
#REDIRECT American_and_British_English_differences
#REDIRECT Talk:American_and_British_English_differences
This article outlines the differences between American English, the variety (linguistics) of the English language spoken in the United States, and British English, which is sometimes used to denote what is more precisely known as Commonwealth English. For the purposes of this article: *American English is the form of English used by the United states Government of the United States, Economy of the United States, Media of the United States, and Education in the United States. It does not include Canadian English; Canadian pronunciation is similar to that in the United States, but spelling often takes the Commonwealth form. Regions and countries that tend to use American English in teaching and publishing include much of Eastern Europe (including Russia), the Far East (especially Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and the Philippines; although largely excluding the former British colonies of Hong Kong and Singapore), the Americas (excluding Canada) and, in Africa, Liberia. The World Bank, the IEEE and the Organization of American States among other organizations also use American English. *Commonwealth English is the form of English used across the United Kingdom and its former colonies in the British Empire, most notably in much of Africa (including South Africa and Egypt), the Subcontinent (Pakistan and India), Australia and New Zealand, and portions of Southeast Asia (Myanmar, Singapore,Malaysia and Thailand), as well as Hong Kong. This form of English, mostly interchangeable with British English, is sometimes called Commonwealth English because most of its speakers live in nations that are members of the Commonwealth of Nations. Other nations and groups to use British English include the European Union and the United Nations. Many international organizations, like the International Olympic Committee, NATO, the World Trade Organization and ISO also use British English. The section on pronunciation assumes the received pronunciation of British English, from which there are many regional variations. *The form of English spoken in Canadian English exhibits features of both British and American dialects. *Ireland's version of English, sometimes described as Hiberno-English, is a variant of British English influenced by, ''inter alia'', the Irish language and a split with British English early enough to preserve rhoticity in most forms of English spoken in Ireland. Written English in Ireland tends to follow the UK usage. *English is one of the official languages of the European Union, and the form used within the EU follows usage in the United Kingdom and Ireland. Although American and British English are generally mutually intelligible, there are enough differences to occasionally cause awkward misunderstandings or even a complete failure to communicate. George Bernard Shaw once said that the United States and United Kingdom are "two countries divided by a common language"; a similar comment is ascribed to Winston Churchill. Henry Sweet predicted in 1877 that within a century, American English, Australian English and British English would be mutually unintelligible, but it may be the case that increased world-wide communication through radio, television, the Internet, and globalization has reduced the tendency to regional variation. This can result either in some variations becoming extinct (as, for instance, ''Truck (disambiguation)'' has been gradually displacing ''Lorry'' in much of the world) or in the acceptance of wide variations as "perfectly good English" everywhere. In addition to its use in English-speaking countries, English plays an important role as a technical language around the world, in medicine, computer science, air traffic control, and many other areas of concentrated expertise and formal communication among international professionals. Such speakers may be fluent in English within their discipline, but not generally fluent in English. ==Spelling== ''Main article: American and British English spelling differences'' Some words shared by all English speakers are ''spelled'' one way by Americans but are ''spelt'' differently in other English speaking countries. ==Slight lexical differences== * Miscellaneous lexical differences between British and American English * Verb past tenses with ''-t'': Commonwealth ''dreamt'', ''leapt'', ''learnt'', ''spelt''; American ''dreamed'', ''leaped'', ''learned'', ''spelled''. As with the "tre" words, the ''t'' endings are occasionally found in American texts. The forms with ''-ed'' are also common in Commonwealth usage, and preferred by many as they are weak verbs. (The two-syllable form ''learnèd'' , usually spelled simply as ''learned'', is still used to mean "educated", or to refer to academic institutions, in both British English and American English.) * Other verb past tense forms: Commonwealth ''fitted'', ''forecasted'', ''knitted'', ''lighted'', ''wedded''; American ''fit'', ''forecast'', ''knit'', ''lit'', ''wed'' (but ''busted''). The distinction is, however, not rigorous as the Commonwealth forms are also found in American, and both ''lit'' and ''forecast'' are standard in Commonwealth English.
Also, the past participle ''gotten'' is rarely used in modern British English (although it is used in some dialects), which generally uses ''got'' (as do some Americans), except in old expressions such as ''ill-gotten gains''. Commonwealth usage retains the form ''forgotten'', though. Furthermore, according to the Compact Oxford English Dictionary, "The form ''gotten'' is not used in British English but is very common in North American English, though even there it is often regarded as non-standard."
''Fitted'' is used in both conventions as an adjective ("fitted sheets" are the same size as the mattress) and as the past tense of ''fit'' ("to suffer epilepsy", for example, "Leavitt fitted" in ''The Andromeda Strain''); however ''fit'' and ''fitting'' do not denote epileptic seizure in ordinary British use (though that usage is common within medical circles), as the same effect is achieved by ''to have a fit'' or ''to throw a fit''.
The past participle ''proven'' is frequently used in American English, although careful speakers usually avoid it, and it remains ''proved'' in British English (except in adjectival use; and usage is different in Scottish law). American English further allows other irregular verbs, such as ''thrive'' (''throve''–''thriven'') or ''sneak'' (''snuck''), which remain regular in Commonwealth English, and often mixes the preterite and past participle forms (''spring''–''sprang'' (U.S. ''sprung'')–''sprung''), sometimes forcing verbs such as ''shrink'' (''shrank''–''shrunk'') to have a further form, thus ''shrunk''–''shrunken''. (The Associated Press Stylebook in American English treats some irregular verbs as colloquialisms, insisting on the regular forms for the past tense of ''dive'', ''plead'' and ''sneak''.)
See also: wiktionary:Wiktionary_Appendix:Irregular_Verbs. * Directional suffix ''-ward(s)'': English ''forwards'', ''towards'', ''rightwards'', etc.; American ''forward'', ''toward'', ''rightward''. The forms with ''-s'' are only used as adverbs or prepositions. In American English, the ''-s'' forms are fast disappearing, except ''afterwards''. In British English, there is a semantic difference in the usage of the two possible forms. The Oxford English Dictionary states the following about ''forward'' and ''forwards'': "/.../ the latter expresses a definite direction viewed in contrast with other directions. In some contexts either form may be used without perceptible difference of meaning; the following are examples in which only one of them can be used: 'The ratchet-wheel can move only ''forwards''' ; 'the right side of the paper has the maker's name reading ''forwards''' ; 'if you move at all it must be ''forwards''' ; 'my companion has gone ''forward''' ; 'to bring a matter ''forward''' ; 'from this time ''forward''' ."
* In British English the word ''sat'' is often colloquially used to cover ''sat'', ''sitting'' and ''seated'': "I've been sat here waiting for half an hour." "The bride's family will be sat on the right side of the church." Not all British people do this, but it is not often heard outside Britain. Standard (British) English speakers would regard this usage as grammatically incorrect. Nevertheless, the colloquial usage is widely understood by British speakers. Similarly ''stood'' can be used instead of ''standing''. To an American these usages may imply that the subject had been involuntarily forced to sit or stand.
* In American English, "built-in" describes a feature integrated or included in a larger whole. The Commonwealth English equivalent adjective is "inbuilt" (without a hyphen).
* A few "institutional" nouns take no definite article when a certain role is implied: for example, ''at sea'' [as a sailor], ''in prison'' [as a convict]. Among this group, Commonwealth English has ''in hospital'' [as a patient] and ''at university'' [as a student], where American English requires ''in the hospital'' and ''at the university.'' (A nurse, visitor, etc. would be ''in the hospital'' in both systems.) On the other hand, American English distinguishes ''in back of'' [behind] from ''in the back of''; the former is unknown in Britain and liable to misinterpretation as the latter. Both however distinguish ''in front of'' from ''in the front of''.
* Commonwealth English allows agentive ''-er'' and attributive ''-ing'' suffixes for ''football'' (also ''cricket''; often ''netball''; occasionally ''basketball''). American English always uses ''football player'' rather than ''footballer''. Where the sport's name is usable as a verb, the suffixation is standard: for example, ''golfer''.
* English speakers everywhere occasionally make new words by eliding common phrases; for example, ''health care'' is now being replaced by ''healthcare'' on both sides of the Atlantic. However, American English has made certain words in this fashion which are still treated as phrases in Commonwealth countries. For example, Americans speak of "trademarks," but other countries speak of "trade-marks" or even "trade marks."
