1 space or 2 after a full stop?

[karadekoolaid Profile]

Bloimey
i bin teechin Inglish for about forty years an I ain´t never come across this fing before. Nevuh!
Seriously - I don´t believe there is a "rule" on this and I imagine the final decision is really a question of how it looks; not whether it is grammatically correct or not.
If I were to gastronomic comparison, I might think about "plating". Are you a minimalist? Do you like abundant colours and textures? Or do you just pile in on?
In the end, it´s really whether it tastes good or not.

[miss mouse Profile]

Having a typographic background, for me it has and always will be a single space. The double space was something secretaries dreamed up, exclusive to the typing pool,

And fancy secretarial training schools, don't blame it on the typing pool who did what they were told to. I think 'house style' features or featured a lot, certainly in relation to publishing, I have never worked in these areas, a volunteer group newsletter job once and very proud of it I was until the retired Fleet Street worker looked it over. It is a skill and training completely away from anything in my working life. Now I will have to find out what an 'interrobang' is.

[Linnet Profile]

The last 10 years of my working life were spent in online publishing, and it was only ever a single space.

[Renee Profile]

I've always put one space and have only seen the use of two spaces recently, which I didn't understand. I don't like it. All official letters from banks etc. just have the one space.

[Renee Profile]

At secretarial college we were taught to leave two spaces at the end of each sentence. This is something that I have always done when typing.

[halfateabag Profile]

Here's another gripe - more wordy though. I hate the word 'slash' what is wrong with the wonderful word oblique? Nuther americanism????

[dennispc Profile]

Simple reason why us shorthand typists put in a double space, because I wouldn't have passed Pitman Level I and Level 2 if I hadn't. A far seeing English teacher, Mr Morris, at my North London grammar school thought the future was typing and shorthand, and am ever grateful.

Mac software was designed to put in a double space automatically, but my automatic brain still hits the space bar twice.

Option + ; … will produce an ellipsis.

Why did I opt for 6 Commercial? The girls were better looking. Shallow, I know.

[Renee Profile]

Changing the subject slightly, but referring to Americanisms, how do you pronounce the word "either"? I have always pronounced it as in "eiderdown" and this is how it was always pronounced during my childhood and later years. Now, it is mostly pronounced as "eether", which, when I looked it up is the American pronunciation.

[Sakkarin Profile]

Now, it is mostly pronounced as "eether"

Not by people wot speak proper, it ain't...

[Earthmaiden Profile]

I was brought up with the 'eiderdown' version too. I suspect it stems back more than just an Americanism though and may be regional, but not 'received pronounciation', possibly one of those things that went to America centuries ago pronounced 'ee' in the region from whence those settlers came. Didn't it feature in the, 'You say tomayto and I say tomato' song?

We moved from the London area to Norfolk when I was six and I was introduced to several variations like that all in one swoop. Over the years I have even changed some pronunciations just to fit in (scon instead of scOne for instance!), others my mother was so insistent on I wouldn't dare change even now! If you read Nancy Mitford's U and non-U pronunciations a lot of it is a way of identifying class, something that some choose to play down nowadays. I love the variations in British language - just look at our recent discussion on the humble bread roll!

[Sakkarin Profile]

It also makes me squirm when I hear people (especially presenters on TV) saying "haitch" when they mean "aitch".

[Renee Profile]

I once looked that one up too and apparently both are acceptable. Surely not?

[scullion Profile]

when i was little i was taught that ee-ther was the english version and eye-ther was the german pronunciation - which would possibly be why some think it's an americanisation, having migrated pre georgian times.

[scullion Profile]

I thought that was a typo, or malfunction on Scully's device :roll: :? :oops: ;) :lol:

hahahahaha!
- you can find it in your symbols list.

[herbidacious Profile]

Eye-ther for me.

Yep with you on haitch, Sakkarin. But I do remember my mother teaching me to say aitch not haitch. My mother is a bit of a snob.

I went to a school where I was one of few who pronounced castle without a long 'a'. I don't think I had a strong accent and there must have have been two people in the whole school wthout what you might call a local accent, so I didn't pick up that many Sheffieldisms and probably lost a lot post 11 years. I have one parent who spend his first 15 years in Wiltshire and Shopshire, and hent to a posh prep school but then spent time in West Yorkkshire where his family were from, and went to a grammar school, and the other parent who was brought up in from Blackburn (although she denies ever having the accent - her brother and his children did/do). So I get confused sometimes about what's universal and what's dialect/local even after living down south for 35 years. Husband's family are from Chesterfield, and he was brought up in North Wales, so asking him often doesn't establish what's what.
I introduced him to mardy though

I say scone to rhyme with stone. I am not sure that this is either regional or a class thing.

[Renee Profile]

I say 'scon' herbie!

Although I have always lived in the northwest, my mother and grandparents were from the south, so I never developed a northern accent, also living in Blackpool, there were few of my friends who were actually born in the northwest, so I was never around northern accents.

[Stokey Sue Profile]

A lot of “Americanisms” turn out to be regional British variants when you look into them

I’m with the Germanic eiderdown version but the eether version doesn’t grate particularly, been hearing it all my life

In fact I (and Fred Astaire) know a song about that!

What does grate is the Estuary English habit of not pronouncing the N in “an” - Rachel Khoo and her “ah avocado” for example and I’ve even heard the BBC economics editor talk about “ah economic downturn”

[Linnet Profile]

Don't get me started on the number of folk on tv and radio who say siCth when they mean sixth...

[WWordsworth Profile]

Pacific when they mean specific.

I could scream when I hear "could of" instead of "could have"

[Earthmaiden Profile]

My ex OH (from Somerset) used to say 'heighth' instead of height . To be fair, when you met his older relatives they used what I considered to be some really quaint old speech so maybe it was normal there once.

Things like 'could of' are just bad English and take the meaning away.

I've noticed that Sue, no 'an' in front of vowels. Strange. .

We were not allowed to say 'haitch' at school.

One of the words I have tried to change in order to 'fit in' with those around me is suit. My father always wore a s-you-t, not a 's-oo-t' but few people seem to say it that way these days.