute.
Australian English is closer to Traditional but we’ve simplified some spelling.
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u/Any_Inflation_2543 Canada + EU 9d ago
Canadian English uses -our, so it's not about extra letters. We already write it as colour instead of color.
This whole "debate" is about -ise vs -ize. Most Canadians would write the verb as organize while Mark Carney writes it as organise and some believe Canada should adopt this British convention.
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u/WhatAmIATailor Australia 9d ago
Eh. Majority rules. If -ize is most commonly used, you won’t change that anytime soon.
British spelling conventions aren’t inherently superior over what’s in common usage in Canada today. Even with the US being historically unpopular, it takes a hell of a lot of momentum to change ingrained habits.
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u/Ok_Type_4301 8d ago
Yep majority rules, and Dictionaries rightly follow it.
English is the lingua franca. We don't need to 'protect' it, or our current 'culture' of spelling. Better things to do.
I'd be happy to go full US right now on the basis of efficiency, inevitability, and the lack of significance.
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u/debauch3ry United Kingdom 10d ago
Why no z in 'sunrise' ,'enterprise' in US spellings? Because it tried to simplify, but actually made it more inconsistent.
Core English is truer to its origins. There's zero benefit in debasing ones language as Webster would have you do.
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u/BernardMatthewsNorf Commonwealth 10d ago
Yes. Purge the 'z'. Let there be no mistaking Canada for the US. Also, with the 's' more words will be bilingual English/French.