* In English_compound#Compound_nounss of the form <noun>, sometimes American English favours the Infinitive#Bare_infinitive where British English favours the gerund. Examples include: ''fry pan'' / ''frying pan''; ''jump rope'' / ''skipping rope''; ''racecar'' / ''racing car''; ''rowboat'' / ''rowing boat''; ''sailboat'' / ''sailing boat''; ''swimsuit'' / ''bathing suit''. In each of these pairs, the former term is more common in America than Britain and the latter more common in Britain than America (although it is not necessarily the case that the former is more common than the latter in America or the latter more common than the former in Britain).
==Grammar==
* In British English, singular nouns that describe multiple people are often used with plural verb and complement (linguistics), particularly where one is concerned with the people constituting the team, rather than with the team as an entity. The singular form is used in most cases in American. For example, British "the team are worried"; American "the team is worried". But, as in British English, the plural form can be used when the individual membership is clear, for example, "the team take their seats" (not "the team takes its seat(s)"), although it is often rephrased to avoid the singular/plural decision, as in "the team members take their seats". The difference occurs for collective nouns (such as ''team'' and ''company'') and for singular proper nouns (for example, where a placename is used to refer to a sports team). Proper nouns which have plural form may take plural verb in America as in Britain. Examples:
**British English: "The Clash are a well-known band." American English: "The Clash is a well-known band." But "The Beatles are a well-known band" is in both.
**British English: "New England are the champions." American English: "New England is the champion." But "New England Patriots are the champions" in both.
* Differences in which nouns are the same in both their plural and singular forms, such as the word ''sheep''. In American English, ''shrimp'' is such a word, but in British English the plural of ''shrimp'' is ''shrimps''. (''Shrimps'' is occasionally heard in the southern U.S., but is otherwise rare, apart from its colloquial use as a pejorative term for small people).
* In names of American rivers, the word ''river'' usually comes after the name (for example, ''Colorado River''), whereas for British rivers it comes before (as in ''River Thames'').
* Use of prepositions before days denoted by a single word. Where Britons would say "She resigned on Thursday", Americans often say "She resigned Thursday", but both forms are common in American usage. Occasionally, the preposition is also absent when referring to months: "I'll be here December" (although this usage is generally limited to colloquial speech). Intransitive verbs in American English often become transitive; for example, Britons say "I'll write to you" where Americans commonly say "I'll write you"; Commonwealth English: "The workers protested against the decision." American English: "The workers protested the decision."
* The grammatical tense is much more common in British dialects than in American, where the preterite is usually used instead. For example, ''I've gone'' in British English; ''I went'' in American. Similarly, the pluperfect is often replaced by the preterite in the USA; this, even more than the dropping of the present perfect, is generally regarded as sloppy usage by those Americans who consider themselves careful users of the language.
* On informal occasions, the British would use "have got", whereas Americans would say "have" or just "got". "Have" is the only form used in formal writing.
* American English allows ''do'' as a substitute for ''have'' (the full verb, in the sense of ''possess''), just as for other verbs such as "walk" or "think"; in the past, British English did not allow this, but it is becoming increasingly common. American: "Have you any food? [or, much more frequently, "Do you have any food?"] Yes, I do." British: "Have you (got) any food? Yes, I have." Note that such substitution is not possible in either American or British English for the auxiliary verb ''have'': "Have you eaten? Yes, I have."
* Similarly, in informal usage, American English often uses the form "did" + infinitive where British English would use "have/has" + past participle. "Did you brush your teeth yet?" would be usual American English whereas most British speakers would say "Have you cleaned your teeth yet?". The "have" form is regarded as correct in both countries, however, and is required in all formal contexts. "Did you clean your teeth yesterday?" would be correct in both countries.
* Where a statement of intention involves two separate activities, it is acceptable for speakers of American English to use the simple continuous form "I am going". Speakers of British English are more likely to use the form "I am going to". So where a speaker of American English might say "I am going upstairs and taking a bath", British English speakers would say "I am going to go upstairs and have a bath", or "I am going upstairs to have a bath", which has a slightly different meaning.
* The subjunctive mood is more common in American English in expressions such as: "They suggested that he apply for the job". British English would have "They suggested that he should apply for the job" or even "They suggested that he applied for the job". However, these British usages are also heard in the United States.
* Singular attributives in one country may be plural in the other, and ''vice versa''. For example, Britain has a ''drugs problem'' while the United States has a ''drug problem'' (although the singular usage is also commonly heard in Britain).
===Prepositions===
*In the United States, the word ''through'' can mean "up to and including" as in ''Monday through Friday''. This causes little confusion in Britain though it is rarely used by British speakers, who might instead say ''Monday to Friday inclusive'', or simply ''Monday to Friday''.
*In Southern Britain the word ''whilst'' is used almost interchangeably with ''while''. ''Whilst'' is more often used in instruction manuals, legal documents, etc. To Americans the word ''whilst'', in any context, seems very archaic and/or pretentious. Similarly with ''amid(st)'', and to a lesser extent ''among(st)''. ("In one's midst" is a standard idiom in both).
*The word ''while'' means ''until'' in some dialects of Northern England. There is an apocryphal story that, because of this, railway crossings with signs saying "do not cross the track while the lights are flashing" had to be changed after several fatalities occurred.
*In Britain, ''from'' is used with single dates and times more often than in the United States. Where British speakers and writers would say "the new museum will be open from Tuesday," Americans would more likely say "the new museum will be open starting Tuesday" or "the new museum will open Tuesday." (This difference, which is more a tendency than an absolute rule, does not apply to phrases of the pattern ''from A to B'', which are used in both British and American English.)
*American English uses ''with'' more often. Where an American will ''meet with'' someone and ''talk with'' them, a Briton can ''meet'' someone and ''talk to'' them.
* American legislators and lawyers always use the preposition "of" between the name of a legislative act and the year it was passed, while their British equivalents do not. Compare ''Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990'' to ''Disability Discrimination Act 1995''.
==Punctuation==
* Full stops/Periods in abbreviations: Americans tend to write "Mr.", "Mrs.", "St.", "Dr." etc., while British will usually, but not always, write "Mr", "Mrs", "St", "Dr" (or even "D'r"), etc., following the rule that a period is used only when the last letter of the abbreviation is not the last letter of the complete word. However, many British writers would tend to write other abbreviations without a full stop, such as "Prof", "etc", "eg", and so on (so recommended by some Oxford dictionaries). The rationale behind this usage is that it is typographically more elegant, and that the omitted periods are essentially superfluous, as the reader recognizes the abbreviation without them. It also removes ambiguity by reserving the period for ending sentences. However, the "American" usage of periods after most abbreviations is also widely used in Britain. Note that in either case it is incorrect to put a period after units such as kg for kilogram or Hz for hertz, as these are considered unit symbols, not abbreviations.
* It is sometimes believed that British English does not hyphenate multiple-word adjectives, such as "a first class ticket". This usage is rare, and often considered incorrect. The most common form is as in American English, such as "a first-class ticket".
* Quotation mark: Americans start with double quotation marks (") and use single quotation marks (') for quotations within quotations. In general this is also true of British English but can be the opposite when used in book publishing, for example. In journals and newspapers, quotation mark double/single use is the same as American English.
* Contents of quotations: Americans are taught to put commas and periods inside quotation marks, whereas Britons will put the punctuation inside if it belongs to the quote and outside otherwise. This means that direct speech retains punctuation inside inverted commas in British English also, with a full stop changing into a comma if followed by explanatory text.
**Carefree means "free from care or anxiety." (American style)
**Carefree means "free from care or anxiety". (British style)
**"Hello world," I said. (both styles)
: The American style was established for typographical reasons, having to do with the aesthetics of commas and quotation marks in typeset text. It also usefully eliminates the need to decide whether a period or comma belongs to the quotation. However, many people find the usage counterintuitive. ''Hart's Rules'' and the ''Oxford Dictionary for Writers and Editors'' call the British style "new" or "logical" quoting; it is similar to the use of quotation marks in many other languages (including Spanish, French, Italian, Catalan, Dutch, and German). This "logical" style is increasingly popular in America, although formal writing generally calls for the "American" style. In fact, the British style is often the ''de facto'' standard among Americans for whom formal or professional writing is not a part of their daily life; many are in fact unaware that they are supposed to place commas and periods within the quotation marks. (This rule of placing all punctuation inside quotation if but only if it belongs to the quotation is expressly prescribed by some American professional organisations such as the American Chemical Society. See ''ACS Style Guide'') According to the Jargon File, American Hacker have switched to using "logical" British quotation system, because including extraneous punctuation in a quotation can sometimes change the fundamental meaning of the quotation. More generally, it is difficult for computer manuals, online instructions, and other textual media to accurately quote exactly what a computer user should see or type on their computer.
