Grab a girl here. I'm Minion Fogarty and you can think of me as your friendly guide to

the English language. We talk about writing, history, rules, and other cool stuff. Today,

we'll talk about writing dates, and then about a fascinating study about how COVID has changed

the way we think about certain words. Can you believe it's already 2023? I feel like I hadn't even

gotten used to calling it 2022 yet, but another year is gone, and since a new year gets people

thinking about the date, I'll answer a few date-related questions. Here's a question from a long

time ago from a listener named Michael to get us started. It'll seem like he's getting a little

off track, but it'll all make sense in a minute. Grammar, girl, I have some concerns regarding the

correct grammar for wedding invitations and wedding announcements. My fiancee and I have two main

questions. The first regarding a year, a year such as 2007, often written as 2007. We both believe

this to be grammatically incorrect yet prevalent among examples that we've seen in print. Our second

question is regarding the use of British English in the states. We live stateside, and yet we see

in these examples many words written in the British spelling versus an American spelling,

and we don't know what to do. Thank you for your help.

The reason Michael's question about British English in wedding invitations is relevant to how to

pronounce dates is that as a general rule, the year is pronounced 2000 and 23 in Britain and 2023

in America. That's the general rule. It's quite common to hear people use the end in the United

States. Although from the number of email messages I get complaining about it, I'd say a lot of

Americans have been taught that it's wrong. So back to Michael's question, I believe the reason you

see the year written is 2000 and 23 in wedding invitations is the same reason you see the other

British spellings on invitations. Americans tend to think British English sounds more formal,

and they want their invitations to sound special. Some people may consider it an affectation,

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