[dofm]

Right. As a Brit I am entitled to think we speak the best version (because we do; ISE is a close second) but I am not entitled to believe everyone else's is wrong, because that is ahistorical. They have diverged repeatedly and thus ours is one of the divergences.

Much of British English was standardised long after several waves of the US settlers left our shores, so US english has some traits of pre-standardised English dialects, and ours is different again.

It's equally silly when some Americans claim their English is closer to the "true" English as a result, because, again, there was really no standardised "true" English when they left.

Along with some simplifications and some things reintroduced from german settlers, it has some traits of older English that the British abandoned in our own simplification of the language.

Is ours the best? Of course it bloody is :-) But is it "true" English? No more than anyone else's. That is the enormous power of English.

[gnubison]

What is ISE?

[dofm]

I mean Indian Standard English here.

[chrismorgan]

I have never heard of a thing called “Indian Standard English”, nor (as an Australian who has moved to India) does it sound a very realistic concept. Can’t find any search results for it as a phrase, either.

[dofm]

Sometimes used as a term in linguistics.

Put it in quotes: "Indian Standard English" and you will see plenty of results.

https://www.google.com/?q=%22Indian+Standard+English%22

https://www.jbe-platform.com/content/journals/10.1075/eww.24...

It doesn't mean a written standard exists.

Maybe it's called Standard Indian English or just Indian English in other contexts; I'm only using a term I've seen used.

[chrismorgan]

For comparison: <https://duckduckgo.com/?q=%22indian+standard+english%22>, exactly zero results.

[dofm]

OK