* Letter-writing: American students in some areas have been taught to write a colon after the greeting in business letters ("Dear Sir:") while Britons usually write a comma ("Dear Sir,") or make use of the so-called ''open punctuation'' ("Dear Sir"). However, this practice is not consistent throughout the United States, and it would be regarded as a highly formal usage by most Americans.
==Titles and headlines==
In American English and Commonwealth English, the words in titles of publications, newspaper headlines, as well as chapter and section headings are often Capitalisationd in the same manner as in normal sentences (sentence case). That is, only the first word is capitalised, along with proper nouns, acronyms, etc.
However, both Commonwealth and U.S. publishers sometimes require additional words in titles and headlines to be Capitalisationd, for added emphasis (typography), as it is often perceived as appearing more professional. The exact rules differ between publishers and are often ambiguous; a typical approach is to capitalise all words other than short articles, prepositions, and conjunctions. This should probably be regarded as a common stylistic difference, rather than a linguistic difference, as neither form would be considered incorrect or unusual in either Britain or the U.S. Many British newspapers use fully capitalised headlines for impact, as opposed to readability (examples include The Sun, The Daily Sport, News of the World).
* The decline and fall of yet another empire (Common British newspaper headline)
* The Decline and Fall of Yet Another Empire (Common U.S. newspaper headline)
==Numbers==
When saying or writing out numbers, the British will insert an "and" before the tens and units, as in "one hundred and sixty-two" and "two thousand and three", whereas Americans will typically drop the "and" as in "two thousand three"; however, "two thousand and three" is also common. Americans are more likely than the British to read numbers like 1,234 as "twelve thirty-four", instead of "one thousand, two hundred and thirty-four" unless discussing the year 1234, when "twelve thirty-four" would be the norm. Similarly, for the house number (or bus number, etc) "272" Britons would tend to say "two seven two" while Americans would tend to say "two seventy-two". Between 1100 and 1900 the British commonly read numbers ending in round hundreds as, for instance, "sixteen hundred" instead of "one thousand six hundred", but from 2000 upwards usage like "thirty-two hundred" would be replaced by "three thousand two hundred".
There is also a historical difference between billions, trillions, and so forth. Americans use "billion" to mean one thousand million (1,000,000,000), whereas in Britain, until the beginning of the 21st century, it was almost exclusively used to mean one million million (1,000,000,000,000), with one thousand million sometimes described as a "milliard", the definition adopted by most other European languages. However, the "American English" version has since been adopted for all published writing, and the word "milliard" is obsolete in English, as are billiard, trilliard and so on.
Nevertheless, the majority of people have no direct experience with manipulating numbers this large, so a significant proportion of international readers will interpret "billion" as 1012, even if they are young enough to have been taught otherwise at school. For this reason, defining the word may be advisable when writing for the general public. However, all major British publications and broadcasters, including the BBC, which long used "thousand million" to avoid ambiguity, now use "billion" to mean thousand million.
See long scale for a more detailed discussion of the evolution of these terms in English and other languages.
Finally, when referring to the numeral 0 (number), Britons would use "zero", "nought", or "oh" normally, or "nil" in instances such as sports scores and voting results. Americans use the term "zero" most frequently; "oh" is also often used, and occasionally slang terms such as "zilch" or "zip". Phrases such as "the team won two-zip" or "the team leads the series, two-nothing" are heard when reporting sports scores. The digit 0, for example, when reading a phone or account number aloud, is nearly always pronounced "oh" in both languages for the sake of convenience.
When reading numbers in a sequence, such as a telephone or serial number, Britons will use the terms ''double'' or ''triple/treble''. Hence 007 is "double oh seven". Exceptions are the emergency telephone number 9-9-9, which is always "nine nine nine" and the apocalyptic "Number of the Beast (numerology)" which is always "six six six". Compare this to American English's "Nine ninety-nine" and "six sixty-six." Some Americans will say "six six six" for the number of the beast, and the emergency phone number in the USA is "nine one one", while "nine eleven" means September 11, 2001 attacks.
''See also'': How to name numbers in English
==Vocabulary==
Most of the differences are in connection with concepts originating from the nineteenth century to the mid twentieth century, where new words were coined independently; almost the entire vocabularies of the automobile and railway industries (see Rail terminology) are different between Britain and America, for example. Other sources of difference are slang or vulgar terms, where frequent new coinage occurs, and idiomatic phrases, including phrasal verbs. The differences most likely to create confusion are those where the same word or phrase is used for two different concepts. Regional variations even within the U.S. or the UK can create the same problems.
It should also be noted that most American words can be freely interchanged with their British versions within the United Kingdom and English-speaking Commonwealth nations without leading to confusion, though they may cause irritation. It tends to be only when the situation is reversed that real problems of understanding occur. However, there are some exceptions, such as ''gas'' (as in ''gasoline''), and ''stroller'' (in the sense of ''pushchair'') which would be misunderstood by speakers of English, as well as common trademark names unknown in the other country, such as ''Dumpster'' (U.S.) or ''Sellotape'' (UK). There are, however, many pitfalls that Americans can fall into without realising it. Be sure you know what you are talking about when talking about a woman's ''fanny'' in Britain, since the word indicates the buttocks in the U.S. versus the vagina in the UK. Speakers of Commonwealth English should be cautious when asking for a ''fag'' (cigarette) in America, as the term refers to a homosexual in the U.S., although nowadays these alternate meanings are understood in the UK as their U.S. version, dependant on context. Residents of North and South Carolina beaches should be wary of inviting their British guests to "go out shagging," (a type of dance), for the term in British English refers to sexual intercourse. Similarly, avoid telling Australians that what team you ''root'' for, as the Australian meaning is obscene.
Another source of confusion is the different usage of the word ''college''. In the U.S., this refers to a post high school institution such as a university, whilst in the UK and most Commonwealth countries it refers primarily to a tertiary institution between high school and university (normally referred to as a "Sixth Form College" after the old name in secondary education for Years 12 and 13, the "6th form") where intermediary courses such as A Levels or NVQs can be taken and GCSE courses can be retaken, with the interchangability of college with high school being rare but not unknown. Americans may be surprised to hear of a 14 year old attending college in the UK, mistakenly assuming it is at the university level. In both the U.S. and UK, ''college'' can refer to some division within a university such as a "college of mathematics and science." Institutions in the U.S. that offer two to four years of post high school education often have the word ''college'' as part of their name, while those offering more advanced degrees (for example, masters, doctorate) are called a ''university''. However, Americans attending either a college or university are often collectively called ''"college students,"'' and the institutions themselves ''"colleges,"'' regardless of their status. The words ''freshman, sophomore, junior'', and ''senior'' refer to the first, second, third, and fourth year respectively of both high school and college (university) students in the U.S. It is critically important that the context of either high school or college first be established, or else it must be stated directly (that is, "She is a high school freshman." "He is a college junior.") In the UK, 1st year university students are called ''freshers'', but there are no specific names for those in other years, or for school pupils.
In the UK, the U.S. equivalent of a ''high school,'' is often referred to as a ''secondary school'' regardless of whether it is public or private.
===Words used only in British English===
Speakers of American English are generally aware of some British English terms, such as ''lorry'', ''biscuit'', ''chap'', and ''shag'' although they would not generally use them, or may be confused as to whether one means the American or British meaning of some (such as ''biscuit''). They will be able to guess approximately what is meant by some others, such as ''candy floss'' or ''driving licence''. However, use of as many other British words, such as ''semi'' (semi-detached house), ''naff'' (not good), or ''busk'' (to play a musical instrument in public with the hope of getting donations from passers-by), risks rendering a sentence incomprehensible to most Americans.
See List of British English words not used in American English.
===Words used only in American English===
Speakers of British English are generally aware of some American English terms, such as ''sidewalk'', ''gas'', ''cookie'', ''elevator'' although they would not generally use them. They will be able to guess approximately what is meant by some others, such as ''cotton candy''. However, use of some other American words risks rendering a sentence incomprehensible to most Britons.
Note that, largely through the influence of Hollywood, the chance of a given Americanism being understood by a British person is significantly greater than in the reverse case.
See List of American English words not used in British English.
===Words with differing meanings===
See List of words having different meanings in British and American English.
