[WikiEN-l] Re: Do we really want to confuse every American who reads the Wikipedia?

[Ray Saintonge]

Vicki Rosenzweig wrote:

> At 06:16 AM 3/3/03 -0800, Jimbo wrote:
>
>> I asked this question on a talk page, and I'm basically just ignorant
>> on this issue: is '2 March 2003' natural to speech?
>>
>> Americans almost never speak that way.  We would say "March the
>> Second, Two Thousand and Three" or "March Second, Two Thousand and
>> Three".  We would never say "Two March Two Thousand and Three".
>
> The people who use the "2 March 2003" style would say "Second March,
> 2003", not "Two March". It's natural to British speech (or, at least, 
> none of
> my British friends seem to find it artificial when they use it).

That's likely more right than wrong but I would think that "Second OF 
March" is even more common.  "Two March" is often associated with U.S. 
militarese.  Fortunately, in this debate about written format no one is 
seriously advocating the use of ordinals for the day. :-)

Eclecticology