#anyway personally i think people should use flippin' a bit more haha. esp for the 70s.

[seriousbrat]

What are your favourite telltale signs that a fanfic was written by an american?

Some that always sticks out to me:

- Characters drinking lots of coffee

- Tea with cream instead of milk (it’s not unheard of, but it’s not your standard cup of tea)

- People mentioning hospital bills

- Being unable to write smokers casually

- Sirius is salivating for a Harley Davidson and not a Triumph

Okay honestly the tea thing in general is a BIG one. I think people don't always understand the way tea is consumed in the UK, how ingrained it is in daily life. Ive basically got a rotating cup of tea all day. Growing up in my house, even when we lived in america, someone would offer to make tea basically hourly lol. There's different situations when tea is offered in slightly different ways, different ways of making tea like builder's tea, different things that are served with tea, tea meaning 'dinner' in some regions, and these customs are hard to understand unless you've lived them.

Often Remus is portrayed as a tea fanatic because he offers tea when Harry visits him, which is always funny to me because that's just the normal thing to do when someone's visiting.

Another tea-related one I encountered once (this made me laugh a LOT and I felt a bit bad for the author) was that Lily 'woke up to the smell of tea.' This is an instance I think using coffee would have been alright lol, they obviously just replaced 'coffee' with 'tea', not realising tea doesn't really smell much when you make it and definitely doesn't waft about the house like coffee does. James would have to be holding the cup under her nose or brewing several large vats of the stuff in the same room lol

I agree with the ones you've said. In what was once the most popular jily fic in the fandom, there's a whole thing with Lily somewhat righteously trying to get James to quit smoking when, in the 70s, everyone and your nan smoked, even indoors, and Lily herself probably would have too. In a lot of Europe young people from all walks of life will casually smoke. rah where's my baccy etc

Similar to the Harley thing, there's often a lot of American music/TV/food/pop culture used. Or anachronistic stereotypically British things like everyone being into the Beatles.

THE NAMES. Characters having surnames that are very much from America's immigrant heritage, polish or german etc, like 'Schneider' and 'Kowalski' and things. First names too, this is a bit less dire but a lot of names common in the US wouldn't have been given to a child in the 60s. Specifically aristocratic characters would have a particular set of names, although pureblood conventions are obv a bit different than irl.

Another one is general drinking culture. Like I mentioned the idea of, honestly, anyone who isn't an obvious child being asked for ID in a pub is very silly haha, unless maybe in a student area. Whereas in America they'll ask everyone for ID before they let them sit down. (even my 60yr old dad has been asked lol)

in my experience Americans have a strange relationship with alcohol in general, which is both slightly puritan and enthusiastic. My theory is that this is because of prohibition (I find this very historically interesting) and they aren't as prone to casual daily drinking as Europeans, rather they tend to go all out on specific occasions. I love an American house party haha, but I don't think Americans would go for work drinks at the pub as often.

Exaggerated distances between places. Working class families having multiple cars and big houses and driving everywhere even within London. Aristocratic characters doing things they'd never do and having things they'd never have. The Blacks are often portrayed as too fantabulously wealthy imo in a very Rockerfeller New England-y way. Also they wouldn't speak French to each other lol

In general class distinctions, which are very important in the UK, are difficult to understand from an outside perspective I think.

However, I think the main tell for me is usually dialogue, SORRY THIS GOT SO LONG:

This issue, tbf, is very understandable. It's very difficult to achieve natural-sounding dialogue for dialects that you're not personally familiar with. Tbh I think it's not always easy to achieve natural-sounding dialogue in general for anyone. I've lived in America too and now have lived in a non-english speaking country for many years, mostly speaking catalan/spanish on a daily basis, so I get confused too and I use american phrases picked up either during my time there or from the internet. Anyway point is I think about/notice dialogue a lot, so here are my thoughts.

There's often overuse/misuse of slang or certain terms that can end up being amusing, like that fan film using 'a row' constantly to describe a bitter fight to the death between sworn enemies haha. Over/misuse of things like 'bloody,' 'wanker,' 'twat' lol. Understanding what types of characters would say what, and in what situations, can be tricky. 'Pants' is a common mistake because in BrE it means underpants, not trousers. 'Restroom' is also very American. 'College' meaning 'university' ditto. 'Pissed' for angry rather than 'drunk,' 'mad' also to a lesser extent-- I'd normally understand 'are you mad' as 'are you crazy.'

I saw a tumblr post once, one I thought would be a bit mean to reply to directly, in which a character jokes to Sirius about 'doing fags' because he smokes cigarettes and is in a relationship with Remus. lmao. That's a good example of someone trying to use a slang term without understanding the way it's really used. Also a good example of someone gratuitously using a slur (which is more common in America anyway) for no reason lol oh well

In general, I think since Americans are used to hollywood portrayals of British characters who mostly use something akin to RP, even authors who are diligent about BrE can end up sounding a bit stilted and a bit pride and prejudice-y with their teen characters (except with 'bloody wanker!' sprinkled in occasionally.) And this is fine, I don't think it's fair to expect perfectly natural/accurate dialogue from fanfic authors all the time, wherever they're from. But a line like "Yes, it must have been nice" might sound more natural as "Yeah, must've been nice," though it depends on the character obv.

Personally I think I overuse contractions because I find them fun (I love a cheeky 'oughtn't' or a 'mightn't.' or 'shouldn't've' lol. tbh im always saying 'ought' and 'ought not' irl but that's just me being weird.) But contractions and dropping certain words is common in informal BrE, what's tricky is that if this is misused it also sounds odd. So it's a difficult balance to get right. For instance: 'it would be nice if they had' can become 'be nice if they had' but not 'be nice if they.' or 'be nice if they'd.' This was a professionally made video game rip but there's a character in Mass Effect who talks like that, it drove me mad.

I love to think about accents and dialects and dialogue in general (which is why this got so long sorry) and imo the key is just familiarising yourself with a dialect as much as possible and making sure you hear the accent in your head as you write. Using slang terms in ways you've heard them used before, and carefully. For younger characters you'll want to watch something like the inbetweeners rather than bridgerton haha. Or something like Would I Lie To You or Taskmaster where there's a variety of panelists and therefore of accents, both series are free on youtube and are excellent!