==Pronunciation==
===Consonants===
Britons and Americans pronounce some instances of t and d differently. In most British accents, the two sounds are distinct and pronounced as and respectively. In American English, when either a /t/ or a /d/ phoneme occurs between a sonorant phoneme and an unstress (linguistics)ed vowel phoneme, it is realized as an alveolar flap allophone (the IPA symbol is called ''fishhook r''), similar to the r in Spanish ''pero''. Consequently, to a speaker of both dialect groups, an American's pronunciation of ''atom'' and ''Adam'' are homophonous in casual speech. Many Americans, however, slightly aspirate this sound when it derives from a 't' and follows a short ''i'' () or long ''a'' () sound, thus ''bitter'' and ''rated'' are distinguishable from ''bidder'' and ''raided''. See linguistics and allophones for more information on this category of phenomenon.
Though most British accents pronounce the t in words as a distinctive t, it is common, particularly in Estuary English, to replace the t with a glottal stop.
Most American dialects have not lost the non-prevocalic r. That is, "standard" American English preserves the sound of "r" in all occurrences, whereas many British accents preserve it only when followed by a vowel (see rhotic). However, this holds true neither for all American dialects nor for all British dialects; the dialects of New England and the American South both exhibit a similar sound change found in southern England. In England, however, when a former syllable final appeared before a consonant not at a word boundary, a schwa was substituted for it, giving British English a new class of falling diphthongs. The non-rhotic North American dialects do not show this. This phenomenon also partially accounts for the interlocution of 'r' between a word ending in a vowel and one beginning with a vowel (such as "the idear of it") exhibited both in some dialects of Britain and in the Boston, Massachusetts Boston accent phonology of American English. Most other American dialects interpose a glottal stop where "r" appears in the Boston example, and appears to perform the same function of separating adjacent (non-diphthongized) vowels.
===Vowels===
American English generally has a simplified vowel system as compared to the British dialects. In particular, many Americans have lost the distinction between the vowels of ''awl'' and ''all'', as well as ''caught'' and ''cot'', the so-called cot-caught merger tending to pronounce all of these with something between a long form of the sound in ''cot'' and the "a" of ''father'' (those two sounds being distinct in British English).
The long "a" of ''father'', the famous British broad A, is used in many British RP words, especially common ones, in two phonetic situations. Firstly, before three of the four voiceless fricatives, as in ''path, laugh, pass, past'', though not before ''sh''. Secondly, before some instances of ''n'' and another consonant, as in ''aunt, plant, dance''. In most northern dialects, not to mention Scottish and Irish, though, the short "a" is the norm (Australian usually follows RP in the first case, though ''dance'' and ''graph'', among others, often have the short vowel, ''aunt'' and ''can't'' invariably have the broad one, and ''castle'' has both depending on where a speaker comes from). An "a" at the beginning of a word (such as "ant") is usually short throughout the country, just as in the American. However, South Australians generally use the broad A in those words just like RP.
British Received Pronunciation has generally lost the long as in ''boat'', replacing it with a diphthong that is close to . Some British speakers still have , but it appears only as a result of a lost , in words like ''force''. More northerly and westerly British speech preserves . The British diphthong is enunciated as or sometimes as in general American.
In American English, words of two or more syllables, where the first syllable ends with a single consonant, usually use the long vowel sound:
* Patriot, the a rhymes with the a in gate
* Zenith, the e rhymes with the ee in seen
* Vitamin, the i rhymes with the i in bite
In British English the short vowel sound is usually employed:
* Patriot, the a rhymes with the a in sat
* Zenith, the e rhymes with the e in bet
* Vitamin, the i rhymes with the i in sit
In British English, the prefix "anti-" is pronounced "antee", while in American it is "antigh"; however the British pronunciation is also considered acceptable in many situations and often used.
In both British and American English a double consonant ending the first syllable usually means the short vowel sound is used.
* Bitter, the first i rhymes with the i in sit
==== [u] vs [ju] etc. ====
Commonwealth speakers insert before (a ''glide'') after more consonants than do American speakers. Both distinguish ''coot'' from ''cute'', but most Americans do not distinguish ''do'' from ''due'' or ''dew''. The major exception among American English is in the Southern dialect, which closely follows the Commonwealth usage. The relevant consonants are .
* Many Commonwealth speakers no longer insert after or , or after initial or . This is called yod dropping. For them as for Americans 'lute' usually sounds like 'loot' (), and 'sue' like 'Sioux' (); but for all Commonwealth speakers 'assume' is , not as in America.
* and tend to mutate to and except in careful speech. This is called yod coalescence. Thus Commonwealth 'tune' becomes rather than . Both contrast with American .
* The British–American distinction only applies to lexical stress syllables. Americans and Commonwealth speakers alike say for ''continue''. Combining this with yod coalescence, many Commonwealth speakers will pronounce ''residual'' as and ''statue'' as , the same way as Americans. The is preserved even if lack of stress alters the Vowel#Vowel qualities of the vowel so it is not , for example, ''penury'' .
* In Commonwealth English, the glide never applies where is spelt 'oo' or 'ou'. Hence 'noon' and 'douche', like 'coot' and 'mousse', sound the same in Britain as in America.
* Reversing the general pattern, American English, but not Commonwealth English, has [j] in 'figure', and (for some speakers) 'Houston, Texas' and 'coupon'.
===Stress===
For some words, British speakers stress a different syllable from American speakers. This is true in particular for many loanwords from French, where Americans retain final-syllable stress while Britons have an anglicized first-syllable stress. Such words include ''adult''A1,B2, ''ballet'', ''beret'', ''bidet'', ''blasé'', ''brevet'', ''brochure''B2, ''café''A1, ''chalet''A1, ''chiffon'', ''cliché'', ''detail''A1, ''flambé'', ''frappé'', ''garage'', ''gateau'', ''gourmet'', ''lamé'', ''montage'', ''pastel'', ''paté'', ''sachet'', ''salon'', ''soupcon'' ; also some French names, including ''Calais'', ''Degas'', ''Édouard Manet'', ''Monet'', ''Renault'', ''René''B2. By extension, trisyllabic words may have second-syllable stress in British as opposed to first- and third-syllable stress in American usage, as in ''exposé'' and ''Renaissance''.
Conversely, ''address'' (in the sense of designating a location; the oration has final-syllable stress everywhere), ''m(o)ustache'' and ''cigarette'' always have final-syllable stress in Britain, but have first-syllable stress for some Americans. Likewise ''limousine'' and ''magazine'' always have first-syllable stress in America, but either first- or last-syllable stress is possible in Britain.
:A1 indicates some Americans have first-syllable stress.
:B2 indicates some Britons have final-syllable stress
===Affixes===
====-ile====
Words ending in ''-ile'' (''fertile'', ''docile'', ''missile'') are pronounced rhyming with ''freestyle'' in Commonwealth English (), and in American with a short, reduced schwa (rhyming with ''turtle'' (), and with ''fossil'' and ''whistle'' respectively), although exceptions can be found, such as ''crocodile'', ''profile'', ''reptile'', ''textile'', ''senile'', and ''reconcile''. In some cases, both forms are common in American English, such as ''juvenile'', ''hostile'', ''projectile'', and ''versatile''.
====-ine====
Some multisyllabic words such as ''iodine'' and ''melamine'' are pronounced with the last syllable sounding the same as ''dean'' or ''mean'' in Commonwealth English (), and like ''dine'' or ''mine'' in American ().
====-ary====
Where the syllable preceding ''-ary'' is unstressed, Americans pronounce the suffix as two syllables, with secondary stress on the first of these. British speakers elision the ''a'' to give a single unstressed syllable. So ''military'' is American and British .
Words ending in ''-rary'' form an exception in British English, where in careful speech some may feel obliged to distinguish the two r's. Thus ''arbitrary'' would be pronounced rather than ; Americans would further expand the schwa to a fully-fledged .
Adjectives ending ''-ary'' form adverbs ending ''-arily''. Formerly the British-American distinction carried over to these, but nowadays most British speakers adopt the American practice of shifting the stress to the antepenultimate syllable: ''militarily'' is thus rather than .
===Miscellaneous pronunciation differences===
This table lists words pronounced differently but spelled the same. See also the table of American_and_British_English_spelling_differences#Spelling_and_pronunciation.
The square brackets normally used to enclose phonetic (not phonemic) transcriptions have been omitted from the following table to improve legibility.
