BUT why do only Americans say Month Day and the the stupid comma before the year?
almost all other nations says day month year. I don't say in german: Juli 4. I say: 4. Juli long version 4. Juli 2004 wird kommen and not 4. Juli, 2004 who invented that stupidity w/ the comma? bye Bill Potts wrote: > I think the explanation is probably fairly simple -- and logical. > > In conversation, we rarely need to mention the year. In the absence > of the year, the month-day sequence is perfectly logical. It remains > logical if, when we add the year, we add it at the beginning. > > However, again in conversation, the year is usually added as an > afterthought or as clarification. Where that is the reason, there is > no need to put the year first. Indeed, it would come across as > linguistically clumsy. Not only that, it would deny us the > opportunity to emphasize the significant part of the date. > > Let's say I'm reminiscing about a particular July 4th celebration. I > want to put my listener properly in the picture. Do I say the year > first or do I start off with the reference to July 4? (For example, > do I say either "I well remember July 4th, 1995" or "I well remember > the fourth of July, 1995," or do I say "I well remember 1995, July > 4?") > > Where the conversational form is written, the name rather than the > number of the month is still used. ISO 8601 quite specifically > excludes such forms from consideration and limits itself to the > all-numeric expression of dates and times, which is the only > situation where ambiguity needs to be resolved. > > I am happy to adhere strictly to ISO 8601 for all-numeric date > references and strongly encourage others to do so. However, for > conversational and narrative references (where the name of the month > is used), I'm equally happy to follow the same linguistic styles and > traditions I use for conversation and narrative prose generally. > > This seems to me to be another of those instances where zealotry in > pursuit of a standard at all costs will do our cause more harm than > good. > > Finally, two things: > > 1. Although ISO 8601 is consistent with the spirit of SI, it has > nothing to do with SI. > > 2. There is no such thing as "Impure ISO 8601." (See subject.) > > Bill Potts, CMS > Roseville, CA > http://metric1.org [SI Navigator] > > >> -----Original Message----- >> From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] >> Behalf Of Terry Simpson >> Sent: Thursday, September 04, 2003 12:38 >> To: U.S. Metric Association >> Subject: [USMA:26838] RE: Fw: [ISO8601] Re: Pure ISO 8601 or varied >> for popular formats >> >> >> Han Maenen wrote: >> "the US somehow, "came up with", the month-day-year order" >> >> Actually, I suspect it is like the debate about gallons. There was >> nobody imposing or enforcing standards from above. You can see old >> examples of the mmm d, yyyy format in the UK. >> >> Here is an 1803 example from the archive of the Times (an eminent >> British newspaper). >> http://www.timesonline.co.uk/section/0,,682,00.html >> >> >> -- >> Terry Simpson >> Human Factors Consultant >> [EMAIL PROTECTED] >> www.connected-systems.com >> Phone: +44 7850 511794
