It's been said that Canadians are simply dis-armed Americans with health care. But there is more than just the coveted care system. Canada has very little dialect diversity compared to the United States. The phonetics, phonology, morphology and syntax for most of Canada are similar to that of the midwest. Differences abound with simple communication.
Annunciation, pronunciation and syntax of the local lingo takes some practice. Is it Spadina or Spadeena? Que, Quay or Key... The easiest key to this lock on the local language of course is local radio. Between weather and traffic one can pretty much guarantee a spot-on spew of the Canadian scene. There is a reason why Canadians get the elbow jab and snicker delivering the EH- routine. Each and every social interaction with a real live Canadian will elicit this. The farther north one travels you can count on conversation peppered with Eh, Aye, Eye, and 'Dayre. String em all together and you have the friendly form of a hello or at least an informal introduction. I have yet to find my self in a formal setting so I can't be sure that the salutation would be any different. Sure it's cute in an aw shucks kinda way but where did it come from and why is it so damn en grained, even within the urban lexicon?
Enquiring minds wanna know, or at least this inquisitive busy body so here is the drill down on the small but fascinating differences.
- The Canadian 'accent' can be heard most easily in the following words: out, about, house, and others with 'ou'. For example, canadian pronunciation of the word 'out' is like 'e' as in 'pet' followed by 'oot' as in 'boot', sounding like 'e'+'oot'. American pronunciation of 'out' is more like 'ow' as in 'cow', sounding like 'ow'+'t'. Other words often pronounced differently are 'pop', and 'roof'. Of course, the trademark 'eh' at the end of a statement is a dead giveaway.
- Canadian spellings can also cause confusion: colour vs color, cheque vs check, centre vs center, etc.
- Canada uses the metric system, although canadians quote their height and weight in feet/inches and pounds. Industry, for the most part, uses imperial units.
- For measuring temperature, Canada uses Celsius (rather than Fahrenheit).
- Although there are many differences in prices of things between US and Canada, two that stand out are the after-exchange lower prices of electronics in the US, and the far lower prices of CDs in Canada. Also, there is a pricing inversion for CDs such that in the US the older CDs are the cheapest, while in Canada it is the newest releases that are usually on sale.
- The drinking age in Canada is 19 in most provinces, and 18 in Alberta, Manitoba, and Quebec. Note that the provinces where it is 18 alternate as you go west to east. Coincidence?
- Soda/pop is made with corn syrup in the US, and sugar in Canada---this changes the taste significantly. Maybe this is why American soda drinkers look cornfed.
- Football rules: size of our footballs, football fields, and one less down
- Canadian inventions: ski-doos, jet-skis, velcro, zippers, insulin, penicillin, Zamboni, the telephone, short wave radios, robertson screws (square hole)
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