{| cellpadding="3" cellspacing="3" border="1" rules="rows"
!Spelling || UK IPA || U.S. IPA || Notes
|-- valign="top"
|''beta''
||
||
|| Other Greek letters, such as ''eta'', ''theta'' and ''zeta'', are pronounced correspondingly. The Commonwealth pronunciation is more naturalised than the American, which is more in keeping with the ancient Greek.
|-- valign="top"
|''buoy''
||
||
|| The U.S. pronunciation would be unrecognised in the UK. The British pronunciation occurs in America, more commonly for the verb than the noun, and is usual in cognates ''buoyant'', ''buoyancy''.
|-- valign="top"
|''chartreuse''
||
||
|| Similarly ''masseuse'' and ''Betelgeuse''; the British pronunciation retains the original pronunciation of these imported French words.
|-- valign="top"
|''clerk''
||
||
|| The derived ''clerical'' is pronounced everywhere.
|-- valign="top"
|''deity''
||
||
||
|-- valign="top"
|''diverge''
||
||
|| In American English, vowels like /ɝ/ are lenghtened before voiced consonants like the /dʒ/ affricate.
|-- valign="top"
|''envelope''
|| (1)
(2) || || Many Americans use the Commonwealth pronunciation of this word. |-- valign="top" |''entrepreneur'' || || (1)
(2) || Similarly ''chauffeur,'' ''connoisseur,'' and ''liqueur'' |-- valign="top" |''garage'' || (1)
(2) || || The U.S. pronunciation is more in keeping with the original French one. The two Commonwealth pronunciations may represent distinct meanings for some speakers; for example, "a subterranean garage for a car" (1) vs "a petrol garage" (2). |-- valign="top" |''herb'' || || || The American pronunciation of the name "Herb" includes the initial phone, which not all Americans drop in the first place. Those who do not say in ''herb'' will not in ''herbal'' either, but most will in ''herbaceous'', ''herbicide'', ''herbivore''. |-- valign="top" |''lieutenant'' || (1)
(2) || || The 2nd British pronunciation is restricted to the Royal Navy. |-- valign="top" | ''of'' || || || |-- valign="top" |''often'' || (1)
(2) || (1)
(2) || |-- valign="top" | ''privacy'' || || || The American pronunciation is also often used by Commonwealth speakers. The Commonwealth pronunciation is the naturalised one, a consequence of the so-called trisyllabic laxing. |-- valign="top" | ''route'' || || || The Commonwealth pronunciation is very common in the United States, especially in the North and South, but not the West. |-- valign="top" | ''schedule'' || || || The American pronunciation is frequently encountered in the U.K. |-- valign="top" | ''scone'' || || || |-- valign="top" | ''shone'' || || || Past tense of ''shine'' |-- valign="top" | ''suggest'' || || || The Commonwealth pronunciation is a common variant in America. |-- valign="top" | ''thorough'' || || (1)
(2) || The difference between UK and U.S. pronunciations of ''borough'' is analogous. |-- valign="top" | ''want'' || || (1)
(2)
(3) || |-- valign="top" | ''was'' || || (1)
(2) || |-- valign="top" | ''what'' || || || |-- valign="top" | ''z'' (the letter) || || || The spelling of this letter as a word corresponds to the pronunciation: thus Commonwealth ''zed'' and American ''zee''. |} ===See also=== * International Phonetic Alphabet for English * IPA chart for English ==Miscellaneous== ===General trends=== While the use of American expressions in English is often noted in Britain, movement in the opposite direction is less common. But recent examples exist, including the idiom "to go missing," which had been a distinctively British expression but is used increasingly in American English, at least in journalism, and the noun "queue" and verb "queue up," which seem to be making inroads in the U.S. as well. (The usual American equivalent of "to go missing" is "to disappear" and that of "queue (up)" is "line (up).") ===Figures of speech=== Both English and American English use the expression "I couldn't care less" to mean the speaker does not care at all. In American English, the phrase "I could care less" (without the "n't") is synonymous with this in casual usage. Intonation no longer reflects the originally sarcasm nature of this variant, which is not idiomatic in British English and might be interpreted as anything from nonsense to an indication that the speaker ''does'' care. In both areas, saying "I don't mind" often means "I'm not annoyed" (for example, by someone's smoking), while "I don't care" often means "the matter is trivial or boring". However, in answering a question like "Tea or coffee?", if either alternative is equally acceptable, an American may answer "I don't care", while a Briton may answer "I don't mind". Either sounds odd to the other. ===Business=== In his history of the Second World War, Winston Churchill records that differences in the interpretation of the verb "to table" caused an argument between British and American planners. The British wanted a matter ''tabled'' immediately because it was important, and the Americans insisted it should not be tabled at all because it was important. In British English, the term means "to discuss now" (the issue is ''brought to'' the table), whereas in American English it means "to defer" (the issue is ''left on'' the table). In a similar vein, the verb "to slate" means "to schedule" in the U.S. but (informally) "to disparage" in the UK. Thus a headline such as "Third Harry Potter Film Slated" has two very different interpretations. One usage of the word "bomb" causes similar confusion: in the U.S. "the show bombed" means it was a total failure; in the UK "the show went down a bomb" means it was a great success. The American slang phrase "the bomb," however (perhaps inspired by African American Vernacular English), almost always indicates positivity. For example, the phrase, "That show was the bomb," would mean that the show was outstanding. ===Education=== In the UK, a student is said to "read" or to "study" a subject, while in the U.S., a student either "studies" the subject or "majors" in it. The latter refers only to the student's principal course of study, while the former may be refer to any class being taken. :"She read history at Oxford". :"She majored in history at Yale." In the UK, a student "revises" or "does revision" for an examination, while in American English, the student "studies" for it. When "taking" or "writing" the examination, a student in the UK would have that examination supervised by a "invigilator" whereas in American English it would be a "proctor". In the UK, a student is said to "sit" or "take" an exam, while in the U.S., a student "takes" an exam. In the UK, a teacher "sets" an exam, while in the U.S., a teacher "writes" or "gives" an exam. The expression "he sits for" an exam also arises in British English, but only rarely in American English; American lawyers-to-be "sit for" their bar exams, but in nearly all other instances, Americans "take" their exams. :"I took my exams at Yale." :"I spent the entire day yesterday writing the exam. At last, it's ready for my students." :"I plan to set a difficult exam for my students, but I haven't got it ready yet." ===Numbers=== In the UK, "a couple of" tends to refer to exactly two of something, even though the term is informal. In American English, it often means a few (maybe rather more than two) and the "of" is frequently omitted. There are also variations in floor numbering between the two linguistic systems — the standard international usage maintains that the "first floor" is one above the entrance level while the entrance level is the "ground floor"; whereas normal American usage labels the entrance level as the "first floor" and does not use "ground floor." Some American buildings have a "ground floor," usually as part of a plan to cater to cosmopolitan persons. === Dates === Date formats are usually written differently in the short (numerical) form. Christmas Day 2000, for example, is 25/12/00 in Britain and 12/25/00 in the U.S., although occasionally other formats are encountered, such as the ISO 2000-12-25, popular among programmers. When writing long-form dates, the format "December 25, 2000" is generally encountered in the U.S., and widely encountered in the U.K.; however, the British are more likely than Americans to use the format "25th December 2000" although it is acceptable in both countries, and the American grammarians Strunk and White, among others, recommend it. Similarly, in American speech, "December twenty-fifth" is the most likely form, and "the twenty-fifth of December" is also not uncommon. In Britain the latter is more likely, and even when the month is presented first the definite article is still inserted in speech, thus "December ''the'' twenty-fifth". ===Transport=== Americans refer to ''transportation,'' while Britons refer to ''transport.'' Differences in terminology are especially obvious in the context of roads. The British term ''dual carriageway'', in American parlance, would be a ''divided highway''. ''central reservation'' on a ''motorway'' in the U.K. would be a ''median'' on a ''freeway'' or ''expressway'' in the U.S. The one-way lanes that make it possible to enter and leave such roads at an intermediate point without disrupting the flow of traffic are generally known as ''slip roads'' in the U.K., but U.S. civil engineers call them ''ramps,'' and further distinguish between ''on-ramps'' (for entering) or ''off-ramps'' (for leaving). When American engineers speak of ''slip roads,'' or ''slip ramps,'' they are referring to an on-ramp and off-ramp that have been rearranged (through use of a grade separation) to minimize weaving on a freeway segment between two interchanges that are too close together. In the U.K., the term ''outside lane'' refers to the higher-speed passing lane closest to the centre of the road, while ''inside lane'' refers to the lane closer to the edge of the road; these terms have the opposite meanings in American English, with the ''outside lane'' being the one near the edge and the ''inside lane'' being the one closer to the median — it is worth noting that Americans also drive on the opposite side to Britons, so that the British inside lane is, like the American one, the leftmost one (going in any given direction). ==See also== * American English * Australian English * British English * Canadian English * Caribbean English * Commonwealth English * Hiberno-English * Hong Kong English * Indian English * Jamaican English * Liberian English * Malaysian English * New Zealand English * Philippine English * Singapore English * South African English *Regional accents of English speakers *Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style ==External links== * [http://www.digitas.