Are we losing a sense of Britishness when asking about getting coffees to go?!?

Americanisms are something that have been rapidly “destroying” true and superior British-English with horrifically ridiculous words and phrases such as ‘skedaddle!’ and ‘can I get a coffee to go’ for too long now! It is up to us to stop this tragedy before we all start “skedaddling” down the “sidewalk” of Trafalgar Square!

Now doesn’t that whole sentence just sound incredibly absurd, overdramatic and a little patriotic? Or is it just me? Either way that is sadly how a lot of British people think nowadays, or perhaps have always thought…

Well, that’s where if you happen to be on the “overly patriotic British side” this blog post falls into place. Hopefully it can change your perspective and show you that skedaddling down the sidewalk of Trafalgar Square isn’t so bad after all.


Obviously, I am not saying Americanisms are always helpful and can fix the English language, some are just downright misleading for any regular British person, such as word ‘pavement’ as it is used instead of the word ‘road’ in America, I don’t think getting those two mixed up would end too well to be perfectly honest with you. The same can be said for the phrase “I could care less” which just straight up doesn’t make any sense whatsoever! I just want to know where on Earth the “couldn’t” went off to…

A lot of British people also don’t find the idea of using pure American words too appealing either, however this is a simply flawed reason to be against Americanisms, the reason being the complete and utter hypocrisy coming from their end.

Over the period of hundreds of years, we have been taking words from other parts of the world and making them our own. Some of these may perhaps make you re-think your entire language as a whole! Probably the most British word of all, being ‘tea’ actually originates from China! The word ‘bungalow’ comes from India, and even the phrase ‘stiff upper lip’ actually originates from the U.S… Seems quite hypocritical doesn’t it?

 I think another plausible reason to let Americanisms pass is for how amazingly fun, bubbly and light they are. Why on earth wouldn’t you want to ‘skedaddle’ downtown, hold a ‘bombazine’ (umbrella) or call someone a ‘pumpkin head’ (imbecile) every once and a while?

Whilst Americanisms are also good to spice up your vocabulary a little they also sometimes make more sense than words and spellings in British-English. We’ve all heard the infamous ‘colour vs color’ debate at least once before, and honestly the Americans definitely win this battle. The extra ‘U’ that we as Brits seem to put everywhere just overcomplicate a very simple word. Even words like ‘gotten’ make more sense to have in our language than only having ‘got’ to define acquiring something and possessing something, the word ‘gotten’ helps to distinct the action of acquiring something from possessing it. Pretty helpful if you ask me.

 In conclusion, the positives of Americanisms far outweigh the negatives in my opinion, although I do not believe they can fix our language completely they certainly do make it a little less complex and can add some fun and exhilarating words and phrases that make a fine addition to our British-English slang collection. Hopefully now you can accept Americanisms or at the very least tolerate them a little more…