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Autor:	pat
E-mail:	não-disponível
Data:	26/MAI/2003 9:22 AM
Assunto:	Re: Organization ou Organisation ??


Mensagem:	Ola Jose, Thanks for your interesting response. Firstly, many Americans (maybe even most) wouldn't know the difference between British or American spelling. I believe the British pay more attention to it. And those Americans who do know the difference rarely make an issue out of it; those of us who read a lot are accustomed to books with the British conventions. The current uproar in Brazil about the accentation of "Telefonica" woud probably be a non-issue here. Of course, it easy to be complacent when - as Miguel says - one's culture and language is dominant. I find your example of recent spelling changes in Portuguese quite fascinating, particularily that the old form of spelling "scienca" and "physica" more similar to the English usage (any other examples?). I've also heard that the pronounciation of "-al" used to match the English also, in words like "Portugal", "total", "legal", etc. Yes, everything I have read indicates that the American "accent" of today is more like the way the British spoke in the 1600's than is the modern British "accent". That is a great generalization because there are several distinct American dialects and speech patterns and many more in Britain. It is more accurate to say that there are 3 or 4 dialects or "accents" in America that can be connected to the prevailing dialects of specific areas in Britain of the 16 and 1700's. In fact, several times I have heard someone talking on the TV, and it will take some time to realize that they are English, because their accent is so similar to the mid-atlantic American accent (the one I speak). Have you ever had this experience listening to a Luso speaker? An in-depth book on this subject is called "Albion's seed". Tchau