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/wiki/ken/BritishVsAmerican Proper Treatment: British vs. American] (Harvard University) * [http://www.peak.org/~jeremy/dictionary/ The American·British British·American Dictionary] * [http://english2american.com/ The English-to-American Dictionary] * [http://www.hps.com/~tpg/ukdict/ United Kingdom English for the American Novice] * [http://www.tysto.com/articles05/q1/20050324uk-us.shtml Comprehensive list of American and British spelling differences] * [http://www.zmaxmiez-jpn.net/Links_page.html British English vis American English with Portuguese/Japanese translation] * [http://www.economist.com/research/styleGuide/index.cfm?page=673931 Americanisms] (from The Economist's style guide) * [http://home.comcast.net/~helenajole/Harry.html Differences between British and American editions of a published novel] (example is Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone) * [http://canadianenglish1.narod.ru American Canadian British English lexical differences in one table] American and British English differences Phonology
Talk:American and British English Differences (Archive 1) ---- == Adverbs-: missing 'ly' in American English == Since when have many adverbs lost the ending 'ly' in the US? It has become impossible to distinguish between the adverb and adjective in many cases. E.G: "He'll be here real soon now" (International: really soon now) Sounds very strange to this writer because I think 'real' is an adjective but the US example above treats it as an adverb (modifying the verb 'be') - Clive Formally speaking, 'real' is an adjective in American English and 'really' is the adverb. However, it is common in informal American speech to drop the -ly where there is no ambiguity, so whether or not that counts as a difference is a matter of interpretation. As an American, if I saw 'real' used as an adverb on wikipedia, I would correct it. - Rob "Many" adverbs have not lost the -ly suffix. Only a few have. However, as is often the case in irregularities in English dialects, they happen to be more common adverbs User:Dogface 22:09, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC) :I'm an American, and my dictionary (Webster's New World Dictionary of American English) says "real" is a colloquial expression for "very". "Really" would be more proper (I don't even recall myself ever using "real" in this sense). --User:Evice 16:47, Dec 30, 2004 (UTC) :No adverbs that have "-ly" endings have lost them in American English. It's that people sometimes incorrectly use adjectival forms instead of adverbial forms. The adverbs themselves haven't changed. User:Moncrief 20:22, May 21, 2005 (UTC) == Tap vs. faucet in Canadian English == Am I right in thinking that Canadians, perhaps in an attempt to preserve some differences from their southern neighbours, also use ''tap'' rather than ''faucet''? User:Jimfbleak :''Tap'' is much more common in Canada; I believe there's even research on it. I've heard ''tap'' all my long life, though, so in that period it wasn't introduced as a deliberate alternative to ''faucet''. User:Jfitzg == Using 'and' in a number == [continued from Tap vs Faucet] I've just thought of one difference. In Europe, we say 'two thousand and three' for 2003 (I to be alkward say 20-0-3!) whereas americans say 'two thousand three' not using the 'and'. Is this widespread or just a phenomenon associated with news anchors? User:Jtdirl 07:52 Feb 19, 2003 (UTC) : That's pretty widespread. Here in Canada I even had someone try to "correct" me when I wrote "one hundred and twenty dollars" on a cheque, with the claim that meant $100.20, which I thought was ridiculous. User:Bagpuss : Yeah, I remember being taught in school (in California) not to put an "and" after thousands and hundreds, and I think that's still considered standard usage. --User:Atemperman 17:20, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC) :: I was taught the same thing in 8th grade in Ohio — only use "and" for separating fractional units from whole units — but in common speech I often hear it both ways. I've updated the article to mention this. I am wondering if there is some historical legal reason for it, because it's the way we're supposed(?) to spell out the dollars and cents when writing a check (cheque). I am wondering if at one time, the spelling was enforced by law, or if it has just been a matter of convention that became entrenched somehow. - User:Mjb 16:07, 31 Mar 2005 (UTC) So - What do Americans call "2001: A Space Odyssey"? I've never heard anyone call it anthing other than "Two thousand and one: A Space Odyssey". I've never heard it called "Twenty oh one: a Space Odyssey". What about One Hundred and One Dalmatians? User:Jooler 10:09, 1 Apr 2005 (UTC) : I call it "two thousand one," just like I call this year "two thousand five." Never heard anything but "a hundred and one" for the Dalmations, though. Like User:Mjb I was taught at a young age that "and" was only for introducing the fractional part. This was in Pennsylvania. In practice, though, using "and" after the hundreds or thousands is fairly common in the US. -- User:Coneslayer 15:47, 2005 Apr 1 (UTC) : "Two thousand one" here. I'd be surprised if I heard someone say "two thousand and one"! I wouldn't consider it necessary to 'correct' them on it, though. Strangely, I hear "one hundred one" and "one hundred and one" about equally often. - User:Mjb 19:49, 1 Apr 2005 (UTC) == News-: -anchors, -casters and -readers == (There's another one: US - news anchors. UK + Irl: newscasters or newsreaders) User:Jtdirl 07:52 Feb 19, 2003 (UTC) :(''newscasters'' is not unheard of, though rare, ''newsreaders'' is unknown to me) I think most Americans would just two-thousand-three -- I would, anyway. User:TUF-KAT Newsreaders is an old term from the time when ''actors'' rather than journalists 'read' the news, becoming professional news''readers''. (Kenneth Kendall in the UK and Charles Mitchell in Ireland spring to mind.) By the 1980s, most stations used professional journalists, who to show their journalistic cred insisted on being called news''casters'' to show they weren't mere actors reading someone else's script. Call a newscaster a newsreader is a bit like calling Rev. Jerry Falwell a catholic: you better duck before you get a punch!!! (But the term still is used, to the fury of journalists. User:Jtdirl 08:03 Feb 19, 2003 (UTC) :I don't believe the above is correct. I've lived in Nottinghamshire and Hertfordshire and in both places they are called newsreaders, the term is respectful and in no way undermines their credentials as journalists. ::It's not intentionally disrespectful, but it is wrong in the same way that the word "Air Hostess" has no intended insult, but women in such work tend to dislike it as sexist, preferring Air Stewardess (compare Air Steward) or the non gender specific (and for some more important sounding) title of Flight Attendant. User:Dainamo 21:27 Oct 27, 2004 (UTC) == Of 'flammable' and 'inflammable' == Could someone say how an American would interpret "Highly Inflammable"? - in the UK, contrary to appearances it normally appears in warning signs, meaning "very likely to catch fire". User:Arwel Parry 22:02 Feb 19, 2003 (UTC) : "Wait, ''inflammable'' means the same as ''flammable''? What a crazy language!" - Dr. Nick Riviera : Taking, as I do, the Simpsons as my guide to America, they have the same thing there. User:Bagpuss The word inflammable is not used in American English. I suspect that many Americans would be highly confused by it. They might guess that it means "fireproof", the opposite of ''flammable'', which is what warning signs in the US say. However, if an American saw ''inflammable'' on a warning sign, they could possibly figure the correct meaning out from context. (''fireproof'' would be an advertising claim, not a warning) According to my dictionary, ''flammable'' and ''inflammable'' mean the same thing. ''Flammable'' is always used on warning signs in the US. The use of ''inflammable'', though technically correct, is considered too confusing. The terms ''combustible'', ''flammable'', ''highly flammable'', ''explosive'' etc., used on warning signs in the US, have precise meanings which depend on characteristics, such as flash point, of the material involved. User:Bluelion 23:38 Feb 19, 2003 (UTC) ::I've seen ''inflammable'' used in writing, but warning signs here in the NE US all seem to say ''flammable''. Perhaps because the ones saying ''inflammable'' all have burned down? User:Mkweise
::IIRC, "inflammable" was still common in USA English into the 1960s, but "flammable" became more common and started replacing it in the 1970s. -- User:Infrogmation
:::Inflammatory is still widely used in the U.S., so I suspect that many would find inflammable easy to parse by analogy.
