language | Steve Woods

The writing on the wall

09/05/2023 Steve WoodsBristol, Language, Politics

Expressing political opinions on walls is a practice that reaches back at least 2,000 years to Roman times – as in the case of Pompeii and other Roman towns and cities – and possibly even earlier.

One wall at the start of Whitehall Road in Bristol has displayed various messages – all of them anti-Conservative – over the years (see posts passim here and here. Ed.), of which the one below is the latest.

It appeared some time before last week’s English local government elections. However, your ‘umble scribe does not know the extent to which this particular slogan contributed to the Nasty Party’s disastrous losses of over 1,000 council seats and – more locally – its loss of overall control of South Gloucestershire seeing as it lies on a well-used commuter and bus route between the city and that neighbouring local authority.
Auntie crosses the Atlantic

07/05/2023 Steve WoodsLanguage, Media, Politics, Social Media

The BBC has always prided itself on the high standard of its English, both spoken and written.

However, that may well a thing of the past if one of today’s social media offerings from the BBC Politics Twitter account (byline: the best of the BBC’s political coverage. Ed.) is to be believed.

Yes, you did read that correctly; license [sic]; twice; in two sentences.

Either Auntie is employing an American to curate the BBC Politics Twitter account or an illiterate.

If the latter, some remedial English lessons are clearly needed, as well as practice, particularly if use of the verb to practise is contemplated in future. 😀

In amongst the predictable responses from licence fee objectors and refuseniks, numerous replies to the tweet pointed out the basic orthographic difference between British and American English. However, no acknowledgement or correction of the error has been forthcoming over 10 hours after the original tweet was posted.
Behind the wheel …of a pub

04/05/2023 Steve WoodsBristol, Language, Media

Down at the Temple Way Ministry of Truth, the ambiguity department has been hard at work.

Again (posts passim).

One commenter rejoicing in the name saveenergy decided to have some fun with this latest illiteracy from the Post, as follows:

“beach you can drive on with a lovely pub”

What if you don’t drive a lovely pub ??

Is it exclusively for drivers of lovely pubs, or can I drive my spit & sawdust bar on this beach; Are taverns, ale houses, inns & wine bars excluded ???

We need to know.

“There is a great pub right on the sea”

How do they stop the drinks spilling when the sea is choppy ??

Well done, sir or madam. Your ‘umble scribe could not have mocked the piece better himself. 😀
Bureaucratic logic

28/04/2023 Steve WoodsBristol, Language, Oddities, Politics

The West of England Combined Authority (WECA) is a combined authority consisting of the local authorities of Bristol, South Gloucestershire, and Bath and North East Somerset.

The authority’s functions, as specified by the West of England Combined Authority Order, mostly cover planning, skills and local transport.

And this post is specifically concerned with transport and buses in particular.

Since passing pensionable age last year, your ‘umble scribe has been entitled to a concessionary bus pass offering him free bus travel within England, subject to various conditions.

That being so, your correspondent has found himself doing things he hasn’t done for many a decade, like running for buses. 😀

At the start of April, significant changes were made to bus services within the WECA area. To announce the changes, posters were put up at bus stops. At the foot of each poster, some useful information is given (not that the remainder of the posters did not also provide useful information. Ed.), as shown in the photo below.

Like your ‘umble scribe, readers may also be perplexed at the advice given to those without internet access to contact the Transport Operations Team by email. Obviously a kind of bureaucratic logic of which normal mortals do not wot is at work, together with a degree of perspicacity to which the fictional Yes Minister could only aspire.

That’s not to say that the authority does not have aspirations. Indeed, the term vision appears some 500 times* on the WECA website, according to a site-specific Google search.

Those working at the authority are therefore in need of a doctor in the opinion of the late West German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt, who famously quipped “Wer Visionen hat, sollte zum Arzt gehen“, usually translated into English as Anyone who has visions should go to the doctor. Perhaps a logician would also not go amiss. 😉

* = This count is a lot less than the instances of vision on the Bristol City Council website (posts passim).

