IN THE past two years, the BBC published two emotionally identical pieces on the annoyance that American English causes many an English English ear.  The Beeb published a much better piece on Britishisms in American English last year, too, but it turns out that the writer still over-egged the annoyance of one American commentator in order to gin up controversy. I was beginning to worry that the mutual transatlantic "nyah-nyah" was just too much fun for anyone to come round to writing something sensible.

So thank goodness for "Thank America for saving our language" by Michael Skapinker in the Financial Times. The headline, too, is over-egged in the opposite direction. But it is a sensible, short rumination. Though he admits being annoyed by Americanisms now and again, Mr Skapinker reminds the reader that the vast majority of the language is shared, and that this is so is of huge mutual benefit to both Britain and America. He points out that without America, J.K. Rowling might not be an internationally best-selling author, and "the FT would not be read all over the world". And he might well add that if Britain had not already begun to spread English around the globe, the world might not have been as fertile for its taking root and growing when America became a superpower. America enjoys Downton Abbey without subtitles. Britain enjoys The Wire, well, all right, with subtitles, but most Americans I know turned them on, too, to understand the Bawlmerese of the show. The point is that the transatlantic debt is mutual.

Finally, Mr Skapinker says something else that I hadn't thought about. English settlement in America began when Shakespeare was still alive. Were it not for constant cultural exchange, the four centuries since would have been enough time for two nearly unintelligible Englishes to emerge. (Originally from South Africa, though now a longtime London resident with a British passport, he notes the much greater difficulty Dutch- and Afrikaans-speakers have communicating.) So here's another New Year's resolution to make, if you haven't already: be thankful for the shared features of English, rather than taking them for granted. And where it appears, enjoy the diversity, rather than assuming that difference is the same as decay.

Clarification:  This article originally referred to Michael Skapinker as a Brit. Then a colleague told me that he was South African, and I wrote a correction. That correction was only half-correct. Mr Skapinker writes in himself to say that while he grew up in South Africa, he has now lived the bulk of his life in Britain and holds a British passport. Apologies for the confusion.