:::Damn, you must be ''even older'' than I am! User:Mkweise
::The words 'flammable' and 'flammability' are in effect deliberate coinages. There are very few older citations in the OED. For 'flammable' it has quotes from 1813 and 1867, then the next one is 1959: it's from the BSI (British Standards Institute), suggesting the adoption of the word 'flammable' for safety reasons, in place of 'inflammable'. Likewise, 'flammability' has two sporadic quotations in the seventeenth century, but next appears in 1942, and in 1963 the BSI again call for the word 'flammability' to be adopted in place of its dangerous synonym 'inflammability'. User:Gritchka 13:26 27 May 2003 (UTC)
:Many ''fireproof'' signs have burned down as well. User:Bluelion 23:47 Feb 19, 2003 (UTC)
The reason "flammable" and "inflammable" have the same meaning is that children and illiterates get confused by the "in-" and think that "inflammable" means "not combustible" when it means "combustible". -- User:65.57.137.165 04:22 Feb 20, 2003 (UTC)
Technically speaking, inflammable and flammable are synonymous in American English. However, 'flammable' seems to be increasingly common on warning signs, probably to avoid confusion. When writing something formal, I would always use 'inflammable,' just because 'flammable' sounds silly to me. - Rob (American)
They dealt with the question in France this way: they invented a new word -- ininflammable, for "is not", and no prefix for "is". User:Ebear422 03:43, 2004 Dec 13 (UTC)
== Tea as a meal ==
The fact that ''tea'' refers to a meal (as well as a beverage) in British English should be added, but I'm not sure where exactly. User:Mkweise
Errr... I don't think there's a North/South divide on tea being an evening meal, it's more of a class thing. User:Mintguy
:Well, when I was a kid on our north Wales farm in the 60s, we had breakfast, dinner (about noon), tea (about 3p.m., or after we got back from school), and supper (about 6p.m.). Oh, and a snack before bedtime. And people were surprised when we put on weight... User:Arwel Parry 02:14 Feb 20, 2003 (UTC)
Mintguy is correct. It is a matter of class. In Ireland too, we called the midday meal dinner, and the evening meal tea, largely because the meal was based around tea. However upper middle class and upper people tend to have a light 'lunch' in the middle of the day, and a large dinner for the evening meal.
: Oh. Well pretty much everyone I've met from the south has lunch and dinner. I'll agree that in the north the posh types will probably use the same, but I'm not sure about the lower classes in the south. User:Bagpuss
Of course, at school, whether you are in the North or South, you still
get school dinners, served by dinner ladies (paid for with dinner money)
during the lunch break. It's a confusing world. (I am, of course, referring
to the midday meal).
: And of course in US usage kids get their school lunches served by lunch ladies (in New England at least), and the more-widely-used ''dinner'' is usually synonymous with ''supper''. User:Poccil_(User_Talk:Poccil)">User:Poccil|User:Poccil (User Talk:Poccil) 04:44, Jul 18, 2004 (UTC)
: In England they call them ''dinner ladies'' in school. Personally I call the two main meals lunch and tea. I think it's pretty rare for ''tea'' to be used to mean mid-afternoon, except for the very upper class. For the evening meal, I think tea and dinner are used interchangably, althought the latter would only be used to refer to a meal later in the evening (say, when eating out at 7-8pm). I'm from the North of England (Yorkshire) user:ecp98rjs
:: I call the main meal of the day 'Breakfast', which I eat about 11pm just before I go to bed. User:Nickshanks
::I would use ''tea'' to refer to a snack taken in the late afternoon or early evening (i.e. after getting home from work but before the main meal, which I call ''dinner'') and I don't think that's rare at all. I think the differences in terminology are down to where you originally had your main meal and I would agree that it's a class thing, not a north/south thing (I've heard the midday meal referred to as both ''lunch'' and ''dinner'' by different people in all areas of England). Dinner was always the main meal. In the past, working class men tended to work near (or even at) home and came home for their main meal at midday, and so that was their ''dinner''. Middle class men tended to work in offices some distance from their homes (often working in the city centre, and living in the suburbs) and so couldn't go home for a meal at midday. They therefore had a light meal at midday and had their main meal with their family in the evening after they got home from work, hence ''dinner'' in the evening. Because the majority of children (obviously) at state schools were working class, we still tend to use ''dinner'' for school meals. For middle and upper class people, ''tea'' was a light snack served in the mid-afternoon at which ladies (who didn't, of course, go out to work) could entertain their friends. For working class people, however, ''tea'' was the light meal they had in the evening to tide them over until the next day. ''Supper'', for all classes, was the light snack you had before going to bed. However, because work patterns changed and many working class people started eating their main meal in the evening too, ''dinner'', ''tea'' and ''supper'' started to become interchangeable for them. Because many working class families have since become middle class, the terms have become less of a current class thing (if class still exists at all) and more of a system of terminology inherited from grandparents etc, varying from family to family. When I was a kid (Southern England, middle class family, but with working class forebears) we called the midday meal ''dinner'' and the evening meal ''tea'', but when I was in my early teens I acquired a new stepfather (from a family that had been solidly middle class for generations) who used ''lunch'' and ''dinner'', and that's what I've used ever since. -- User:Necrothesp 00:18, 29 Aug 2004 (UTC)
::In Australia it is common to talk of ''morning tea'' (10 or 11am) and ''afternoon tea'' (3pm), and also of ''tea'' as the evening meal. The first two may well be just a cup of tea or coffee and a biscuit. I think this is common across classes, although it may be fading away. User:Mbp 06:16, 16 Sep 2004 (UTC)
:For me the distinction between calling the evening meal tea or dinner is fairly simple. If it is my main meal of that day it is dinner. If however, I had my main meal at lunh-time then it would be tea. - Monjo
== Veterinarians and veterans ==
If a Briton said - "My brother is a vet". Everyone would understand that his brother is a veterinarian. If an American said the same thing, would people automatically assume that he is a war veteran, or might there be some confusion as to whether he is a veterinarian or a war veteran? User:Mintguy
:"Vet" ''does'' have both meanings in the U.S. and, in abscence of solid context, it can sometimes cause confusion, but usually the intended meaning can be easily determined by context. User:Nknight 12:53 Mar 14, 2003 (UTC)
:Support of Nknight. In the US, the meaning of "vet" is purely contextual. Now, that being said, I happen to know a vet who is a vet, and he was a vet before he became a vet.
:I can imagine it would be quite hard to qualify on the front line, so one would naturally preced the other User:Nickshanks
== Admonishment vs. admonition ==
Q: I am British, and for the noun-form of ''admonish'' I say admonishment.
: ''Fred received an admonishment from his teacher for untidy work''.
My American wife says admonition.
: ''Fred received an admonition from his teacher for untidy work''.
Is this a UK/US difference, are they just alternative words, or is one of us plain wrong! -- User:Chris Q 09:24 Mar 3, 2003 (UTC)
: For what it's worth, I'd say the first, but I wouldn't think the second was wrong. User:Bagpuss
: I've always heard and used 'admonition.' - Rob (American)
: "Admonition" is more common among the older folks, but I've heard "admonishment" among peopl 30 and younger in Indiana. User:Dogface 22:13, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)
== "An upside down" apartment ==
On an old NOVA production on visual agnosia, one English guy describes another guy's apartment as "an upside down". What does that mean?User:Arthur3030 19:30 Mar 14, 2003 (UTC)
: Possibly meant that there were two floors and the entrance was on the top one. Not certain on this. User:Bagpuss
::An upside down dwelling (usually a house but anything with at least two floors) is where the daytime rooms (reception/living/lounge etc.) are on the upper floor and bedroom etc. are on the ground floor. Although this might be done for a variety of reasons, the most common on I have observed is where the occupant wants to enhance the views that might be seen from the lounge etc. User:Dainamo 09:02, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)
:::Likewise if ground level is the upper floor. User:Nickshanks
== Use of double-hyphens for em-dashes ==
''Discussion, including the suggestion to automatically transform them into appropriate markup, moved to meta:Automatic transformation of hyphens and dashes.''
== -re in AE? ==
I removed the following claim, on the grounds that there is no body authorized to designate official spellings, and that American dictionaries typically give the -er spellings as standard. (This is regarding words like center/centre.)
"The official American spellings end in -re, but the American people use the -er spelling almost exclusively."
