tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28787909.post8336721017717631149..comments2024-03-16T00:21:43.240+00:00Comments on Separated by a Common Language: conformity and date-writinglynneguisthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10171345732985610861noreply@blogger.comBlogger63125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28787909.post-46055215463954924942020-08-17T12:14:33.622+01:002020-08-17T12:14:33.622+01:00BrE (Scot, 60+). I’m no longer sure what my prefer...BrE (Scot, 60+). I’m no longer sure what my preferred date format is (it varies) except that where possible, I always use the month name (possibly abbreviated) to avoid confusion. The issue of conformity is interesting. I have been working with American colleagues for nearly 30 years, largely via written exchanges (documents and reports, rarely letters). I find that for numerical date formats, Brits will use US styles, and vice versa, attempting to be helpful, or to meet perceived expectations.<br /> The YYYYMMDD date format (as part of a file name) as a means of sorting files chronologically is a colossal red herring: most modern systems like Windows will append a date to a file automatically, and it’s easy to sort chronologically, alphabetically or whatever. Using the date as part of the file name just uses up space better used for words that actually tell you what is in the file. I also find that those who use the numerical date as part of a file name tend to put it at the start, so that you have to expand the file name tab before anything in the name that is actually useful becomes visible. They also seem to abhor spaces in file names, using underscores instead. Aaaaaargh!Shy-replyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01891566073375322808noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28787909.post-2533342490069261562015-10-09T16:48:06.201+01:002015-10-09T16:48:06.201+01:00I thought month-day-year was only American when wr...I thought month-day-year was only American when written as number? <br /><br />Most British newspapers use the form October 9, 2015. That's also the way I was taught to date letters when I was at school in the seventies. Also, it's common in old British TV shows, films and books <br />When did day-month-year (in words) become the "standard" British form?stevehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07348817693141540409noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28787909.post-68863333249484733122010-07-07T22:59:34.318+01:002010-07-07T22:59:34.318+01:00Sell-by date is BrE? I'm a 22 year old from th...Sell-by date is BrE? I'm a 22 year old from the Pacific Northwestern United States (Washington, specifically) and that term has always been familiar to me.Joshnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28787909.post-53933776779078222352010-03-25T21:48:49.759+00:002010-03-25T21:48:49.759+00:00A really interesting one- unrelated to our experim...<i>A really interesting one- unrelated to our experiment- is "recovery service." After 3+ years living in the UK, my (American) boyfriend's car broke down on the side of the highway(motorway). Trying to figure out how to get a "tow truck" was nearly impossible because the service is a "recovery service"!</i><br /><br />...Or, colloquially, the "breakdown [service/van/man]". Whilst I imagine the section heading in the Yellow Pages is "recovery service", I'd have thought that was unlikely to be used too much in speech. I think I say "the breakdown", as in "My car won't start; I'll have to call the breakdown".Rich Thomashttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16026727832456275022noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28787909.post-16303819927387644652010-03-15T15:03:25.526+00:002010-03-15T15:03:25.526+00:00@ the previous anonymous poster:
I am very intere...@ the previous anonymous poster:<br /><br />I am very interested in what you have said. A few people have already suggested that "Americans are just more conformist." I have been hesitant to believe this because many scientific studies (and casual knowledge) suggests that Americans are less conformist and more individualist than other cultures. The very fact that our ancestors left Great Britain and started our own colony leads me to believe that independence is, in many ways, natural to the majority of Americans.<br /><br />However.. your comment is absolutely intriguing- perhaps Americans ARE more conformist (than say their British counterparts) when in foreign situations where they know of the preconception that Americans are "selfish/ignorant/obnoxious". I have certainly felt those sentiments and adjusted my behavior accordingly, most often by conforming! My boyfriend used to hate that when I first came to the UK I would say "thaynkyu" rather than "THANk you."Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14156644720990835011noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28787909.post-87519802305946559092010-03-15T14:52:09.351+00:002010-03-15T14:52:09.351+00:00I have noticed a few of comments suggesting that t...I have noticed a few of comments suggesting that the date-switching behavior "may not be conformity but rather an attempt to avoid misunderstanding." When designing the experiment we did take precautions against this. We wanted to disentangle the possibility of confusion from conformity, making the conformity arbitrary, rather than necessary. Thus all of the manipulated dates were written analogically (i.e. May 17, 2010 or 17 May 2010). In this way we avoided the possibility that people were "just trying to survive/be understood" and were measuring a completely arbitrary form of conformity.<br /><br />Also, Isabelle, I love that you mention looking at how long it takes American students to start using words like lorry and dust bin. In designing the experiment we actually began thinking about that very subject. I'm not sure whether it would be "more interesting" but it would be equally as interesting and perhaps serve the same function as date-writing (which is language too). We ultimately went with date-writing because it is finite, measurable, and can be produced under both experimental and natural conditions. <br /><br />In hindsight, I am glad we chose date-writing instead of language, as my naturalistic observation of Americans in England have shown to be lesser and less measurable. We do pick up on the catchy and obvious phrases such as "cheers," but I have never heard an American say lorry, most likely because we are rarely exposed to such words. Some Americans will switch to say toilet, but others will continue to say restroom, because toilet sounds vulgar to the American ear. A really interesting one- unrelated to our experiment- is "recovery service." After 3+ years living in the UK, my (American) boyfriend's car broke down on the side of the highway(motorway). Trying to figure out how to get a "tow truck" was nearly impossible because the service is a "recovery service"! <br /><br />-Santa BarbaraUnknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14156644720990835011noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28787909.post-20019568638811380492010-03-09T22:51:50.850+00:002010-03-09T22:51:50.850+00:00Comments like Jean-Paul's above probably expla...Comments like Jean-Paul's above probably explain why the American students might be quicker than equivalent British students (or commenter elarien) to switch how they write the date. As an American expatriate, I can tell you that if I were to say something like elarien said, I'd be viewed as "ignorant" and "selfish" -- not a "nonconformist."Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28787909.post-69186050690948519512010-03-05T13:30:37.204+00:002010-03-05T13:30:37.204+00:00The BrE/AmE difference isn't distinct, at leas...The BrE/AmE difference isn't distinct, at least not on the BrE side. Some BrE folk write March 5, 2010 and some BrE folk write 5 March 2010 without the "th". Others use numeric dates. Some write dates with the day of the week. The best dates are Japanese, thus 20100305.Paul Danonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04816761952837296368noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28787909.post-20924120032749487522010-02-25T06:00:31.307+00:002010-02-25T06:00:31.307+00:00I would never say "nine-eleven" unless I...I would never say "nine-eleven" unless I were reading off a date for someone to copy in the same form. When my clients give me dates in that form, I ask "Is that September 11th?" If I want to give the date some importance, say, for an even, I might say the eleventh of September. (We call the events of that fateful day 9/11 because that's also our emergency phone number.) <br /><br />In a letter, I would usually write out February 24(superscript th optional), 2010. My checks say Feb 24, '10. When I sign a document for a client, it says 2/24/10. I often put a date in a computer filename as 2-24-10, but only because it won't take the slash.<br /><br />The superscript is old-fashioned, and is underlined in handwritten script. American English has been dropping all those typographical details for decades now, I think thanks to typewriters, which don't support them. It's also sometimes used for the cents in prices. I've always been fond of it because it's old-fashioned. (I like the offset numerals, too.)Juliehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14376545097377854998noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28787909.post-43021077967604465792010-02-24T15:59:55.836+00:002010-02-24T15:59:55.836+00:00As the name of the event, I prefer something unamb...As the name of the event, I prefer something unambiguous like "the World Trade Centre bombing" (or "attack", I guess, since bombs weren't used). Around this house we were mainly referring to it as "the Twin Towers" for the first year or so.<br /><br />But the American form of "9/11" seems to have won out in the media.<br /><br />Speaking entirely for myself (as someone with memory abnormalities), I recall the event but have no idea what the date was, not even what season of the year. If someone seems to be telling me it was the 9th of November, I'm happy to go along with that. It takes a distinct mental effort to remember "9/11" is an American-style date, so it must refer to the 11th of September.