Listen very carefully, I shall say this only once. English is a rich and complex language. It can also be confusing, particularly when a change in emphasis, where the spelling is the same, or with the addition or deletion of just one letter can change alter the whole meaning of the word. An example of this happened to me only yesterday (5th March) when I had an appointment with a consultant at a local hospital. I had arranged this appointment over the telephone a couple of days earlier, following a conversation with my GP. She had advised me to make the necessary arrangements and that her referral letter would be sent to the hospital through the post as normal. Arriving at the hospital in good time, I completed the usual formalities of confirming my registration on their system and awaited the call. The consultant duly arrived and conducted me through to his consulting room where we sat down and commenced the appointment. I described to him the symptoms which I ...
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Now the "Americanism" is now part of our language. Do you? Another Americanism creeps into use on television, on the BBC News as well as SKY . Even the media are caught up in this swing towards the American rather than the usual UK use of words and phraseology. This time it seems we now use the word "homicide" rather than the UK English "murder" to refer to unlawful killing. Not that the word "homicide" is wrong, it is just not what we have historically used to describe that crime. Too many American "cop" shows on television have no doubt ingrained the "American" language into the minds of the viewer who now accept and even use the phraseology in their everyday lives. Kojak, Colombo, LA Law, Miami Vice and others, even going back to Dragnet, have been littered with variations ad nauseum, of the the "I am lootenant Colombo LA Police Homicide" introduction of the character. Even the British Police seem to b...
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/australasia/missing-malaysian-flight-mh370-promises-and-prayers--but-wait-goes-on-for-passengers-relatives-9223743.html Search teams 'tantalisingly close' to finding the wreckage Search area's As the perplexing hunt for Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 enters its fourth week, search teams believe they may be tantalisingly close to finding the wreckage. But for the relatives of the 239 passengers and crew, the failure to retrieve a single piece of debris to date is excruciating. Kathy Marks, "Independent":Saturday 29 March 2014 "Tantalisingly close to finding the wreckage". Now what on earth does that mean? "Wreckage" is either there, or it isn't. Kathy Marks, "Independent" reporter and author of this piece of journalistic nonsense, joins what seems to be a growing trend amongst "journalists" of the "Independent" by writing stories using "s...