Update 07/05/23: five weeks after the actual timetable changes were implemented, new revised timetables have finally started to appear at bus stops; see photo below. No need to rush as it appears that if you’re a local government organisation, you are at complete liberty to do your allotted tasks entirely to your own satisfaction!
Bilingual illiteracy

26/04/2023 Steve WoodsLanguage, Media, Oddities, Social Media

Playwright Oscar Wilde gave his character Lady Augusta Bracknell some memorable lines in his play The Importance of Being Earnest.
Of these, one in particular related to the difference between misfortune and carelessness:
To lose one parent, Mr Worthing, may be regarded as a misfortune; to lose both looks like carelessness.

In the case of contractors working for gas supply company Wales & West Utilities in Abertawe/Swansea, carelessness seems to be their modus operandi, as per this report on the Swansea Bay News website.

On a job outside Llangyfelach Primary School, the utility’s contractors managed to spell school incorrectly as shcool. Sharp-eyed Cymraeg-speaking readers will aslo notice that its Welsh equivalent ysgol is also misspelt as ysool, although this appears to be from an earlier job, judging by the colour differences in the asphalt.

Image credit: Rob Jones

Speaking to the BBC, Wales & West Utilities said the cock-up had occurred during repairs to the local gas network. Its spokesman Phil Whittier said: “Unfortunately, (we) have misspelt the word ‘school'”. However, denied any responsibility for the misspelling of ysgol. The BBC reports that Swansea Council has been contacted about that incorrect spelling.

The error has gone around the world, being mocked as far afield as Australia, with some parents suggesting on social media those responsible be made to write school out correctly one hundred times.
Sunak and his low-carbon escort

25/04/2023 Steve WoodsLanguage, Media, Oddities, Politics, Security

It’s not unusual for heads of government and state to have their motorcades accompanied by motorcycle escorts, as seen in the example below from 2009 of the then Chinese president Hu Jintao‘s visit to Zagreb in Croatia.

Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons
On Sunday – the day of the London marathon – a fleet of cars containing the alleged Prime Minister was spotted surrounded by two sets of police officers – one on bicycles and the other on foot.

Sunak has in recent months been criticised for his disproportionate use of flying, both on private aircraft and on military ones, including one of a mere 25 minutes’ duration.

The Telegraph has suggested the action was to thwart the attentions of environmental protesters from Extinction Rebellion.

If that were not the case and Fishy Rishi was making a vain attempt to reduce his carbon footprint, your ‘umble scribe would like to introduce him to a new word to add to his vocabulary: greenwash.
Mail continues its anti-Welsh campaign

22/04/2023 Steve WoodsLanguage, Media, Politics

Why does the Daily Mail hate Cymraeg – and by implication the speakers of that language so much?

It was one of those Anglophone media outlets that blew its top earlier this week over the decision by a second Welsh national park authority to call the national park solely by its Welsh name – a name for prominent local topographical features that reaches back over a millennium (posts passim).

Yesterday it discovered and did a hatchet job on a petition currently gathering signatures on the Senedd Cymru website calling for the exclusive use of Welsh place names,

To quote the same places named by the Mail, your ‘umble scribe sees no problem at all in Caerdydd, Abertawe, Casnewydd and Wrecsam being referred to by their names in the local vernacular, which have existed for centuries. He also believes that if the Mail is against something, what is being ranted about is inevitably worthwhile.

The Mail’s anti-Welsh piece was also boosted by Andrew RT Davies, leader of the Welsh Conservatives, who used it as a means of attacking what he called extreme policies likely to be introduced by a future Labour government, no doubt winning approval from his colonial masters at CCHQ in London SW1.

Since the Mail’s intercession the petition, which was languishing with a signature count of some 250, has now amassed over 300.

Da iawn! 😀

Update 23/04: Following coverage in the Welsh media of the Mail’s bigotry, the number of signatories this evening is now approaching 700, well above the threshold for its consideration by the Senedd’s petitions committee, if somewhat short of the 10,000 needed for a debate in the chamber.
Bore Da, Bannau Brycheiniog!

18/04/2023 Steve WoodsLanguage, Media, Politics

Yesterday the news was announced that, following the recent decision by its fellow national park authority in North Wales, the one covering a large swathe of south Wales would henceforth be called the Bannau Brycheiniog National Park in English.

There was also a video to accompany the name change.

However, the change has not gone down well, particularly in the rabid right-wing monoglot English press, as shown by the image below from yesterday’s Daily Mail website.

