When we first moved to England we were surprised to see how many of the locals mistook us for Canadians. At first we thought they were confused by our Midwestern accents. After all, they’ve heard a lot of East Coast and West Coast American accents, on television and in the movies. It wouldn’t take a professor in linguistics to notice that we don’t sound like either end of our country. They’d also easily rule out Australia and New Zealand, and must have arrived at Canada by default. But during our second year here one of our friends set us straight. “They’re not sure which country you’re from,” he said. “If they call a Canadian an American, he might get mad. But if they call an American Canadian, he might actually be flattered. They’re just trying to be as tactful as possible.” Ah. Mystery solved.
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