US or European spelling.

Draíocht

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Does it matter if you send a manuscript with European English spelling rather than US, or is it polite to have a separate manuscript for each continent that you submit to?
eg: flavour vs flavor.
colour vs color.
realize vs realise.
center vs centre.

Thank you!
 

Drachen Jager

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American agents and editors are used to manuscripts from Europe, Australia and Canada. They don't mind the spelling differences.

I am sure that most publishers have software that knows all the different spellings between cultures and can do an auto-replace to the American spellings in about five seconds.
 

Cyia

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International spelling conventions are the domain of copy editors. I stubbornly cling to my preferred spellings because to me the words don't look right the other way and it's distracting (counsellor and traveller should have two "L"s TYVM and "equipped" looks stupid next to "equipt" ditto "leaped" and "leapt".) My editor said it's not a problem because the copy editor will straighten it all out at that stage.
 

Drachen Jager

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It's funny, everyone in the world, except the British count Britain as a European country.

Oh, not us, we're an Island see? We're right fookin special ain't we? ;)

(Colonials are allowed one poke at Mother England per year (it says so in the King James Bible), this is mine)
 

Draíocht

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I'm Irish, I spell words the same way as the UK, but I'm not English, thus I referred to it as European ;)
 

mirandashell

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So ... you couldn't just say English? As in the native language of the English. Who come from England.
 

Draíocht

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Sure. I was referring to the English spelling used by people from Europe, not specifically those from England, but those from Ireland too. Also, as I was referring to US English, I wanted to distinguish between the two.
 

mirandashell

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So people in Europe who speak English use the English spelling. Americans use different spelling. So the distinction is English spelling v American English spelling.

Nope... still not seeing what it's got to do with Europe.
 

Draíocht

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If you wish to be finnicky about it, then sure, you could say that.
 

mirandashell

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It's not really me being finicky. I've just never heard anyone say 'European English' before. That's like saying 'European French' or 'European German'. It's odd.
 

Captcha

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I've heard 'European French'. More commonly 'French from France', but the European acknowledges the Swiss and Belgian and whatever other components.

And I think 'European English' makes a lot more sense than just 'English'. I mean, Americans write in English.

But European English doesn't totally work, because Canadians and, I think, English-speakers from most Commonwealth countries spell using the same conventions. Maybe 'Commonwealth English' would work?
 
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It's funny, everyone in the world, except the British count Britain as a European country.

Oh, not us, we're an Island see? We're right fookin special ain't we? ;)

(Colonials are allowed one poke at Mother England per year (it says so in the King James Bible), this is mine)
England is not an island.
 

jclarkdawe

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I've seen "European English," although not among writers. I actually like it, as it reads a lot better then "English English." It's also more accurate, as non-American spellings are used in most of the world, such as Europe, Canada, India, China, Australia, and a host of other places. As far as I know, American spellings are only used in America. But calling it "non-American English" isn't a whole heck of a lot better then "English English."

As far as the original question is concerned, keep it in your native spelling. Not only is spelling different depending upon where you are from, so isn't how you write. Cultural aspects also impact our writing, and for many writers, a query is enough to give some indication of where the writer is from. That uniqueness can be a help for a writer.

Best of luck,

Jim Clark-Dawe
 

Captcha

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We could clarify the question by asking whether things should be spelled according the rules of American English, or whether they should be spelled properly.;)

ETA: And, yeah, for the original question - I use American spellings because my publishers are all American and it's one less thing to worry about during editing. But I don't think it's a big deal.