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Location: The western periphery of Terra Australis
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I know the obvious one is spelling and some words. 'Zed' instead of 'zee' for instance. Also I wonder if some 'British words' are used in Canada vs American words?
Are there any aspects of British culture that are commonplace in Canada but rare/unknown in the States?
A Canadian friend mentioned Fish'n'Chips are semi-common, at least in the Toronto area. Is this true? I think of fish'n'chips as a UK, Aus, NZ thing, be interesting if it was as popular in Canada.
Of course your money has the Queen on it too.
What of say, afternoon tea? Are scones pretty well known in Canada?
Cricket doesn't seem that popular, but are most Canadians more familiar with it or baseball?
I know there is a Canadian rugby team. What about say the sport of polo?
Are Canadians more in-touch with that happens in the UK, the Royal Family for instance? Or are they just as removed from all of it as Americans are?
Are most Canadians even very conscious of being part of the 'Commonwealth?'
I wonder if the idea of Canadians being more reserved than Americans has something to do with their history of being 'loyalists' while the Americans were the free-spirited, independent freedom lovers.
Cricket doesn't seem that popular, but are most Canadians more familiar with it or baseball?
Baseball by far.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Trimac20
I wonder if the idea of Canadians being more reserved than Americans has something to do with their history of being 'loyalists' while the Americans were the free-spirited, independent freedom lovers.
I know the obvious one is spelling and some words. 'Zed' instead of 'zee' for instance. Also I wonder if some 'British words' are used in Canada vs American words?
Are there any aspects of British culture that are commonplace in Canada but rare/unknown in the States?
A Canadian friend mentioned Fish'n'Chips are semi-common, at least in the Toronto area. Is this true? I think of fish'n'chips as a UK, Aus, NZ thing, be interesting if it was as popular in Canada.
Of course your money has the Queen on it too.
What of say, afternoon tea? Are scones pretty well known in Canada?
Cricket doesn't seem that popular, but are most Canadians more familiar with it or baseball?
I know there is a Canadian rugby team. What about say the sport of polo?
Are Canadians more in-touch with that happens in the UK, the Royal Family for instance? Or are they just as removed from all of it as Americans are?
Are most Canadians even very conscious of being part of the 'Commonwealth?'
I wonder if the idea of Canadians being more reserved than Americans has something to do with their history of being 'loyalists' while the Americans were the free-spirited, independent freedom lovers.
I don't believe fish and chips are any more popular in Canada than they are in the U.S. You have a fairly large fish and chips chain in the U.S. called Arthur Treacher's...
Fish and chips tend to be popular in coastal areas where fishing is an important economic activity - places like New England in the States and Atlantic Canada have this in common, and the popularity of stuff like fish and chips spreads outward across the country from there.
Afternoon tea is not something most average English-speaking Canadians would partake in, although in pretty much any largish city in the country you will find the older high class downtown hotels will offer high tea in their restaurant - sometimes daily, sometimes only on weekends. It is a long-standing tradition for a lot of them.
Scones are not that hard to find - not sure if they are a rarity in the U.S. though...
Canadians are about a million times more likely to know the rules of baseball than the rules of cricket. Cricket is played in Canada by certain immigrant communities (recent arrivals from the UK, West Indies, India, etc.) but the mainstream bat and ball sport is definitely baseball.
Rugby is also a fringe rather than mainstream sport. It is played of course, and most men are vaguely familiar with it (and would be able to reference the All Blacks and their ritual for example), but it's not where the mainstream interest lies.
Depending on where you are in the country, there can be a lot of interest in the British royal family. Some of it is because of history and tradition, some of it is a celebrity thing. Note that I don't find that Americans are completely removed from the British royal family. There is still quite a bit of interest in the U.S. - maybe not more than in Canada, though.
Are there any aspects of British culture that are commonplace in Canada but rare/unknown in the States?
A Canadian friend mentioned Fish'n'Chips are semi-common, at least in the Toronto area. Is this true? I think of fish'n'chips as a UK, Aus, NZ thing, be interesting if it was as popular in Canada.
Of course your money has the Queen on it too.
What of say, afternoon tea? Are scones pretty well known in Canada?
Cricket doesn't seem that popular, but are most Canadians more familiar with it or baseball?
I know there is a Canadian rugby team. What about say the sport of polo?
Are Canadians more in-touch with that happens in the UK, the Royal Family for instance? Or are they just as removed from all of it as Americans are?
Are most Canadians even very conscious of being part of the 'Commonwealth?'
