JOHANNESBURG — South Africa’s ruling African National Congress party has lost its outright majority for the first time in a devastating blow for the party once led by Nelson Mandela. The ANC has dominated South African politics since winning in the first post-apartheid elections 30 years ago.
The ANC was braced for a disappointing outcome, predicted by polls before Wednesday’s elections, but the final results are even more sobering. It won 40 percent of the vote, falling from 57% in 2019.
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Now we’re all waiting with baited breath for some of these interminable assholes to actually form a coalition government 😕
baited breath
“bated breath”
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/with_bated_breath
From the verb bate, alteration by aphesis of the verb abate (“to reduce; lessen”). Coined by William Shakespeare in The Merchant of Venice, see quotations.
with bated breath
-
With reduced breath.
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(idiomatic) Eagerly; with great anticipation.
We are waiting with bated breath for the release of the new version.
Bate and goon
-
I know pundits have been calling this for months now but its still pretty wild that it happened.
Next up, Mexico’s first female president
Thank you NPR editors for not saying “an historic” for once.
“an historic” isn’t incorrect, neither is “a historic” it’s the same issue as “a European” - the a/an choice is based off of pronunciation which is inconsistent because languages diverge (especially english)… the dumb thing is that “an” is written instead of just being written as “a” and optionally pronounced as “an” when followed by a vowel it’d meld into.
Anyways, both choices are valid. The only truly incorrect thing is that en-uk use “speeded” as the past tense of “speed” and that’s just fucking awful - we can all agree on that. /s
checks Google Ngrams
According to Google Ngrams, in American English, “an historic” and “a historic” were about neck-and-neck until 1935, when “a historic” started steadily pulling ahead. Today, “a historic” is far more common.
In British English, “an historic” had a solid lead for a long time, with “a historic” pulling ahead in 1986, and “a historic” now being significantly much more-common as well.
Anyways, both choices are valid. The only truly incorrect thing is that en-uk use “speeded” as the past tense of “speed” and that’s just fucking awful - we can all agree on that. /s
The one that drives me nuts is “pressurized”. In American English, you “pressure” someone to do something, but “pressurize” something with gas. In British English, you “pressurize” both, which is ambiguous. I mean, given context, I can normally make it out, but it’s just ambiguity that doesn’t need to be there, and it always gives me the wrong mental image to start with.
I had no idea about “pressure”/“pressurize” in en-uk. Thanks for sharing that!
In British English, “an historic” had a solid lead for a long time, with “a historic” pulling ahead in 1986, and “a historic” now being significantly much more-common as well.
Well that explains why my British father with a doctorate in English drilled using “an historic” into me.
In the US, the H isn’t silent. So we’re taught to say “a historic” and “a hospital”. But for some reason many US journalists like to pretend they went to Eton or something. And NPR is in the US. So I was commenting about how nice it was to see a US-based journalist use US grammar for a change.
many US journalists like to pretend they went to Eton or something
I’m not sure that the “h” is silent in Received Pronunciation, either. I know that some British dialects do use silent "h"s, but I though that that was…what, Cockney?
kagis
Cockney and others.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H-dropping
H-dropping occurs (variably) in most of the dialects of the English language in England and Welsh English, including Cockney, West Country English, West Midlands English (including Brummie), East Midlands English, most of northern England (including Yorkshire and Lancashire), and Cardiff English.[6] It is not generally found in Scottish English and Irish English. It is also typically absent in certain regions of England and Wales, including Northumberland, East Anglia and parts of North and West Wales.[7]
H-dropping also occurs in some Jamaican English, and perhaps in other Caribbean English (including some of The Bahamas). It is not generally found in North American English, although it has been reported in Newfoundland (outside the Avalon Peninsula).[8] However, dropping of /h/ from the cluster /hj/ (so that human is pronounced /'juːmən/) is found in some American dialects, as well as in parts of Ireland – see reduction of /hj/.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_language_in_Southern_England
Commentators report widespread homogenisation in South East England in the 20th century (Kerswill & Williams 2000; Britain 2002). This involved a process of levelling between the extremes of working-class Cockney in inner-city London and the careful upper-class standard accent of Southern England, Received Pronunciation (RP), popular in the 20th century with upper-middle and upper-class residents. Now spread throughout the South East region, Estuary English is the resulting mainstream accent that combines features of both Cockney and a more middle-class RP.
Features of working- or middle-class Estuary English, spoken in the counties all around London in the 21st century, include:
- Not as much h-dropping as Cockney, but still more than RP
So it sounds like Received Pronunciation, the wealthy crowd, does it the least, but that it’s there to some degree. I think that NPR would be doing it more if they were trying to adopt an accent used by poorer people in England, though, if anything.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
Tessa Dooms, a director at Rivonia Circle, a think tank in South Africa, said it was a historic result that diminished the ANC’s three decades hold on power.
Thirty years later, many voters at the same polling unit echoed a similar sentiment: frustration with the state of the country, and a desire for change.
He is the first ANC president to lose the party’s majority, has overseen the steepest fall in share of the vote (17%), and turnout has reduced to 58 percent.
But Ramaphosa faces a major challenge to survive the duration of his second term, if he manages to form a government that based on the results, will likely be divisive.
Professor David Everett at Wits School of Governance said the result forcing the ANC to partner with another party was a positive step for the country.
Within the country’s proportional representation system, more parties and independent candidates than ever are forming and providing an alternative — a reality the ANC must now grapple with.
The original article contains 1,261 words, the summary contains 165 words. Saved 87%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
