How To Be Swedish

I’ve heard this statement, or something along these lines one too many times from someone in Sweden: “I prefer ‘English english’ over ‘American english’ because it’s the real (or more pure) english”. What a stupid thing to say, but I hear it a lot. Briefly, here is why that asinine statement annoys me and makes the person who says it come across as a imbecile. It’s one of those statements that they heard someone else say, thought it sounded like a cool philosophy, and now like to spout it off to sound intelligent. But they are really not because they have not thought it through.

First of all, what exactly is English english? In what part of England do they speak the proper form of the language? Because the English you hear in one part of that country will be drastically different than in another part. Is the english they speak in London the real english, or is it more proper up in Manchester? Or out in the middle of wherever? I don’t know the country that well but I do know that there is a huge variety of english spoken in that one english speaking country. You can’t categorize English english as one all encompassing category because there is so much variation. I’ve listened to some people from the UK and I can’t even understand them. To say everyone there speaks with perfect grammar is ridiculous. There are people in North America who speak good English, and people who butcher the language. Same thing in England or any other English speaking country.

Secondly, English is your second language, so to talk down to someone who grew up speaking the language and has an college degree in the language, saying that I speak a lower form of the language is pretty arrogant. I realize that the Swedes are generally fairly proficient in English, but to try to give me a lesson in my own language and tell me that I speak a lower form of it is assuming a lot.

The fact is that there are multiple dialects of any language. Varying accents, slang, regional differences. Where do they speak proper Swedish? Because I have heard huge differences in how Swedish is spoken, but I’m not saying which one is the “real Swedish”. All languages are constantly evolving.