Along with the majority of the press, those writing for The Guardian occasionally confuse the written and spoken word when two languages are involved; somehow the British media have great difficulty telling translators and interpreters apart (posts passim).
Yesterday The Guardian acknowledged its errors by publishing the following correction and clarification.
One article (Merkel backs May’s decision not to trigger Brexit until next year, 21 July, page 6) referred to the chancellor “speaking in German with an official translator”, and another (No free trade without open borders, Hollande tells May, 22 July, page 1) referred to the president “speaking in French with an official translator”. While Collins dictionary says “translator” can mean “a person or machine that translates speech or writing”, our style guide advises using “interpreter” for people who work with the spoken word, and “translator” for those who work with the written word.
Well done Grauniad; I’m glad your style guide acknowledges the correct use of terminology.
The British government is to ban all Latin abbreviations on all its websites, allegedly to save confusion amongst users of accessibility software and non-English speakers.
Writing in a post on the gov.uk blog, Persis Howe writes that he and his colleagues have several programs that read webpages for those with visual impairment read ‘eg’ incorrectly and that while ‘e.g.’ gets read correctly by screen readers, there are better, clearer ways of introducing examples for all users.
Howe goes on to say that:
We promote the use of plain English on GOV.UK. We advocate simple, clear language. Terms like eg, ie and etc, while common, make reading difficult for some.
Anyone who didn’t grow up speaking English may not be familiar with them. Even those with high literacy levels can be thrown if they are reading under stress or are in a hurry – like a lot of people are on the web.
Those in charge of the gov.uk website are therefore changing the site’s style guide and phasing out their usage, which will take some time as some 4,000 instances alone of eg have been found.
Abbreviations such as eg and ie should be written properly with full-stops as e.g. and i.e. and the fact they are being allowed on government websites is a sign of the fall in standards of both writing and teaching English since I finished my formal education some four decades ago. The fact they these erroneously-written abbreviations are getting misinterpreted by software such as screen readers is a symptom, not the disease.
While confusion amongst non-English speakers may be a valid reason to curtail the use of e.g. and i.e., meaning respectively exempli gratia (for the sake of an example) and id est (that is), etc. does not deserve to be lumped in with them as its use has spread around the world far from its origins in ancient Rome.
One field in which the use of Latin phraseology abounds is the law and the administration of justice. However, it seems likely that Whitehall’s mandarins will be reluctant take on the horsehair wig and gown brigade on their use of terms from an empire that ceased to exist over 1,600 years ago.
Commenting on the changes, the Daily Telegraph reports that campaigners said the decision was to give up Latin was “short-sighted” because they have been part of common parlance for hundreds of years.
The Telegraph quotes Roger Wemyss Brooks of the Latin Mass Society of England and Wales, who said the following:
Latin is part of our cultural heritage and it’s part of the basis of English. It unites us with other cultures throughout Europe and the world who have a connection with the Romance languages.
It’s a very concise language which is used specifically for its precision and I think it’s short sighted to be giving it up.
There was good news this week for Bristol businesses with a yearning for high speed internet connectivity.
The Bristol Post reported on the deployment of ultra-fast 1 Gbps internet in the city.
While journalists at the Temple Way Ministry of Truth are quite competent at their main task of churnalism, such as copying and pasting the words of wisdom given in press releases by men in suits – as in the article in question – standards slip dramatically and the absence of sub-editors and the associated lack of quality control are patently obvious when Post staff try simplifying complicated technical concepts, as shown by the following sentence.
Shall we just examine the above sentence in detail? There’s plenty wrong with it both technically and grammatically, which schoolchildren sitting their SATs examinations at ages 10 or 11 years would be embarrassed to get wrong.
Firstly, those glass cables. The proper designation is “optical fibre cable“; and as is well known the correct use of terminology is important. An optical fibre cable is a cable containing one or more optical fibres that are used to carry light, whilst an optical fibre itself is a flexible, transparent fibre made by drawing glass (silica) or plastic to a diameter slightly thicker than that of a human hair. So an optical fibre cable can be made of either glass or plastic, i.e. not solely glass.
