Greenwich Mean Time is not the world's time. So said Dr Felicitas Arias, director of time at the International Bureau of Weights and Measures, on the Today programme this morning (listen again here). GMT has been a standard in Britain since 1847, but since 1972 most of the world has operated on Co-ordinated Universal Time (UTC). Apparently GMT is not accurate enough, nor is it uniform, since it reflects the speed of rotation of the Earth, and the Earth rotates at varying rates. Atomic clocks, on which UTC is based, are more accurate.
I must say that I've noticed that there is often confusion if GMT is used when I am talking to someone in another country. Until I knew better, I found that someone elsewhere would agree to Skype me at a certain time -- 14:00 GMT, for instance -- but, in fact, we were often an hour out and never got to speak. That is because many people think that GMT is the current time in the United Kingdom. It isn't. The time in the UK at the moment is currently GMT+1; we call it British Summer Time. We put the clocks back at the end of this month and we will be on GMT again over the winter.
The OED gives four pronunciations for Greenwich: /ˈgrɛnɪtʃ/ (Grennitch) , /ˈgrɪnɪtʃ/ (Grinnitch), /ˈgrɛnɪdʒ/ (Grennidzh), and /ˈgrɪnɪdʒ/ (Grinnidzh). It gives the US pronunciation as /ˈgrɛnɪtʃ/ (Grennitch), the same as the first of the four UK pronunciations. The pronunciation of Green... as 'grin...' is more old-fashioned, I think.
For the interview with the director of the International Bureau of Weights and Measures, click here.
Great post, Susan.
Yes, it can be confusing at times for those who aren't used to it.
GMT is also referred to as "Zulu Time" in US military circles. "Zulu" is the phonetic word for the letter "Z", and I believe Z-time was initially derived from "zero-meridian" time, i.e., GMT.
The usage of Zulu is to avoid confusion when communicating across multiple time zones. To facilitate things further, it is normal to have multiple clocks displaying Local and Zulu. UTC is thrown into the mix occasionally when extreme precision is required.
Posted by: John | October 03, 2011 at 11:20 PM
Thanks, John. Yes, the Wikipedia page on GMT did mention Zulu time, but, to be honest, it was so technical and above my head that I couldn't understand it.
Posted by: Virtual Linguist | October 04, 2011 at 02:38 PM
Hopefully this helps. GMT and Zulu are the same.
Zulu and UTC are one and the same at a practical, human, level. To a precision navigation system, they may differ by milliseconds.
Posted by: John | October 04, 2011 at 06:17 PM
I grew up in Deptford, within bottle-throwing distance of Greenwich, and I and those around me pronounced it as per the fourth OED version. In Greenwich itself there were those of a more RP nature, and they used the first OED version. You may be right about "grin" being old-fashioned - I am certainly old-fashioned myself - but in my day it was a class issue, so the upmarketing of that part of London may be a reason for the decline of "grin", if decline there be.
Posted by: Picky | October 04, 2011 at 07:51 PM
Thank you very much for your comment, Picky, and for the answer from the horse's mouth, so to speak. Thanks for dropping by and reading.
Thanks again, John. Yes, that's clear.
Posted by: Virtual Linguist | October 05, 2011 at 10:05 AM