The US and Australia are the two main countries NOT using this standard. (just as there are only two countries in the world not using the metric system...)
I cannot tell you who started it, but that Monday is the first day of the week is an international standard - ISO_8601 to be precise.
Ah, right. So you're asking why Americans and Aussies say "have a nice weekend" on Fridays when their calendar week starts on Sunday? Well, I guess then they would be wishing you a nice Saturday, and not really giving a **** about how your Sunday goes
It goes without saying same as...
English words are starting to appear in the strangest places. For example, on many food products, below the list of ingredients you will often find information with the heading "food facts" with the nutritional information.
Worse still, Coop often calls that section "Foodprofil." [ ]
What is truly ridiculous is when languages 'borrow' words that do not actually exist!! Like 'Wellness' which is a direct translation of 'Bien etre'!
Or 'parking' 'brushing' 'footing' 'pressing' (car park/blowdry/jogging/dry-cleaners)
Or totally wrong like 'Entrée' in the US being the main course - when it is clearly a starter in French.
Although I'm not surprised that other countries have adopted English and many people learn the language, I don't really like that is is 'invading' other languages. I guess if it doesn't get too out of hand it's ok but sometimes it seems a bit pointless e.g. why 'weekend' instead of 'Wochenende'??
I thought about that too. 'Schönes weekend' sounds like a desperate attempt to use English..
Another e.g. Ich bin 'happy'. ???
Would be really funny when the swiss start saying 'schöne day' or
ich bin sad
Do you mean desperate, in the same way a native English speaker is desperate to use German when he is using terms like 'rucksack', 'zeitgeist', 'to abseil', etc.?
The use of words most often is not conscious process, but if languages come in contact with each other, there will be some diffusion of words. The only exception to this is, when there is placed a strong social stigma for using an "impure" language. In such a way immigrant communities often retain a variety of their language, which is considered out of date in their country of origin. Of course this can only happen, if there is only minimal contact between the emigrants and their home country.
I tell people to "have a nice abig" all the time.
In Switzerland, for centuries, the "invading" language was French. This only gradually changed in the 60ies, 70ies, 80ies, when English "arrived". "Wochenende" in German NEVER became a general expression like "Weekend" in English
But again a piece of warning to all English speakers: an English word appearing in Switzerland or elsewhere does not necessarily have the same meaning as it had originally !
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One of our managers each week issued a leaflet titled "Preishits"
I have a full understanding for "än Schöne", but the thing brought into here by the "Balkanese" cashiers in the retail business, to add a "no" and say "än Schöne no " is nonsense, unless the "addressee" is to die in the following night.
Sorry to go so far OT, but is this a reference to those wooden calendars with the horizontal sliding bars? We had those in my home when I was growing up, but I haven't found one since I've been back here. Any clues as to where they can be found today? (I looked around at a few shops while visiting Appenzell last year and didn't see them anywhere.)
No, the Appenzeller Kalender is an almanach, currently in its 291 year of continuous publication.
The perpetual calendars in solid state cellulose technology you are referring to are not a very traditional thing around here. We have one in our vacation home in the Lower Engadine, age unknown; the house was built 1616 but the calendar is much newer, maybe 150 y.o.. It's one of the kind with three sliding bars, from top to bottom:
1) days of the week, beginning with "Lündeschdi" (Vallader Romansh for Monday; meaning the week began on Monday already centuries ago!) and ending with "Dumengia" (= Sunday, meaning Sunday was part of the weekend because it was the end of the week),
2) month (January through December), and
3) day of month.
We do not even know if it was made in the Engadine (definitely not in China, though), but the letters and digits look pretty typical for the area.
That's the kind I meant, except the days were in German (though I think still Swiss-made), and they were sold in shops somewhere in Appenzell about 35 years ago (I only know this because I bought one for my mom's house in Texas back then).
Just read this in the Christian Science Monitor: In French print media, Anglicisms are 'le buzz' :
COOL
Except that there's no equivalent word in french and Weekend is the only used word for it.
In german, wochenende is mostly used.
In Québec, they happily say fin de semaine , only three syllables in colloquial language, even only two syllables with Québec accent (findsmaine), simple and easy.
Wochenende is the only German word for it, using weekend in Germany's German equals using an English word on purpose for whatever reason "coolness factor" demands. The only German word is still Wochenende . "German word" and "word used in German" are not synonymous.
Ditto in the small villages that I viisit in the Valais.
OTOH two online English-French dictionaries translate weekend into le weekend : WordReference and Collins .