Data from an internet connection is transmitted as light down an optical fibre cable. Light travels at the speed of light. However, it is the method for providing the internet connection which is “highly reliable and efficient, not the speed of light. The subordinate clause, i.e. “which is highly reliable and efficient is misplaced and should at any rate have been preceded by a comma.
Finally, there’s that speed of light; it’s so reliable and efficient that its precise value is 299,792,458 metres per second (approximately 3.00×108 m/s). It is commonly denoted as c, as in Einstein’s famous mass–energy equivalence formula. Furthermore, c is the maximum speed at which all matter – and hence information – in the universe can travel.
In the slightly better old days when the Post still employed proper sub-editors, any decent holder of that position would have taken that sentence to bits and re-written it roughly as follows:-
“These fibre optic cables deliver an internet connection reliably and efficiently at the speed of light.”
Or alternatively:
“These fibre optic cables deliver a reliable, efficient internet connection at the speed of light.”
Unfortunately, local newspapers and their online analogues nowadays seem to have forgotten that quality matters and with quality comes a reputation and with the latter, authority.
Like many, I was saddened to hear of the death of Muhammad Ali. As a young lad growing up in the 1960s and keen on sport of all kinds, he was a large presence on the TV sports programmes and the newspaper sports pages.
His achievements in the ring and his stand against conscription and the Vietnam War helped reinforce his reputation: he really did end up as “the greatest“.
However, news emerges via the Bristol Post that Ali’s death may not be all it seems: Muhammad’s demise could have been at the behest of Marvin Rees, Bristol’s newly elected mayor.
However, as per usual, it is merely a case of the endemic bad use of English, appalling grammar and ambiguity by the Post’s semi-literate hacks.
Unfortunately, the reporter concerned fails to tell readers how the car was able to stay in the saddle, given the inability of the car’s wheels to fit into the stirrups. 😉
Very soon after graduating and getting my first job with Imperial Group, I was taught by my then manager to avoid any ambiguity when writing. Times have clearly changed!
For any Brit with republican leanings who is still trying to forget yesterday’s antediluvian pantomime in Westminster otherwise known as the State Opening of Parliament, 19th May 1649 is a significant date.
On that day in 1649 the English Parliament enacted a law entitled “Act Declaring and Constituting the People of England to be a Commonwealth and Free-State“, abolishing both the monarchy and the House of Lords.
The text of the Act is available on Wikisource*, from whence it has been transcribed from the accompanying PDF with the original 17th century spelling and punctuation.
BE IT DECLARED and enacted by this present Parliament and by the Authoritie of the same:—
That the People of England and of all the Dominions and Territoryes thereunto belonging are and shall be and are hereby constituted, made, established, and confirmed to be a Commonwealth and free State And shall from henceforth be Governed as a Commonwealth and Free State by the supreame Authoritie of
this Nation, the Representatives of the People in Parliament and by such as they shall appoint and constitute as Officers and Ministers under them for the good of the People and that without any King or House of Lords.
* Originally taken from Acts and Ordinances of the Interregnum, 1642-1660, edited C H Firth and R S Rait (London, 1911)
Although they are more likely to be seen in upland areas of south-west England, Wales, the north Pennines and Lake District and much of Scotland, sightings of ravens are not unknown in the low-lying city of Bristol.
Common raven (corvus corax). Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons
Your ‘umble scribe has seen single ravens around Temple Meads railway station, as well as in such inner-city districts as Easton. More often than not, I have heard the raven’s distinctive call before seeing it with the naked eye.
The largest number I’ve ever spotted at one time was a few weeks ago, when I sighted three ravens circling over Barton Hill, being mobbed by aggressive members of the area’s resident gull population.
Mythology and legend
Ravens have long featured in European mythology. In Irish mythology, the goddess Morrígan alighted on the hero Cú Chulainn‘s shoulder in the form of a raven after his death. In Welsh mythology ravens were associated with the Welsh god Bran the Blessed, whose name translates to “raven.” According to the Mabinogion, Bran’s head was buried in the White Hill of London as a talisman against invasion.
In Norse mythology, Huginn (from the Old Norse for “thought”) and Muninn (Old Norse for “memory” or “mind”) are a pair of ravens that fly all over the world, Midgard and bring the god Odin information.
