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Canadian English
Dec. 3rd, 2015 01:19 pmI've got a lot of animation tying-down to do, and while the BBC continues to put out more excellent listening than I can possibly keep up with, I've been finding myself drawn back to the CBC lately as their current events coverage and analysis is the best I've found anywhere. This invariably comes with a tinge of homesickness, but on the other hand I get occasional affirmations of Canadianness, be it in values represented, observations made, or a particular sense of humour. But what really rings my bell is the rhetorical style – it's a subtle differentiation and difficult to explain, because you do get it in other places, but there's a particular Canadian way of saying things that is a certain combination of informal, impersonal, and as strongly worded as possible, sometimes with a tone that belies the words. This kept getting me into trouble at Disney, and in California generally, where people tend to expect a particular decorum*, take everything personally, and take overstatement at face value. I could never quite shake this programming no matter how hard I tried. So it was with a lovely little pang of recognition that I heard the interview between Brent Bambury and his guest Kliph Nesteroff, who he affably introduced as "a comedy nerd," at which Californian Nesteroff characteristically balked. And then on Tuesday's As It Happens, an item introduced via the description of a Trump perfume, transitioned to the meat of the matter with the line "But on this subject, as on literally every other subject, Mr. Trump is wrong." And this leader on Monday's show: "A new study will make you question all you knew about flatworms ... but it won't make you question whether they're gross." See also everything written by Neil Macdonald, especially when he was the US correspondent.
I might be tempted to think these examples only turn up because the CBC knows that, outside Canada's borders (and often inside, too), no one really cares what it says, so it doesn't have to play politics the way the BBC and other major international broadcasters do. But it is reflecting an aspect of culture and conversation style, which holds true for Canadians I know both at home and abroad, and goes back through history – Charlotte Whitton and Silas "I should have pushed him down a crevasse when I had the chance" Wright speak the same language.
People tend to refer to the "backhanded compliment" as a signature Canadian device – something that sounds like a compliment at first but when processed turns out to have a sting in the tail (e.g. "Nice work, it's almost professional" which I got at my first job), but it's part of a larger pattern, I think. A backhanded compliment is a species of Positive Negative – a negative meaning delivered in a positive way – but just as often you get the Negative Positive, a positive message delivered in a negative package. Often the tone of voice, context, or the cultural "given" that meaning is carried on multiple levels, is necessary to grasp the intent of the speaker, which leads to serious and often hurtful misunderstandings if the speaker assumes these values are shared when they are not.
I love Cambridge to pieces and most days can't imagine leaving it without a twinge of panic, but I do wonder sometimes if I'll end up back in Canada eventually anyway ... it seems inevitable, sometimes.
*People tend to think of California, and Californians tend to think of themselves, as very informal, but there is absolutely an expected mode of behaviour in general, and with slight variation for given situations. One is expected to be unambiguously positive, for instance, and while informality is practically a dogma (heaven forbid one decline to be on first-name terms with anyone), one must always protect the self-image of the exalted, something very difficult for an inveterate piss-taker and pretension-pricker ...
I might be tempted to think these examples only turn up because the CBC knows that, outside Canada's borders (and often inside, too), no one really cares what it says, so it doesn't have to play politics the way the BBC and other major international broadcasters do. But it is reflecting an aspect of culture and conversation style, which holds true for Canadians I know both at home and abroad, and goes back through history – Charlotte Whitton and Silas "I should have pushed him down a crevasse when I had the chance" Wright speak the same language.
People tend to refer to the "backhanded compliment" as a signature Canadian device – something that sounds like a compliment at first but when processed turns out to have a sting in the tail (e.g. "Nice work, it's almost professional" which I got at my first job), but it's part of a larger pattern, I think. A backhanded compliment is a species of Positive Negative – a negative meaning delivered in a positive way – but just as often you get the Negative Positive, a positive message delivered in a negative package. Often the tone of voice, context, or the cultural "given" that meaning is carried on multiple levels, is necessary to grasp the intent of the speaker, which leads to serious and often hurtful misunderstandings if the speaker assumes these values are shared when they are not.
I love Cambridge to pieces and most days can't imagine leaving it without a twinge of panic, but I do wonder sometimes if I'll end up back in Canada eventually anyway ... it seems inevitable, sometimes.
*People tend to think of California, and Californians tend to think of themselves, as very informal, but there is absolutely an expected mode of behaviour in general, and with slight variation for given situations. One is expected to be unambiguously positive, for instance, and while informality is practically a dogma (heaven forbid one decline to be on first-name terms with anyone), one must always protect the self-image of the exalted, something very difficult for an inveterate piss-taker and pretension-pricker ...
