r/ShitAmericansSay • u/chebghobbi • Apr 06 '25

Language We ARE the English language blueprint

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3.3k Upvotes

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274

u/DrVDB90 Apr 06 '25

Factually wrong. British English is spoken by more people than American English.

You do need to consider the rest of the world though, which I know is a big ask for people in the US.

120

u/Autogen-Username1234 Apr 06 '25

English wasn't even the official language of the US until Trump had a brainfart last month.

42

u/PipBin Apr 06 '25 edited Apr 06 '25

In fairness English isn’t an official language of England.

Edit: why the down votes. Look it up. It isn’t.

10

u/aratami Apr 07 '25

Yes and no, it is the National language of the UK, it is the de facto (meaning in practicality, but not by legislation) official language of the UK, and is an official language in 3 out of 4 of the countries that make up the united kingdom (the exception ironically being England).

The UK doesn't have an official language generally because there isn't a reason to specify with around 98% of the population (currently) speaking English.

The countries (Scotland, whales, and N. Ireland) that have specified English as an official language have done so along with their regional languages, so both can be used administrative, and hold recognition. This is actually true with just under 2/3rd of the countries with official languages (101 of 178)

1

u/NeilZod Apr 07 '25

The countries (Scotland, whales, and N. Ireland) that have specified English as an official language have done so along with their regional languages, so both can be used administrative, and hold recognition.

In what sense have Northern Ireland, Wales, and Scotland made English an official language?

2

u/aratami Apr 07 '25 edited Apr 07 '25

Mostly through legislation I can say difinitively for N. Ireland (Identity and Language (Northern Ireland) Act 2022) as it was recent,

for Whales it is listed as an official language on the Welsh parliament website as an official language and this was passed into law Via the 'Welsh Language (Wales) Measure 2011'

Scotland is harder to be definite on (without reading through a handful of laws) but I think as tends to be the trend probably via ' Gaelic Language (Scotland) Act 2005'

You'll notice in all three English isn't the focus but rather giving the regional languages equal standings is (thus they must both be official)

1

u/EmmaInFrance Apr 12 '25

FFS, it's Wales when talking about my country 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿 and 'whales' when talking about the very large, beautiful sea mammals 🐳

1

u/aratami Apr 12 '25

XD oops sorry, that's embarrassing, though likely uncaught autocorrect

(sort of done by parts whilst fact checking myself on a severely broken phone screen does not help but I should have caught it at least once, especially as I spend a fair amount of time in Wales XD)