I grew up in Victoria where British culture is all around, we have British pubs, tea shops, places that do "high tea", red double decker buses for tourists, the "Royal" BC Museum, British candy shops, etc. That stuff is harder to find in Vancouver. The British influence here is mostly nostalgic and when a member of the royal family visits it's mostly people with British roots that get excited about it.
Overall Canadians aren't in touch with the current events going on in the UK...(not to mention the rest of the world), most of us watch the cbc and if it's not on the cbc most Canadians don't know about it or don't follow it.
Most Canadians are very conscious of being a part pf the Commonwealth and have no issues with it, it's part of our history, and doesn't interfere with our freedom or everyday life
I don't know if it's just me, but I have noticed that British cultural elements are even rarer than they were in the past, such as just a couple decades ago (even in the scope of my young life...lol), regardless of how common they used to be, and American influence is just continuously becoming more dominant over time (though obviously, Canadian and American culture were close to each other to begin with, and based on distance and proximity influence alone etc.).
An example I can think of -- some slang that was shared with the UK (I didn't know at the time, but in hindsight it seems so) such as calling someone "mental" for "crazy" seemed common enough even say in the 90s, at school but became less common as I grew up, and now it seems the words Canadian youth use are much closer to American slang (probably not even distinguishable often).
I would say, that no matter how much in denial they may be about it, Canadians are far closer to Americans than they realize, especially in day-to-day lived lives and pop culture (British cultural elements only come into "high culture" like people being aware of how the Parliament system and politics works) and way less like Commonwealth countries in "lived life on the street".
I grew up in Victoria where British culture is all around, we have British pubs, tea shops, places that do "high tea", red double decker buses for tourists, the "Royal" BC Museum, British candy shops, etc. That stuff is harder to find in Vancouver. The British influence here is mostly nostalgic and when a member of the royal family visits it's mostly people with British roots that get excited about it.
Overall Canadians aren't in touch with the current events going on in the UK...(not to mention the rest of the world), most of us watch the cbc and if it's not on the cbc most Canadians don't know about it or don't follow it.
Most Canadians are very conscious of being a part pf the Commonwealth and have no issues with it, it's part of our history, and doesn't interfere with our freedom or everyday life
Yeah, that's the thing though.
It seems that for Canadians, British = past. American culture = present.
Canadians don't "follow" events in the UK as much as they do in the US if at all.
Look at all the American election coverage in the newspapers and news media etc. I'm hearing all this stuff about Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum.
During British elections, do you hear about that as much? I bet all the Canadian youths are much more familiar with American politics than British politics -- many not even know much about the individual political parties and figures etc. on the other side of the pond but everyone will hear about the Republican candidates 2012.
A Canadian friend mentioned Fish'n'Chips are semi-common, at least in the Toronto area. Is this true? I think of fish'n'chips as a UK, Aus, NZ thing, be interesting if it was as popular in Canada.
Yes, Fish and Chips is very common here, you can find it at any restaurants that serve "Canadian style" foods. Many school, hospital etc. cafeteria's have Fish and Chips days (usually on Fridays).
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What of say, afternoon tea? Are scones pretty well known in Canada?
Yes scones are pretty well known here also. You can fins them at any coffee shop.
Quote:
Cricket doesn't seem that popular, but are most Canadians more familiar with it or baseball?
No Cricket is not popular at all, even though Canada does have a cricket team and have been to several ICC world cups. Most of the players on team are immigrants or children of immigrants from Countries where cricket is popular.
Most British culture elements are more political, we're somewhere in a grey area between the UK and the US, leaning more towards the US for pop-culture, but more towards the UK for professional aspects (job performance expectations, government, military system, education in some places (mostly at the university level, we use the Scottish system), and social class systems.)
Over-all Canada is a mix of French, United Kingdom (Not just England, we take from Ireland and Scotland too), and American culture. Where-as the US is a mixture of English, and Spanish systems, with much less French influence, and almost no Scottish, Irish, or Welsh influence. Both countries have homegrown cultural elements as well.
Canada has American pop-culture, with a British government, Scottish education and beers, hybrid spelling, and a multitude of other influences.
No were in the US would you found a community where people speak Gaeilge Thalamh an Éisc (Census Canada says it's dead among native speakers, but as a second language you can still find it), or French.
No were in the US would you found a community where people speak Gaeilge Thalamh an Éisc (Census Canada says it's dead among native speakers, but as a second language you can still find it), or French.
The French thing isn't fair actually, remember Cajun's, Maine Acadians, and the Canadien descended French speaking villages of the Northern parts of the other New England states. Of course, French Americans aren't anywhere near as culturally influential as Canadian ones
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Lol I think some Americans have a false sense of freedom nowadays 