<br /><br />Not that there's a lot of distance between September and November anyway.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28787909.post-92150515883206187122010-02-23T22:59:28.200+00:002010-02-23T22:59:28.200+00:00The norm in reading a two number date, at least in...The norm in reading a two number date, at least in my experience in Yorkshire, would be to refer to today as twenty-third of the second.Shaun Clarksonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16290670832534929741noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28787909.post-2914671555205076472010-02-23T18:14:55.399+00:002010-02-23T18:14:55.399+00:00I don't say "nine eleven" for any no...I don't say "nine eleven" for any normal date, so, although I'm American, if somebody said that today is "two twenty-three" I would assume they mean the time not the date (if they said today is "twenty-three two" I would be completely puzzled as two what they meant. Now if they were reading a text and read the date that way, especially including the year, I'd understand. If this is how it works in the UK as well, then maybe that's why "nine eleven" is not confused with the ninth of November. However, I still prefer "September (the) 11th" as the name of the event, at least when spoken out loud.Boris Zakharinhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16560756640621720539noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28787909.post-74270217308211185652010-02-23T14:10:05.308+00:002010-02-23T14:10:05.308+00:00Biochemist said (way up nearer the top of the page...Biochemist said (way up nearer the top of the page): "Brits can just about manage to refer to the 11th of September 2001 as 9/11, because that is a very quick way of summarising a cataclysmic event. Like D-Day, we know what it means."<br /><br />But I suspect that, now that "9/11" has been accepted as the name of the event, most Brits automatically think of it as referring to the 9th of November.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28787909.post-36913270189793613992010-02-23T10:26:34.798+00:002010-02-23T10:26:34.798+00:00My work once took me to most Central American and ...My work once took me to most Central American and Caribbean-Basin countries, where I dealt with all their passports. It was a while ago, but ISTR they all used DDMMYY, but used Roman numerals for the MM. I took the view that they did this to establish disambiguation, since their northerly neighbor refused to do so.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28787909.post-42955719839017945262010-02-22T22:33:44.857+00:002010-02-22T22:33:44.857+00:00I take the view that the Americans have 31 months,...I take the view that the Americans have 31 months, the days of which are interleaved in a curious way.Grahamhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10748485660099592412noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28787909.post-20052695912297840402010-02-22T07:01:18.488+00:002010-02-22T07:01:18.488+00:00You can safely assume that any American visiting B...You can safely assume that any American visiting Britain these days has had to present a US passport -- in which the date of birth, date of issue and date of expiration (sic) are all given in day-month-year format -- and has taken an international flight using a ticket (or e-ticket) on which the departure and arrival dates are given in day-month-year format.<br /><br />Dates are easy. Try something harder: how long do AmE speakers have to be in Blighty before they can quote their own weight in stone(s)?rkillingshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00449704927207443251noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28787909.post-38476748818682727512010-02-21T21:19:36.349+00:002010-02-21T21:19:36.349+00:00@Esha:
while I can see the need of a comma in &quo...@Esha:<br />while I can see the need of a comma in "February 16, 2010", that is a fault of the month-day format rather than a benefit of the comma. And "16 February, 2010" is the worst of both worlds.mollymoolynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28787909.post-65273722174783126392010-02-21T15:15:26.993+00:002010-02-21T15:15:26.993+00:00I'm another who's a bit sceptical about th...I'm another who's a bit sceptical about the date-writing experiment. Communicating a date is important -- conforming to the local standard comes under "survival" rather than "being agreeable".<br /><br />Which is why most experiments on conformity and peer pressure use techniques like estimating the length of lines or answers to arithmetic problems.<br /><br />It's hard to think of a conformity experiment using anything linguistic that won't be confused by "survivalism". Perhaps pronunciation? If one person says zee-bra and everyone else in the room says zeb-ra, will the first person conform?Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28787909.post-76118982371978866602010-02-21T06:49:25.040+00:002010-02-21T06:49:25.040+00:00On conformity, there's that simple experiment:...On conformity, there's that simple experiment: collect about a dozen people in a room. In some way, inform all except one to give the answer 9. Clap your hands 10 times and ask each participant how many claps they heard.<br /><br />The uninformed individual, on being asked (last) will very often answer 9 not 10.Mohammed UKhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12729413072431658626noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28787909.post-62445822855277534302010-02-21T06:43:05.621+00:002010-02-21T06:43:05.621+00:00I think that techy-geeky types also quite prefer Y...I think that techy-geeky types also quite prefer YYYYMMDD numerical format (with or without separating dashes, slashes and the like) for file names as it results in a chronological ordering.Mohammed UKhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12729413072431658626noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28787909.post-49301880224196341832010-02-21T06:37:51.620+00:002010-02-21T06:37:51.620+00:00Fascinating stuff. I hope to have time to read al...Fascinating stuff. I hope to have time to read all these comments!<br /><br />I'm in the UAE where there is a great mix of BrE and AmE. I wonder if it is the cause of a recent mix up.<br /><br />We had cards issued for insurance purposes. My wife's dob is written in BrE standard and mine in AmE.Mohammed UKhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12729413072431658626noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28787909.post-3134599625136154032010-02-20T23:28:36.753+00:002010-02-20T23:28:36.753+00:00@mollymooly: I think the comma in the date format ...@mollymooly: I think the comma in the date format of January 1, 2010 is to add even more visual separation of the day numerals from the year numerals.Eshanoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28787909.post-55576447654995735822010-02-20T20:25:33.460+00:002010-02-20T20:25:33.460+00:00The adaptation is very much about clarity - On arr...The adaptation is very much about clarity - On arriving in the US for the first time my university's international office was thrown into a panic when they thought I'd messed up my visa dates. (Although you'd think they'd've been used to dates not conforming to the US format, being an INTERNATIONAL OFFICE but hey). I quickly learnt to write the date that way, encouraged by forms which often have a watermark in the date boxes showing mm/dd/yy, just to make it idiot-(and international student-)proof.<br />I never found it necessary to change my text style (20th Feb 2010) because there's no ambiguity.<br />Ambulant's absolutely right, omitting the 'the' from a spoken date is jarring, in the same way as that bit at the start of Syriana when the English newsreader says 'A hundred twenty'. In a British accent its completely wrong, it feels like holding in a sneeze.<br />Lammyl's 'seventeenth of the scond' is not frequwently used, but I don't reckon any Brits would be wrong-footed by it. It's the form that I almost always use if I'm giving a date over the phone.Jethednoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28787909.post-29718188674813414092010-02-20T19:03:01.665+00:002010-02-20T19:03:01.665+00:00@Mrs Redboots. You asked about when we started wri...@Mrs Redboots. You asked about when we started writing our dates numerically. By which I assume you mean 4 or 4th instead of fourth, rather than just the numbering of the months. I have recently started transcribing old parish records going back several centuries and the number of different methods of recording dates (and the handwriting) is mind-boggling. Roman numerals for the years are quite common between 1538 and 1640, whilst roman numerals for the month pop up all over the place. And of course the latin date could also appear in word form as <i>quarto</i> (on the fourth) or <i>quattuor</i> (four). <br />Worse still, prior to 1752 the year began on the first of March, so an entry for <i>8</i> or <i>8ber</i> meant October - the then eighth month - (and of course the reason that October, November and December are so named). <br />And then there are the regnal years, where <i>6 Mar</i> actually means the sixth year of the reign of Mary, ie 1558.Andy Jnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28787909.post-83851865429798632142010-02-20T11:51:19.860+00:002010-02-20T11:51:19.860+00:00I was foiled yesterday in my attempt to repeat the...I was foiled yesterday in my attempt to repeat the 'conformity' experiment - but perhaps others can try it. When visiting an old colleague in a nursing home, I have to sign in and out, giving relevant times. In the afternoon, one can use the 24-hour clock or the time as we say it. I thought I would do the reverse of previous entries and see if others followed me - so I wrote 4.15 on the page. But alas, no-one else arrived in the interim before I left; not only that, but I had to start a fresh page, which would remove clues to the previous entries.<br />I will try again next time and hope to find out if the next visitors follow me or the majority!biochemistnoreply@blogger.com