American English Vs British English
American English and British English are two major varieties of the English language, differing in spelling, vocabulary, and pronunciation. Some common examples of differences include the use of "color" in American English and "colour" in British English, and "apartment" in American English and "flat" in British English. These variations have developed over time due to historical, cultural, and geographical influences.
6 Key excerpts on "American English Vs British English"
eBook - ePub- Vivian J Cook, Vivian J Cook(Authors)
- 2014(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...In a way it resembles the success of the Chinese writing system at unifying speakers of many dialects through a single writing system. Written English too can be read by people who might find it difficult to understand one another in speech. Yet this does not mean that there is complete uniformity within the English writing system. The most obvious variation that most people are aware of is that between British and American spelling. Task 1 tests some of the familiar shibboleths. Let us go over some of the salient differences between these two styles of spelling. Usage is often not firmly demarcated to particular language communities. Nor are the rules applied consistently within one language area. They also vary from person to person, or publisher to publisher. Furthermore, the differences are mainly based on the pronouncements of manuals of style and spelling rather than on the description of large corpora of written English. Both in Britain and in the USA, such manuals differ among themselves as to the preferred spelling for particular words. Sources for the following are mainly the British Carney (1994) and the American Venezky (1999). Task 1. American and British variants Which are British variants, which American? American British American British 1 kerb □ □ 7 ameba □ □ 2 enrollment □ □ 8 kidnapper □ □ 3 traveller □ □ 9 judgement □ □ 4 favor □ □ 10 litre □ □ 5 defense □ □ 11 analyze □ □ 6 tyre □ □ 12 catalog □ □ Answers at end of chapter British <-our> versus American <-or> One give-away to the source of a text is the difference between ‘colour’ and ‘color’, ‘honour’ and ‘honor’, and ‘favourite’ and ‘favorite’. American spelling prefers the <-or> ending, British the <-our>. A similar rule applies to <oul> in some words; British style tends to keep the <u>, American to drop it, as in ‘mould’ versus ‘mold’ and ‘smoulder’ versus ‘smolder’...
eBook - ePubInternational English
A guide to the varieties of Standard English
- Peter Trudgill, Jean Hannah(Authors)
- 2013(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...4 English and North American English: Grammatical, Orthographical and Lexical Differences At the level of educated speech and writing, there are relatively few differences in grammar and spelling between EngEng and NAmEng; those which do exist tend to be fairly trivial when considered from the point of view of mutual understanding. Vocabulary differences, on the other hand, are very numerous and are capable of causing varying degrees of comprehension problems. Each of these three areas will be discussed in turn below. It should be noted that we treat EngEng and NAmEng, often, as if they were two entirely homogeneous and separate varieties. This makes the presentation of the facts more straightforward, but it does obscure, to a certain extent, the fact that there is regional variation, even in Standard English, in the two areas. There is also considerable influence of the one variety on the other, particularly of NAmEng on EngEng; thus, what is NAmEng usage for older English people may be perfectly normal EngEng usage for younger English people. 4.1. Grammatical Differences In this section we will discuss differences both in morphology and syntax. We will also note some differences in frequency of use of certain constructions which occur in both varieties. 4.1.1. The Verb 4.1.1.1. Morphology Inflectional...
eBook - ePubEnglish Accents and Dialects
An Introduction to Social and Regional Varieties of English in the British Isles, Fifth Edition
- Arthur Hughes, Peter Trudgill, Dominic Watt(Authors)
- 2013(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...In many cases, of course, native speakers will simply not be aware of such difficulties. Even when they are, a common strategy is to repeat what has just been said, only louder, or to revert to ‘foreigner talk’ (‘me come, you go – OK?’), usually making understanding even more difficult. It seems to us, then, that exposure to a number of varieties of English, and help in understanding them, can play an important and practically useful part in the study of English as a foreign language. Even when learners with comprehension problems recognise that English, like their own language – indeed, like every living natural language – is subject to variation, that variation can be so complex and at times so subtle that it is usually a long time before they begin to see much order in it. And native speakers, even those who teach the language, are often hard put to explain the things that puzzle learners. For this reason, we will attempt now to give some idea of the principal ways in which British and Irish English speech varies and, just as importantly, the non-linguistic (social, geographical) factors which condition that variation. It is hoped by doing this to provide a framework within which to set the features of social and regional variation, which will be our main concern in the remainder of the book. Variation in Pronunciation Received Pronunciation We should first make clear the way we are going to use two important terms, dialect and accent. A dialect, in the strict sense of the word, is a language variety distinguished from other varieties by differences of grammar and vocabulary. Standard (British) English is therefore a dialect of English, just as the other standard dialects of the language (Standard Scottish English, American English, etc.) are, and all the non-standard dialects of the language too. Accent, on the other hand, refers just to variations in pronunciation...
