Re: [OT] British vs. American English

[Stephen Powell <zlinuxman@wowway.com>]

On Sun, 02 Oct 2011 11:08:11 -0400 (EDT), consul tores wrote:
> 2011/10/2 Stephen Powell <zlinuxman@wowway.com>:
>> On Sun, 02 Oct 2011 06:20:57 -0400 (EDT), Nuno Magalhães wrote:
>>> i still get quirky about color instead of colour or centre vs center
>>> (which is which btw?).
>>
>> ...
>> center is the American spelling and centre is the British spelling
>> ...
> 
> Nop, it seems incorrect:
> 
> The center of the earth.
> The Bachellors centre.

The names of businesses are an exception.  The name of
a business will often use a British, or even an archaic spelling
in order to create an effect.  For example, there is a business
called "The Vitamin Shoppe".  Shoppe is an archaic British spelling
for shop.  In ordinary prose, the word is always spelled "shop".
But in the name of a business, they may deliberately use an old
spelling to create an effect.  Maybe they want you to believe that
their business has been around for a very long time.  Or maybe
they want you to associate their business with the old-fashioned
personal touch of a sole proprietorship from long ago.  It's a
marketing thing.  Sometimes, they deliberately misspell things
in the name of a business.  A well-known example is "Toys R Us".
(Actually, the right way to spell it is with a backwards "R", but
I don't have such a key on my keyboard.)  It is a store which
specializes in selling toys for children, and children are known
for incorrect spelling.  That's part of the effect that they
are trying to create.  "Center" may be spelled "centre" in the
name of a business, to create a marketing effect, but in ordinary
prose, it is always spelled "center".

The only other exception that I know of is Bible quotations.
When quoting verses from the "Authorized Version" of the Bible,
commonly known as the "King James Version", the words are spelled
exactly the same as they appear in print in the Bible.  The AV
is, after all, an English book, and the spellings are the standard
English spellings from 1769, which is when the book was last
revised.

-- 
  .''`.     Stephen Powell    
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