This. I'd be very wary of using it because it could be taken as sarcastic or insulting. As a Scot at a Scottish university, I didn't take kindly to English students who referred to Scots as "ethnic". Sometimes it may have been meant to be light-hearted, but it was patronising and offensive. At other times there was no doubt it was meant to be offensive.
While it's not a direct parallel, I wouldn't want to offend US people by referring to the USA as The Colonies. Maybe if I was very sure it wouldn't be taken ill, and that they could comfortably respond with something similar about us. Very sure.
(When playing a role in a role-playing game, quite possibly - but not in real life.)
I know one or two British people who say "The Colonies" to refer to USA, Canada, Australia: basically the English speaking world. It is hard to separate it from sarcasm but I am not sure any is intended.
I'm with them. I'm British and I have occasionally done it, but not as sarcasm or insult. Rather I do it as a gentle send-up of that whimsical eccentricity for which we Brits are so loved by one and all...aren't we?
I feel it's important to make this distinction clear, just as when I say, for instance, "What ho," I don't mean to imply that the lady of the night in question doesn't exist, or that I do not see her. That would be rude.
That's precisely it. It's not a sarcastic or insulting term, merely a recognition of of a shared history. It's a term you can use amongst friends, not a term you would expect to see politicians use.
Pretty much this. I'll use it as a friendly 'dig' occasionally when chatting to American friends (usually while also in America and with pretty serious anglophiles) but only where we all know it's just a bit of gentle fun.
It's been used around the table playing BtVS rpg sometimes, but generally again to highlight the fact that we don't actually know how to pretend to be Californian school kids in the late 90's, or to show a level of anachronism in general.
Not British, but I've seen British newspapers do it occasionally, in a sarcastic way. (Sarcasm not directed at the Americans but at themselves, I hasten to add.)
I'm British, and use the term when it makes historical or rhetorical sense to do so. It isn't a term used much in a modern context when talking about the modern world, but you might say "...back when we still talked about The Colonies".
I've used it in a joking manner "jumped up johny come lately collonie who'll be begging to be back in the empire beore the day is through" but never seriously.....
I clicked 'Never' but this is a lie: I've never used it seriously or unironically, and even those occasions are few and far between. When I was reading a lot of John LeCarre, I took to calling Americans 'the cousins' for a while....
Where have you seen this on US TV lately? You watch way more TV than me, but aside from the London episode of Bones (which could have spewed from the MacBook of the laziest script writer in Hollywood) I can't really think of any this century that did it.
I would only do this as a joke - and only when I knew it would not be taken at all seriously by anyone present. I might do it within a group of Britons, or I might do it with US people who I knew well. I have never done this, but I suppose I might do it to annoy an American I really disliked...
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While it's not a direct parallel, I wouldn't want to offend US people by referring to the USA as The Colonies. Maybe if I was very sure it wouldn't be taken ill, and that they could comfortably respond with something similar about us. Very sure.
(When playing a role in a role-playing game, quite possibly - but not in real life.)
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A Limey writes...
Re: A Limey writes...
Essentially: rarely, jokingly and about a specific person not the country.
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I feel it's important to make this distinction clear, just as when I say, for instance, "What ho," I don't mean to imply that the lady of the night in question doesn't exist, or that I do not see her. That would be rude.
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It's been used around the table playing BtVS rpg sometimes, but generally again to highlight the fact that we don't actually know how to pretend to be Californian school kids in the late 90's, or to show a level of anachronism in general.
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LOL
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*orange juice all over keyboard*
Thanks for that.
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Last century? Oh yes.
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The colonies
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