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Old 07-08-2023, 11:05 AM   #1489
Quoth
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Quote:
Originally Posted by issybird View Post
Using "high tea" to describe afternoon tea. It's worse in a British author who really should know better (as in my current read), but whatever the nationality it shows that someone didn't do his research/isn't all that familiar with the situation he's writing about.
Mad. A British author that's very young might not know better as "High Tea" and "afternoon tea" are maybe slightly obsolete. I'm not behind in saying Wikipedia can be very inaccurate, but I'd agree with most of this:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tea_(meal)#Afternoon_tea
However such things are regional in the British Isles and even in England usage may differ between South West (Devon & Cornwall), Home Counties, Midlands, Yorkshire and Northumberland.
N.I. would be different East and West of the River Bann. I've encountered considerable difference between friends from Inverness and Glasgow (Scotland). High Tea and Afternoon tea are to me English institutions, but even to me Afternoon Tea is a snack you have out (and maybe in 1950s) and High Tea is later meal. But I've not heard the usage of either for maybe 45 years in daily life, only in older books maybe 50 to 100 years old. However likely certain classes of English in the South of England do it.

It's an odd thing to get wrong in a historical novel set 1900s to 1970 and maybe a strange thing to have in a contemporary novel, but I've got a bit out of touch with English people about 30 years ago.

Edit
Nowadays if out in the afternoon, you might say, "lets go for coffee", even if everyone drinks tea). My part of the world growing up had Lunch or Dinner at 1pm depending on size and teatime was the meal at about 6pm. But a posh evening meal was a dinner. Still is. Afternoon Tea and High Tea was something in books or the English had.
Growing up and as a young adult I only heard N.I. Unionists and in GB, only "people of colour" call themselves British. But the Unionists would often mysteriously be Irish if in Spain etc. GB people called themselves Scottish, Welsh, Cornish, English, Brummies (Birmingham), Yorkshire men. Almost never British. British for many for last 500 years was a synonym for Westminster, Empire or English. Elizabeth I decided England would be British at the suggestion of John Dee. It acquired the modern meaning from then on. It was because the Welsh had someone that claimed to have discovered the Americas and She wanted a prior claim in the French court! Though many in the English Court did have Welsh connections the title "Prince of Wales" is an English fiction and the recent QEII was QE1 of Scoctlant (see James).

Last edited by Quoth; 07-08-2023 at 11:19 AM.
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