The Dumbest girl in the world

[longdogs]

but it's surprising how many Brits there are in American TV shows (acting as Americans) that people in the UK probably wouldn't know. BBC America

I have been watching The Affair (now into the second series). Although I knew that Ruth Wilson was British, I was amazed to learn that Dominic West was also. To me, they are both excellent actors and have the accent down to a tee. Are their accents as convincing over there or are they the equivalent of Dick Van Dyke in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang?

 

[misterhelpful]

The pound sign was in use as commercial shorthand for "lb." long before teleprinters came along. You can find old bills and invoices from the 19th century which contain entries such as "10# sugar" or "50# 10d. nails." It developed in a similar way to @ for "at" and & for "and." No doubt it was the existing use of # which caused it to be included in the character set of (American) typewriters from early days, and hence to teleprinters and later computer equipment.

I had a feeling it was used well before teleprinters, etc, but never really looked that deeply into it. There are so many nuances and connotations for me to get a grip of that I just try to take what I'm told at face value.

Thanks for clearing that up.

 

[misterhelpful]

I have been watching The Affair (now into the second series). Although I knew that Ruth Wilson was British, I was amazed to learn that Dominic West was also. To me, they are both excellent actors and have the accent down to a tee. Are their accents as convincing over there or are they the equivalent of Dick Van Dyke in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang?

To be honest, I don't notice if their accents are bad or not - there are so many regional accents here (just like the UK) that I suppose Brits can fudge it a bit and get away with an American twang. Andrew Lincoln (Rick) from The Walking Dead takes a little bit of stick for his southern accent in the show, but I think it's passable. Most American accents are rhotic so, if you just try to emphasise and roll the 'r' in words a little bit, as well as considering the regional accent you are aiming for, it's surprising how close you can get.

I'm not changing my Taffy accent for no-one, though. Right, butty boy!

 

[PBC_1966]

I had a feeling it was used well before teleprinters, etc, but never really looked that deeply into it. There are so many nuances and connotations for me to get a grip of that I just try to take what I'm told at face value.

Then there's the whole "octothorpe" business, which it seems was started as something of a gag in Bell Labs and ended up being propagated. Or, also in reference to the telephone keypad, you might still occasionally hear the # key on the telephone referred to as "diamond." That's because some early trial versions of the TouchTone keypads did have a diamond symbol where the # was later to be established, and so the name stuck.

 

[JBR]

In Britain, I'm sure we've all heard about America and, largely due to the prevalence of American TV programmes and films, have a pretty clear idea of what America is like.
The Americans have probably seen very few British TV programmes and films (and I have to say that many of those seem to feature American actors anyway, probably in order to hope to sell the programmes to the US!), so they are quite likely to be oblivious to the reality of anything outside of their own country.

There are not an awful lot of British shows on TV in my neck of the woods, unless you have specific subscriptions (which cost a bloody fortune!), but it's surprising how many Brits there are in American TV shows (acting as Americans) that people in the UK probably wouldn't know. BBC America is about the only channel I get that is dedicated to British TV. Unfortunately, it's basically like Dave - Top Gear, Top Gear, Top Gear, Doctor Who, Doctor Who, Doctor Who, Star Trek, Star Trek, Star Trek..Top Gear, Top Ge.... You get the picture!

Ah, but that's because British actors can act!

When I worked with Americans in the past, they referred to this - # - as a 'pound' sign (rather than a 'hash'). I assume that someone at some time saw one of these strange symbols - £ - and confused it with one of these - # - which I find rather strange.

I've queried this a few times since being here and have had various reasons as responses. The most popular reason is to do with the Baudot code, where teleprinters/telex machines had US keyboards with the '#' symbol in the position that the '£' symbol was in on British keyboards. Apparently, the US didn't really have much use for the '£' symbol and it was therefore not on their keyboards at all. (Bloody cheek!!) Later, the '#' key became known as the pound symbol here because of that similar positioning. (It's something along those lines anyway.) Another explanation is that it is a variation on the 'lb' term for pound with a horizontal line through the top which looked similar to '#'.
Maybe it will start to change now that Twitter uses the term 'hashtag', but they are a bit like us over here - 'We don't like change!'