Snowflakes!

Not forgetting to add all their typical smears, they’re touchy souls at the Mail, aren’t they? Nevertheless, like all good Anglophone monoglots, they cannot even get the pronunciation of Bannau Brycheiniog right. In Brycheiniog, the ch is pronounced as in the Scottish loch, not like an English ck as written in the Mail.

Furthermore a ‘columnist‘ at The Independent also did not want to be excluded from being outraged and mocking the Welsh language, as Nation Cymru reports.

Nor has the change met with universal approval in Wales itself.

To being with, Reach plc’s Cardiff-based Wales Online title adopted a provocative stance with its headline at the top of yesterday’s home page (clickbait for a largely monoglot Anglophone readership not known for voicing its support for either Cymraeg or Cymdeithas yr Iaith? Ed.).

However, the all-Wales whinging trophy has to go to the Welsh Conservatives, those faithful servants of their colonial masters in London SW1, with the charge being headed by their Senedd and Welsh ‘leader‘, one Andrew RT Davies, who planted the Welsh Tories firmly in the Anglophone camp.

This earned him plenty of derision, particularly from his fellow Welsh, of which the following is typical.

If Mr Davies doesn’t like his compatriots using their own language and celebrating their own heritage (the hills were known as the Bannau Brycheiniog long before the monoglots arrived in force), perhaps he ought to relinquish his seat in the Senedd Cymru and find a nice safe Tory constituency in the English Conservative heartlands.
I for one shall look forward to visiting the Bannau Brycheiniog and Eryri (the national park formerly known as Snowdonia. Ed.).
Public notice, public ignorance

18/04/2023 Steve WoodsBristol, Language

As seen in Gloucester Lane, BS2.

In the words of lots of disappointed parents trying to teach their offspring manners, “What’s the magic word?” 😉
Seriously

06/04/2023 Steve WoodsLanguage, Security, Tech
The language used in official responses to news stories seems to have been rigid and formulaic in recent times, particularly amongst those organisations within or linked to the public sector.

Today’s edition of The Register reports that ACRO, the UK’s Criminal Records Office was taken offline due to a security breach. The site currently displays a holding page blaming ‘technical issues‘, a fine example of misleading bureaucratic language.

This is the site’s holding page as this post is published.

El Reg notes that manages ACRO people’s criminal record information, running checks as needed on individuals for any convictions, cautions, or current prosecutions. It with British police and businesses, as well as exchanging this data with other countries, particularly where people wish to move or emigrate to another country and a certificate of good behaviour is required from the British police. ACRO has access to data from the Police National Computer via an information sharing agreement with the Cabinet Office.

The data typically handled by ARCO includes name and address history, extended family information, a new foreign address, legal representation, passport information, photo and data PIN cautions, reprimands, arrests, charges or convictions.

Earlier this week, ACRO emailed users to inform them that it had “recently been made aware of a cyber security incident affecting the website between 17th January 2023 and 21 March 2023“, adding that “we have no conclusive evidence that personal data has been affected by the cyber security incident; however it is only right that we inform you of the situation. We are very sorry that because of your interaction with ACRO your data could have been affected, and we are working tirelessly to resolve this matter.”

The message went on to say that “robust measures” had been taken as soon as the breach was discovered. It won’t be the first time that pulling the plug on a website has been described by a public sector organisation spokesperson as “robust”, If your systems were truly “robust”, taking the site offline would not have been necessary.

After intoning the “robust” mantra, ARCO then goes on to say: “We take data security very seriously and will ensure that the matter is fully investigated…. Translating this into plain English, this means “Oh dear! We’ve been caught out!”

The fact that ARCO had not taken data security “very seriously” is clearly highlighted by two facts:
- Firstly, ARCO did not notice crooks were gaining access to its computer systems for more than two months; and
- Secondly, it has now freely admitted that it is going to take steps to find out how the breach happened and prevent its reoccurrence. A clear case of that old adage of shutting the stable door after the horse has bolted.
The public sector relies heavily on public trust to do its work. If it really does want to be taken seriously, tough measures need to be taken and implemented, not just for IT security, but in connection a very ancient and fundamental idea: that of honesty.

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