American English V British English

I was recently asked by a financial services sector client to review about 50 pages of content on their U.S. website and edit this so that it was suitable for a British audience.

I thought that this would be a fairly straightforward task involving making all the obvious spelling changes...making sure that words like "color" and "flavor" had a "u" in them, changing "center" to centre, "toward" to towards, "program" to programme and amending words like "organization" and "specialize" to the UK spelling.

The work actually turned out to be rather more time-consuming than I had anticipated. It was easy enough to go through the text and amend the American spellings of particular words, but what surprised me was the amount of additional work required to amend some of the grammar, vocabulary and punctuation.

You don't very often come across words which have completely different meanings on either side of the Pond but you do have to take into account things like different noun usage, different verb patterns and use of tenses, and different use of prepositions and adverbs. Until I did this work I had never really appreciated the amount of divergence which exists today between American and British English.

In terms of the spoken word we're so familiar with American English usage over here, through TV, music and films, that we rarely misunderstand what Americans are saying. We take American English for granted and new examples of American English usage are creeping into the way we speak over here all the time.

Look at the written word on pretty much any American website though and the divergence between the two forms of English is quite apparent. It would have been easy for me just to let many of the differences go, because at the end of the day a British audience will have little difficulty in understanding the content on an American website.

As a professional copywriter I wanted to do the job properly of course - my brief was to edit the content so that it looked like it had been written by a Brit. On each page of content I had to make perhaps 10 to 20 edits. In this type of work edits have to be done manually - as far as I'm aware there is no software available which can flawlessly amend American English to British English.

The key learning point for me from doing this, and one that I would like to pass on, was....don't underestimate how much work is required to amend American English web content to British English.

Steve Shaw, Bishopsgate Copywriting

Bishopsgate Copywriting are based in Sevenoaks, England and specialise in financial and business copywriting and copyediting for websites and print media.

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Learn Spanish Abroad: Latin American Literature Part I

When you learn Spanish abroad, you will find that you learn more than just a new language. When you study Spanish in Peru, Argentina or Chile, you will also find that you learn a great deal about the culture and history of these regions. One way to do accomplish this is through exploring the rich tradition of literature in these countries.

The importance of literature in Latin America can be traced back to the Pre-Columbian days. While literature at this time was primarily passed orally down from generation to generation, there was a strong tradition that was quite important to civilization. Luckily, some of the oral narrative has been preserved to this day. Typically, this very early literature deals with mythology and religion.

If you are interested in the early history of Latin America, it is also useful to look at literature produced during the colonial period. Much of this text that was written deals with the experiences of the conquistadores and explorers. A few examples are Bernal Diaz del Castillo's account of the conquest of Mexico and Bartoleme de las Casas's Brief Account of the Destruction of the Indies. This literature provides the reader with some unique insights into this time period and also issues that surfaced due to colonization.

Of course, it is extremely valuable to read the literature written from the native's accounts as well. If you study Spanish in Peru, you will find that there are some fascinating Peruvian writers in particular. It is useful to read authors include El Inca Garcilaso de la Vega and Guaman Poma.

El Inca Garcilaso de la Vega was a historian who is often read due to his tremendous contributions to the understanding of the society of the Incans in the 1500's. In fact, this writer is so important to Peruvian culture that the main stadium in Cusco was named after him in the 1950's.

Guaman Poma was an indigenous Peruvian who wrote about how he was unsatisfied with the way the people of the Andes were treated after the Spanish conquest. He wrote the illustrated chronicle Nueva Coronica y Buen. Due to the fact that Poma used Quecha words in this document, it helped scholars later on to learn more about this language. This 1189 page document described various injustices the people faced. It is interesting to note that while the book was addressed to the King of Spain, the King never actually received this document.

When you learn Spanish abroad, you have the benefit of gaining insights into a culture that has a fascinating history. Anyone with an interest in ancient times will find reading this early literature to be an exciting experience. Even if you already know a great deal about Latin American civilization, you will find that your knowledge is heightened even further when you have an experience to read the early literature of the region.

When you attend one of Latin Immersion's Spanish language schools you will have many chances to look into the region's impressive literature. Through the organization you can study Spanish in Argentina, Chile, and Peru.

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