In England a legend developed that the country would not fall to a foreign invader as long as there were ravens at the Tower of London (invasions are averted by the simple expedient of clipping the wings of the resident ravens. Ed.). Although this is often thought to be an ancient belief, Geoffrey Parnell, the official Tower of London historian, believes that, like so many other legends of the British Isles, this is actually a romantic Victorian invention.
In culture
In western culture ravens have long been considered to be birds of ill omen and death, partly due to the negative symbolism of their all-black plumage and the eating of carrion.
As in traditional mythology and folklore, the common raven features frequently in more modern writings such as the works of William Shakespeare, and, perhaps most famously, in the poem “The Raven” by Edgar Allan Poe. Ravens have also appeared in the works of Charles Dickens, J. R. R. Tolkien and Stephen King, amongst others.
Ravens have also featured in song. “The Three Ravens” is an English folk ballad, printed in the song book Melismata compiled by the appositely named Thomas Ravenscroft and published in 1611, but it is perhaps older than that.
The music and lyrics are set out below. The latter are in their original 17th century orthography, with the refrains in italics.
The ballad takes the form of 3 ravens conversing about where and what they should eat. One tells of a newly slain knight, but they find he is guarded by his loyal hawks and hounds. Furthermore, a “fallow doe”, an obvious metaphor for the knight’s pregnant (“as great with young as she might go”) lover or mistress comes to his body, kisses his wounds, bears him away and buries him, leaving the ravens without a meal.
Music for The Three Ravens
There were three rauens sat on a tree, Downe a downe, hay down, hay downe
There were three rauens sat on a tree, With a downe
There were three rauens sat on a tree,
They were as blacke as they might be. With a downe derrie, derrie, derrie, downe, downe
The one of them said to his mate,
‘Where shall we our breakefast take?’
‘Downe in yonder greene field,
There lies a knight slain vnder his shield.
‘His hounds they lie downe at his feete,
So well they can their master keepe.
‘His haukes they flie so eagerly,
There’s no fowle dare him come nie.’
Downe there comes a fallow doe,
As great with yong as she might goe.
She lift vp his bloudy hed,
And kist his wounds that were so red.
She got him vp vpon her backe,
And carried him to earthen lake.
She buried him before the prime,
She was dead herselfe ere euen-song time.
God send euery gentleman,
Such haukes, such hounds, and such a leman.
Your correspondent does not know what the three ravens circling Barton Hill found to eat, as dead knights are not exactly common in that part of the city. 😀
With the notable exception of Test Match Special‘s cricket commentary on long wave, BBC sports commentators seem to be employed more for their ability to shout than proficiency in the English language, judging from the rare bits of sports commentary that get broadcast as part of Radio 4’s news bulletins.
This opinion received further support yesterday when the BBC Sport Twitter account sought the views of Aston Villa FC fans on news that the club at the bottom of the Premier League (that’s the English First Division in old money. Ed. 🙂 ) table would be playing in the Championship (the old Second Division. Ed.) next year, as per the following tweet, which has since been deleted:
Wait off the shoulders, Auntie? This blog is giving you a red card and you should now proceed from the field of play for an early bath and thence to your reserved place in Heterograph Corner! 🙂
Yesterday evening there was dark smoke on the skyline as your correspondent returned from an early evening pint. However, it wasn’t until this morning that its full significance and exclusive nature was revealed by the Bristol Post, the city’s newspaper of warped record.
As per the screenshot above, the Post duly reported a fire at a scrapyard in the Fishponds area, although a later report moved the fire to nearby Speedwell.
Furthermore, the conflagration must have been painful on the ears for anyone in the vicinity or downwind as the smoke was “bellowing“.
However, as the witnesses interviewed by the paper make no mention of noise, it can only be assumed that the hapless hack had an unfortunate vowel movement.
The later report did state correctly that “A scrapyard in Speedwell left dark smoke billowing over parts of Bristol,” but not until the hopeless howler had caused much merriment in the reports comments section.
If the reporter in question happens upon this post, the definitions of bellow and billow are given below for future reference:
Bellow: (of a person or animal) emit a deep loud roar, typically in pain or anger: e.g. “he bellowed in agony”
Billow: (of smoke, cloud, or steam) to move or flow outward with an undulating motion: e.g. “smoke was billowing from the chimney-mouth”.