eBook - ePubAuthority in Language
Investigating Standard English
- James Milroy, Lesley Milroy(Authors)
- 2012(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...9 TWO NATIONS DIVIDED BY THE SAME LANGUAGE? The standard language ideology in Britain and the United States 9.1 Some beliefs about Standard English Comments on Standard English and criticisms of non-standard speakers are commonplace in both Britain and the United States, but the most contentious public debates about language are framed rather di ff erently in the two countries. It is di ffi cult to imagine a long-running controversy in the United States with all the ingredients of the great grammar debate which we alluded to in Chapter 8. Equally, it is hard to imagine the British press focusing over many years on an English Only movement or on whether British Black English should be taught as a separate language, as in the Ebonics debate. In this fi nal chapter we shall consider some social and historical factors underpinning these somewhat di ff erent manifestations of the standard language ideology. We begin by looking more closely at the term ‘Standard English’ when used in reference to a spoken norm. Although not all scholars are in agreement with us, we suggested in Chapter 1 that standardisation was best treated as a process, since attempts to locate a speci fi c standard (product) are by de fi nition doomed to failure. We also saw that phonology was particularly resistant to standardisation. Hence some scholars identify the standard as a prestigious system of grammar and lexis which can be realised with any phonological system; for them there is no such thing as a ‘standard accent’. However, in practice Received Pronunciation (RP) is often treated not only by the general public, but also by some professional linguists as a reference accent and described as ‘Standard English’ (Smith, 1996:65). In the United States, so-called ‘network American’ 1 is often identi- fi ed as Standard English, although RP and network American are horses of a very di ff erent colour...
eBook - ePub- Carolyn Temple Adger, Walt Wolfram, Donna Christian(Authors)
- 2014(Publication Date)
- Routledge(Publisher)
...It is important, for this reason, to carefully distinguish between those norms that make up the formal standard and the informal, yet highly influential, norms of social acceptability that govern most everyday, interactional evaluations of standardness. The situation becomes quite a bit more complicated when we consider World Englishes—the varieties of English spoken in other countries. Just as in the United States, there are standard and vernacular English language varieties in countries that were colonized by English speakers, where English has become the mother tongue of most people (e.g., New Zealand) or a second language spoken by nearly everyone for certain purposes, such as business and higher education (e.g., Nigeria). English is used for special purposes in many other countries as well, and local standards have developed. When English speakers travel abroad, they may find that speech considered standard in their own country is difficult to understand, odd, even nonstandard according to the standards of the host country. Here again Standard English is relative to the particular norms of the speech community. Standard Singapore English is very different from any version of Standard American English. Thus, it is more accurate to speak of Standard Englishes than of just one Standard English. We use the term Standard English as a proper noun with a capital s on standard, but we intend it as a collective noun. Standard English is a collection of the socially preferred dialects from various parts of the United States and other English-speaking countries. Dialects and Understanding Given the differences among English dialects, it stands to reason that communication among speakers of different dialects might be flawed occasionally. Although problems in comprehension and interpretation can arise, the severity of these problems and their precise source are not always clear. Certainly, there are Standard English speakers who claim not to understand vernacular speakers...
eBook - ePub- Robert D. King(Author)
- 2021(Publication Date)
- Austin Macauley Publishers(Publisher)
...Chapter 10 British Versus “American”: Noah Webster English [British English] has been arrested in its growth by its purists and grammarians. It shows no living change in structure and syntax since the days of [Queen] Anne and very little modification in either pronunciation or vocabulary. —H.L. Mencken (1880–1956), The American Language. "Virginians have little money and great pride, contempt of Northern men and great fondness for dissipated life. They do not understand grammar." —Noah Webster, Jr. (1758–1843) Even American children these days can detect a British accent when they hear one. And if they are bookish, they soon notice that British spelling and vocabulary are different from ours. Words spelled differently in British publications like colour, centre, tyre, and connexion are easily mastered. Gaol for ‘jail’ is a bit of a stretch, but it seems to be becoming a bit of a stretch for the Brits too. [When in high school, I read Oscar Wilde’s The Ballad of Reading Gaol. I pronounced ‘gaol’ as ‘gale’ until I learned better—how, I cannot remember.] Then there are the different words with different meanings: ‘braces’ are ‘suspenders’ in British English, ‘lorry’ is ‘truck,’ ‘nappies’ are ‘diapers,’ ‘mean’ can mean ‘cheap, miserly.’ ‘He knocked her up’ in British English does not necessarily mean that he got her pregnant; it can mean that he knocked on her door to wake her up. (The ‘got her pregnant’ meaning seems to be gaining ground in the U.K. even as the ‘knocked on her door’ meaning seems to be losing ground.) There are also a few differences in syntax and morphology...
