Before
it sails over anyone’s head let me just point out that the title is a play on
words based on the name of a Pink Floyd song.
Now
down to the nitty gritty of it all. The English speaking nations of the world
(and I mean the proper ones, UK, US, Canada, Australia and NZ, possibly South
Africa too. NOT INDIA) have, in my opinion, a very odd relationship. I would
not be the first to draw this comparison. Scores of people that study English
literature will learn of Oscar Wilde and Robert Louis Stevenson’s experiences
in dealing with people and customs from different sides of the Atlantic. Oscar
even summed up the ‘special relationship’ best with his quote that the US and
UK were “divided by a common language.” Now this is something that has been a
cause of much bafflement to me for a very very long time. It just doesn’t add
up in my book. The primary reason for this is perhaps down to my own life; until
recently I felt a strong kinship with Indians (and in some senses one could
argue I still do) and this has been hugely influenced by my ability to speak
their language. I, for many years, felt more at home in India than other
cousins raised outside the motherland because of this. From this I always felt
that culture and by some extension kinship was inexplicably linked to language.
After all if I can express my thoughts and feelings in a coherent manner in
someone’s language, a bond is formed, isn’t it?
And
yet somehow Brits and Americans, whilst having admiration for one another, do
feel they are different sides of the coin at the very least and as such see
each other as foreign. My American relatives argue time and distance count for
something. Whilst that may be so it can not fully explain the barriers that exist,
because this is not the case everywhere. I will of course dip back into Hindi because,
after all, that is a language I know well. Through colonisation etc various
Indian diasporas have come into existence, two famous examples being Fiji and
Surinam. In both nations there have been at least 5 or 6 generations of
separation with India, and as such the Bihari dialect of Hindi, Bhojpuri, has
been spoken amongst these communities and changed a little. And yet it is still
intelligible for a speaker of a more mainstream more Indian form of Hindi. What’s
more the nuances are accepted for what they are, nuances, and then the bonds
form. They still feel a part of India, or at the very least that Indian culture
is not something separate and distinct from them. Heck, even the Guyanese, who
now speak English, still feel India is the motherland!
This
led me to think that perhaps it’s a European thing. The reason I say this is
because there is a significant difference between European and Brazilian Portuguese,
not enough for them not to be mutually comprehendible but enough for my
language partner from Rio to realise I’d been learning what they speak in
Portugal and informing me what words were used in South America instead. That
said from speaking to him it appeared that when he got over this hurdle with
the Europeans they just chat and don’t make a (massive) deal out of it. It’s
only natural to talk about differences, but I could easily talk about the
differences between Scotland and England with someone, couldn’t I?
There
just has to be a British element. Or at the very least a north-western Europe
element because the French are well known for mocking the ‘ridiculousness’ of
the way the ‘colonies’ speak their language. I’d argue that maybe (just maybe)
the Francosphere are more divided than we Anglos are.
But
wait they have that ‘Francophonie council’ (google it if you don’t believe me)
where they meet up and, regardless of what they officially say, fight the
onslaught of English in the international arena. I can’t think of anything like
that for English, well at the very least it’s not as prominent, and in any case
there isn’t much of a need for it, is there?
So
wait, is this a British thing? And before any Americans get up in arms, that is
the correct adjective because, whatever happens English came from England. And YOU CAME FROM ENGLAND. And if you
disagree with that I explained this above. Have a read again about 'Why we're all British' if you haven't.
The ‘British’
argument is one that I’ve leaned towards for a long time since there is an ‘us
against the world’ mentality in these isles coupled with a sense of righteous
snobbery from having shaped so much of the world in the image it is in today.
And the Americans have definitely got this too. I’ve lost count of the number
of Americans who feel that their government is a ‘do-good’ police force for the
world and that they really are bringing ‘democracy’ to world, only the world
isn’t too grateful. Argue the political ramifications elsewhere, this is most
definitely in the psyche of many Americans, much as Victorian England thought
that they were doing a great service to the world with all its ‘expansions.’ If
you’re anti-war you may argue about how your nation is a ‘great beacon of civilisation’
and how the world can learn much from following your examples. That, again, was
something the Victorians thought when they pushed through all the labour
reforms and cleaned up the Thames with the largest sewage system then known to
man. I see a lot of similarities in mindset even if many Americans feel that
England is some weird foreign country that couldn’t be more different. I’m
sorry I still don’t buy it, why are Brits and Americans so adamant about considering
each other different?
Well,
the best answer I can come up with is that it’s comforting. We’re familiar to
the Americans and they’re familiar to us. In this mad crazy world where
national identities are often blurred and manipulated and changed Britain (or
the US) is a wall to lean on and give and take culture from, and then pretend
as though it never happened. It’s better than having a rapport with say, the
French or Russians, with their weird languages and bizarre rituals, call the
English foreign because they speak our language so we can talk the night away
about how different we are when secretly, deep down, we know we have more in
common than we may admit to. One thing I found particularly weird when I
travelled to the New World (I love calling it that and sounding like some big
shot explorer!) is that I felt far more at home in the US than I did Canada.
That was down to one thing; a cynical attitude. As strange as it may sound, the
cheerful attitude of Canadians, whilst lovely (and I’m not knocking it I swear)
did create some distance. Weird. Not enough for me to think of them as foreign
before anyone points the finger, but the distance was there. Just like there is
a bit of distance between me and many people from London proper, but it’s not
huge.
So
enjoy thinking of Brits as totally different, Americans. I know it’s not true.
I know our secret…
Regards,
The
Vedic Underdog
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