Learning a New Language. English.

A better title might have been, 'Relearning a Language I Thought I Knew'. I'm in the midst of my dissertation writing. As I complete each chapter, I send it to my supervisor for feedback. Today, we sat down to look over the first three chapters I had sent him. Among other things, I learned that I don't know the English language...well, at least not British English.

I was amazed at how many things are different. For those of you contemplating academic work on this side of the globe, here's some things I've learned:

Quotation Marks: In the U.S., the double quotation mark, ", is what we use to open and close quotations. If there happens to be a quotation within a quotation, we then use single, ', quotation marks to designate this interior quote. Well, turn everything on its head to fit in over here. The single quotation mark is used first, with the double quotation mark used for quotations within the original quotation.

Example (US): Koinange wanted to "give his life to assuage 'the educational hunger of three millions [sic] natives of Kenya'."

Example (UK): Koinange wanted to 'give his life to assuage "the educational hunger of three millions [sic] natives of Kenya"'.

You'll notice that quotation marks aren't the only thing that's different, but also where you put them. In the US, the punctuation almost always go inside the quotation mark.

Example: Berman writes, "Administrators in Kenya came to believe that there was no necessary linkage between African socio-economic problems and political action."

However, once again, flip it around here. With the rare exception that a complete, standalone sentence is used within the quotation, the punctuation always goes on the outside.

Example: Berman writes, 'Administrators in Kenya came to believe that there was no necessary linkage between African socio-economic problems and political action'.

Commas: Commas are also used differently here. For example, in the US, commas separate items in a list:

Example: Billy played soccer, basketball, and baseball.

Over here, there is no comma used in the last pairing of items.

Example: Billy played football, basketball and baseball.

The way we do it in the US is also known as the 'Oxford comma'. It seems as though they are one of the few places in the UK to place a comma in the last pair of items.

Spelling: Perhaps not surprising, words are spelled differently here than they are in the US. Here's some examples:

Where we would use 'ize' in the US, they would use 'ise' here.

Example (US): recognize

Example (UK): recognise

Where we would use an 'ense', they often use 'ence'.

Example (US): defense

Example (UK): defence

They like to add extra letters. For example, where we would use 'o', they'll use 'ou' and where we use one 'l', they'll use 'll'.

Example (US): color and traveled

Example (UK): colour and travelled

Where we would use 'er', they use 're'.

Example (US): center

Example (UK): centre

Introducing Persons and Quotations: In JBU's history and bible department, we were always taught to establish the credibility of someone we're citing. For example:

Jack Gallagher, the revered Cambridge scholar, gave a series of lectures on the British empire at Oxford University.

Here they expect that when you cite someone in your paper, they're an expert. As a result, you leave out the accolades.

Example: Jack Gallagher gave a series of lectures on the British empire at Oxford University.

[Side note: At this point in my paper, my supervisor, who trained under Jack Gallagher, made the comment, 'If they don't know who Jack Gallagher is, they have no business reading your paper.' :-)]

As well, if you're using a quote from a scholar, no need to say who you're using it from, your footnote does the work. So, for example, in my writing at JBU, I would have written:

Drake writes that Koinange "was on a political mission representing [the] KAU."

Here, however, it's better to just write:

Koinange 'was on a political mission representing [the] KAU'.

The footnote then tells the reader who it is that said it.

In Conclusion...
There are certainly lots of others intricacies that I've learned as I've stumbled along this year, these are just a few of them. We may both be speaking and writing in a language that goes by the same name, English, but there are times where I feel like I'm having to learn it all over again.

This doesn't even get into the way they grade over here (a mark of a 70 is an excellent mark and two professors grade your 'anonymous' paper), the use of Dr. vs. Prof., and the expectations for student-professor interaction. It's been a whole new ballgame! :-)