{"id":9266,"date":"2016-09-12T15:28:29","date_gmt":"2016-09-12T20:28:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/boydsnest.org\/news\/?p=9266"},"modified":"2016-09-15T15:38:42","modified_gmt":"2016-09-15T20:38:42","slug":"how-to-talk-english-learning-to-embrace-britishisms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/boydsnest.org\/news\/2016\/how-to-talk-english-learning-to-embrace-britishisms\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Talk English: Learning to embrace Britishisms"},"content":{"rendered":"

This post is the seventh in our “England 2015”:\/news\/category\/travel\/england-2015\/ series.<\/em><\/p>\n

As soon as we had secured our plane tickets, our first task was to contact our dear friend and host Teresa, a spunky, energetic 86-year-old Englishwoman. She and the Boyd family have been friends for decades, and she has been urging us to bring our family to visit for years.<\/p>\n

Once I figured out how to make an international call on my phone, I got through to Teresa. As always, she was warm and considerate (“Darling, I’m so glad you will stay in the flat. I won’t be a bit in your way!”), but I ended the call with a sudden realization: I have an American accent, and I was feeling very self-conscious about it.
\n\"Posing<\/a>
\nA few Americans posing with King Henry VIII at Hampton Court Palace.<\/em><\/p>\n

Essentially, this anxiety simply mirrored the rest of the self-consciousness I felt about my American ways, and I handled it in a similar style: by aiming to be both true to myself and sensitive to our host culture. I found a healing example of American elegance in England through watching Downton Abbey<\/em> and studying “Lady Grantham\u2019s”:http:\/\/downtonabbey.wikia.com\/wiki\/Cora_Crawley gracious and unapologetic American accent.<\/p>\n

At home, we practiced saying “I’m looking for the loo!” and “May I please have a biscuit?” The girls found it hilarious that one should say “trousers” instead of “pants” in England, lest others think you are referring to undergarments.<\/p>\n

It all worked out, albeit imperfectly. We stumbled right off the bat by explaning to the customs officer that we were “on vacation” (and not “on holiday”). I was always strangely surprised that people understood what we were talking about when we asked for “the loo.” We even said “pants” a few times in public, then giggled with embarrassment. I did finally relax into a state of acceptance of my own American accent.<\/p>\n

But we felt very pleased when, at one breakfast in Gloucestershire, a man mistook us for Canadians due to our quiet demeanor. Score one for Team America!
\n\"Mind<\/a>
\nAn English cautionary sign with English graffiti about an “English genre of dance music”:https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Dubstep .<\/em><\/p>\n

Read the next post in our “England 2015”:\/news\/category\/travel\/england-2015\/ series: It’s Merely a Flesh Wound: Diving into England’s bloody history<\/a><\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This post is the seventh in our “England 2015”:\/news\/category\/travel\/england-2015\/ series. As soon as we had secured our plane tickets, our first task was to contact our dear friend and host Teresa, a spunky, energetic 86-year-old Englishwoman. She and the Boyd family have been friends for decades, and she has been urging us to bring our … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “How to Talk English: Learning to embrace Britishisms”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":9297,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28,21,2,27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9266","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-england-2015","category-family","category-kids","category-travel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/boydsnest.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9266","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/boydsnest.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/boydsnest.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/boydsnest.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/boydsnest.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9266"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/boydsnest.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9266\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9330,"href":"https:\/\/boydsnest.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9266\/revisions\/9330"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/boydsnest.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9297"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/boydsnest.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9266"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/boydsnest.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9266"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/boydsnest.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9266"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}