Phrases/words that set your teeth on edge.

[P. G. Tipps]

I'm not at all persuaded by the Americanism-Apologists who simply respond by suggesting The Unpersuaded are just a bunch of reactionary stuffed shirts who are against the further development of the English language. What an absurd misapprehension!

There are plenty of welcome foreign additions to our language which are meaningful and now well-established such as, say, 'a la carte' and 'angst'. Such words serve a useful purpose and add an undoubted richness to the language.

The now regular adoption of Americanisms, to often replace perfectly adequate and already widely-used English alternatives, are of a quite different order. It appears the only reason that such words and phrases are introduced is because these are American. For example, replacing 'to get a grip of'' with the strange-sounding 'to get a handle on' is a clear impoverishment of the language not an enrichment, surely.

It's time to get real you guys at the BBC ...

[Richard Barrett]

The now regular adoption of Americanisms, to often replace perfectly adequate and already widely-used English alternatives, are of a quite different order. It appears the only reason that such words and phrases are introduced is because these are American.

They don't replace anything, they supplement things, just as did the admixture of French to Anglo-Saxon back in the day so that English has a larger vocabulary with more subtly-different almost-synonyms than any other current language. Long may that continue. Anyway, no amount of Bufton-Tuftonism is going to stop it from happening!

[french frank]

They don't replace anything, they supplement things, just as did the admixture of French to Anglo-Saxon back in the day

And Norse … of course they did all invade us and defeat us in battle: we were a subject race Oh, wait …

All one can do, individually, is use these Americanisms or not use them.

[Bryn]

And Norse … of course they did all invade us and defeat us in battle: we were a subject race Oh, wait …

"Oh, wait ... " indeed. I for one like to think of myself as coming from a long line of invaders (of this island, that is, rather than of other lands).

[Richard Barrett]

All one can do, individually, is use these Americanisms or not use them.

"Oh, wait" used sarcastically is somewhat transatlantic in tone, isn't it?

[french frank]

"Oh, wait" used sarcastically is somewhat transatlantic in tone, isn't it?

And why not? I don't in any general sense object to language evolving in the way language has always evolved. I would use phrases that seem useful to me and others should do the same. The psycholinguistics behind indiividual usage is still of interest.

[gurnemanz]

They don't replace anything, they supplement things, just as did the admixture of French to Anglo-Saxon back in the day so that English has a larger vocabulary with more subtly-different almost-synonyms than any other current language. Long may that continue. Anyway, no amount of Bufton-Tuftonism is going to stop it from happening!

Well put! Also, the acquisition by an individual speaker of a new mode of speech, whether vocabulary, syntax or pronunciation, is likely to be an unconscious process. I would therefore disagree with PG Tipps above who wrote: "It appears the only reason that such words and phrases are introduced is because these are American." Mostly, people are unaware of what they are doing in this respect and choose the language they use instinctively based on its usefulness in expressing the meaning they wish to communicate.

Many years ago I taught English at a German university and as a resident native speaker of English I would often be asked to give a ruling on usage. One day the professor asked me "Can you say ...?" I answered in the negative. I was talking to him a few days later and he pointed out: "You just said that thing you said you couldn't say."

[french frank]

When did a cookery book become a cookbook? Is there a difference?

[jean]

About the time the swimming baths became a pool?

[Pulcinella]

When did a cookery book become a cookbook? Is there a difference?

Perhaps when the Moosewood Cookbook became so popular?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moosewood_Cookbook

First edition 1974.

(Haven't checked first use/usage: it's usually you and jean who find that out for us!)

[vinteuil]

.

... or perhaps Alice B Toklas, 1954

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Alice_B._Toklas_Cookbook

1971 also saw the Anarchist Cookbook...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Anarchist_Cookbook

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

1971 also saw the Anarchist Cookbook...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Anarchist_Cookbook

Anarchy in the UK three years earlier:

http://biblio.co.uk/book/jimmy-young-cook-book-jimmy-young/d/969889003?aid=frg&utm_source=google&utm_medium=product&utm_campaign=feed-details&gclid=CLfy5dXImtQCFZUV0wodOpkHpw

[P. G. Tipps]

'Bufton-Tuftonism ... '

A hopelessly outmoded term still used by some on the Classist Left, the only good thing to be said for it is that it is not an Americanism.

[french frank]

Anarchy in the UK three years earlier:

http://biblio.co.uk/book/jimmy-young...FZUV0wodOpkHpw

The earliest British use of cook-book in the OED is 1951: John Wyndham - The Day of the Anarcho-Triffids. An American use dates from 1809: An assortment of culinary reviews, vulgarly called cook-books.

Cookery book goes back to 1639.

[Richard Barrett]

A hopelessly outmoded term

- recte a term used to describe people with hopelessly outmoded attitudes, known from the pages of Private Eye, a journal hardly noted for its left-wing bias.