Very interesting, thank you.

Mind you, I think # looks nothing like lb, more like £, in fact! The bit about being in an equivalent location on the keyboard makes sense, though.

 

[JBR]

They show a lot of programmes about the royal family. They absolutely love Prince Harry over there.

If only they knew...!

 

[JBR]

The vastness of America means that for many people other countries really are very remote. For example, where I'm sitting at home at the moment, it's about 700 miles north to the Canadian border, and about the same distance south to reach Mexico. Westward I have about 140 miles of California to cross (and pretty wild, sparsely inhabited country at that) then it's the Pacific Ocean. Eastward I have almost the full width of the United States stretching in front of me - It's over 2000 miles across about seven other states to Ohio where "misterhelpful" is located, then it's still hundreds more miles to the Atlantic from there.

Now that explains something...

why everything in America is bigger than anywhere else!

The pound sign was in use as commercial shorthand for "lb." long before teleprinters came along. You can find old bills and invoices from the 19th century which contain entries such as "10# sugar" or "50# 10d. nails."

Ah, at least America uses (pre-decimal) British coinage, then!

Sorry. Only joking!

 

[JBR]

I have been watching The Affair (now into the second series). Although I knew that Ruth Wilson was British, I was amazed to learn that Dominic West was also. To me, they are both excellent actors and have the accent down to a tee. Are their accents as convincing over there or are they the equivalent of Dick Van Dyke in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang?

To be honest, I don't notice if their accents are bad or not - there are so many regional accents here (just like the UK) that I suppose Brits can fudge it a bit and get away with an American twang.

And they must remember to pronounce the word 'NUKILAR', too!

 

[PBC_1966]

Ah, at least America uses (pre-decimal) British coinage, then!

Sorry. Only joking!

But joking aside, while designs can change from time to time, at least the shape, size and denomination of the coins hasn't changed in a very long time, unlike the U.K. where in more recent years it seems as though they're either introducing a new coin, discontinuing one, or altering the size of one every couple of years!

 

[JBR]

Ah, at least America uses (pre-decimal) British coinage, then!

Sorry. Only joking!

But joking aside, while designs can change from time to time, at least the shape, size and denomination of the coins hasn't changed in a very long time, unlike the U.K. where in more recent years it seems as though they're either introducing a new coin, discontinuing one, or altering the size of one every couple of years!

True enough. It's the same with banknotes too.

Whilst I admire the American choice not to keep changing coinage or banknotes, I do think that their banknotes all look very similar (at least to an outsider) apart from the numbers, of course.

The British philosophy is to use different colours for different denominations which, I think, is a better idea permitting easy and quick identification.

 

[misterhelpful]

Whilst I admire the American choice not to keep changing coinage or banknotes, I do think that their banknotes all look very similar (at least to an outsider) apart from the numbers, of course.

The British philosophy is to use different colours for different denominations which, I think, is a better idea permitting easy and quick identification.

They do look pretty similar, although do have somewhat different colouring, but the main issue for me is that they are all the same size. This means you can get 10's and 20's - I can't afford 50's and 100's - stuck between singles, unless you keep your wallet well organised (and you need a lot of singles in there for tipping).

The other problem is that I have to use a different wallet when I go back to visit the UK because the bigger British notes all stick out of the top of my American 'billfold'!! (I still love it over here though! )

 

[PBC_1966]

If you don't mind my asking, whereabouts in Ohio are you? Not that I know the state well in person at all - Only ever passed through it once on the train!

 

[misterhelpful]

Thirty minutes north of Dayton...in the middle of corn country!

 

[JBR]

I can't afford 50's and 100's - stuck between singles, unless you keep your wallet well organised (and you need a lot of singles in there for tipping).

You TIP people?

 

[bernardgreen]

I recall ( from a visit in 1988 ) that blind people had problems with American bank notes as there was no difference in size or texture between note of different denominations. During my last visit in 2002 I didn't notice any changes.