User:Mark Foskey 03:38 Mar 15, 2003 (UTC)
:I like that change. Meant to do it myself on same grounds but forgot. User:Arthur3030 21:39 Mar 16, 2003 (UTC)
I removed the following from this section, I think it's more an example of a wider US phenomenon of affected use of Commonwealth forms. I haven't put it back anywhere else though... User:Joestynes 10:25, 17 Aug 2004 (UTC)
:The Commonwealth forms are recognizable by Americans and are occasionally found in American texts, but their usage may be considered an affectation. The Commonwealth spelling that has perhaps gained the most currency in American English is ''theatre''. However, ''theater'' is still more common in everyday use, and ''theatre'' is generally reserved for more formal settings or for the names of specific venues (e.g., the Kodak Theatre).
Actually, the -re form IS standard for measurements -- kilometre, etc., in the US. The American Standards Institute, or some such name, has established those spellings. Never understood why, myself, since no Americans I know ever spell them that way. User:RickKUser talk:RickK 21:23, Nov 25, 2004 (UTC)
I disagree about the -re forms being standard for measurements in the US. I quote from NIST Special Publication 811, 1995 edition, page 81, Appendix C, section 3: User:cameronc 04:14, Dec 11, 2004 (UTC)
:the spelling of English-language words—for example, ‘‘meter,’’ ‘‘liter,’’ and ‘‘deka’’ are used instead of ‘‘metre,’’ ‘‘litre,’’ and ‘‘deca’’—is in accordance with the United States Government Printing Office Style Manual [4], which follows Webster’s Third New International Dictionary rather than the Oxford Dictionary used in many English-speaking countries. This spelling also reflects recommended United States practice.
== Lounge as a (commerical) drinking location ==
Does "lounge" really mean "bar" in the States? User:Bagpuss 23:45 Mar 16, 2003 (UTC)
:I think of a specific kind of bar, a relatively quiet place with some sort of generally unobtrusive live music (i.e. a lounge singer, lounge music). User:TUF-KAT
:: Okay, it's not one I'd heard of. UK pubs sometimes have a lounge, a large room with couches (a small one would be the snug). User:Bagpuss
In the most common usage of "lounge" in the US, it does not mean a "bar". It ''could'' mean a bar, but it's much more likely that it simply means a place to relax.
Bagpuss. - You're probably too young to remember this, but most pubs used to have two or more bars, the "public bar" or "saloon bar" was for working men (in workman's clothes perhaps) and might have had lino (linoleum) or possibly even sawdust on the floor, whilst the other bar (the "lounge bar") would be for women in company and the more refined customer and would have had carpet and some soft chairs. A pub might have also had a "snug bar" which would have been a small room for a few people to enjoy their own company. User:Mintguy (Actually this should go in the the entry on pubs).
:It's still like that in Scotland for the most part. -- User:Derek Ross
I'm surprised the UK doesn't use lounge meaning bar. It is so common in Ireland a pub will often have a separate lounge, with it described as that in the signage. A lounge is usually more comfortable, with soft seating, softer music, carpeted floor, more relaxing. In many ways, a lounge is more feminised, a bar more masculinised, with harder seats, seats at the bar counter, wooden or tiled floor, with Sky sports blaring on a TV (God I hate Sky Sports!). It never dawned on me that that term didn't exist in the UK. User:Jtdirl 21:03 Apr 7, 2003 (UTC)
Don't let the Englishmen confuse you, JTD. There are still plenty of hotels and public houses with lounge bars, public bars (and even snugs) in the UK of just the type that you describe. Maybe they're dying out in some parts of England but they are still going strong in Scotland. -- User:Derek Ross 04:37 25 May 2003 (UTC)
:Don't let the ''other'' Englishmen confuse you. They're still common in English pubs as well, although not as common as they used to be. Most older pubs that haven't been bought up by chains still have both a lounge bar and a public bar. -- User:Necrothesp 00:26, 29 Aug 2004 (UTC)
The use of "lounge" is, has been stated before, very specifit. Not just any drinking establishment would be a lounge. A lounge attempts to exude an aura of sophistication and fancy-pantsity. In general, any sort of raucous association would be discouraged. As an extreme (and probably incorrect) stereotype: A tuxedo would be less out of place at a lounge than it would anywhere else in the world of American inebriative establishments.
== Flat apartments ==
What is this idea implied in one of the tables that "flat" does not mean "apartment" in the US. It most certainly does! - especially in the case a apartments that are flats. As is stated in the text, "apartment" has been gradually displacing "flat" in much of the world. My experience is that the generation before mine used the word "flat" instead of the word "apartment". How is the status of the word 'flat' any different in the US than it is in much of the world? User:Bluelion 00:25 Mar 17, 2003 (UTC)
: Well if it's wrong it's a popular misconception in the UK. User:Bagpuss
::I think most Americans are aware of the word, but think it's a Britishism. I don't think I've ever heard an American use it. User:TUF-KAT
Well, I've heard lots of Americans use the word "flat" to refer to an "apartment' although, admittedly, some were of a generation before mine. It is , perhaps, somewhat regional, but "Flat for Rent" signs are available at many hardware stores in the US. Believe me, that is a fact. I have current sign catalogs to prove it. Such signs are readily available even today in the US. I doubt sign companies would be selling signs using a word that isn't commonly understood. User:Bluelion
:As a fairly young'un on the US west coast, I've never in my life heard "flat" used to describe an apartment except as a Britishism. I have though managed to google up [http://www.verinet.com/~tasman/h_guide_to_buffalo_english.html this page] which seems to indicate that "flat" is current in upstate New York and that it's considered exceptional enough elsewhere for an expat to mention it as a regional peculiarity. --User:Brion VIBBER 02:25 Mar 17, 2003 (UTC)
I'm not so young and, in my younger days, I heard LOTS of Americans refer to apartments as "flats". In fact, they were pretty disdainful of the word "apartment" - only people "putting on airs" used that word, according to them. That's my experience, growing up in the 'show-me' state of Missouri. And I've seen more "Flat for Rent" signs than I'd care to count. User:Bluelion 02:38 Mar 17, 2003 (UTC)
Just to add to the confusion, in New Zealand English "apartment" is a fairly specific term while "flat" may mean an apartment but could mean almost any form of rented accomodation including part of a house. "Flatting" used as a varb describes the situation where a group of people who are not a family share any rented accomodation even a whole house.
''From above because it's relevant''
:: "This can result either with some variations becoming extinct (as, for instance, apartment has been gradually displacing flat in much of the world) or that wide variations are accepted as "perfectly good English" everywhere. "
:: I'd have thought that "flat" was more an example of the latter. It's certainly not extinct in the UK. The main reason new buildings contain "apartments" is that "flat" sounds downmarket, due to council flats. A decent example of a now extinct word or phrase required. User:Bagpuss
:: In Ireland, an apartment is usually a new development, largely middle class. A flat is usually either council owned or a converted part of an older building, which may have been subdivided. Apartments usually are larger, more modern and almost invariably less well built than older buildings that have been converted into flats. User:Jtdirl 20:40 Mar 14, 2003 (UTC)
:: Similar. Either way "flat" is not extinct. User:Bagpuss
: Perhaps "flat" is now extinct in the US but not in the UK. User:Bagpuss
::In Toronto a flat is, or at least was, an apartment which is not self-contained (you share a kitchen or a bathroom). The term is dying out as flats die out.
: As a young American on the East Coast (Maryland), I am aware of 'flat' only as a Britishism. - Rob
Midwest U.S., urban: flat is commonly used to refer to a specific type of apartment located in a smaller building -- either purpose-built or converted from a single-family home -- in which each apartment occupies one full floor of the building, although it is not used without qualification and refers to the containing building rather than the apartment itself (e.g. "I live in a three-flat.") It's used in contrast to 'apartment building' or 'apartment complex'. User:SpacemanSpork 23:06, 2005 Feb 22 (UTC)
""Flat" is utterly extinct in American English to mean a rented dwelling. The only exception I can think of is a regionalism; in San Francisco, people sometimes call old Victorian houses "flats" if you're renting out the whole floor. User:Moncrief 20:28, May 21, 2005 (UTC)
----
"Complexion" is still standard British English. PML.
== Pronunciation of Greek-alphabet letters ==
The article claims that "phi is "fie" to Britons and "fee" to Americans". φβκ in "American" though would seem to be "fie beta kappa" not "fee beta kappa": American dictionaries also seem to give the pronounciation "fi": is φ indeed pronounced as "fee" by most Americans? -- User:Someone else 02:25 Mar 22, 2003 (UTC)
I think it depends greatly on the context. As you say, "fie" appears to be the most common pronunciation when the letter appears as itself, but in a technical or scientific context it is almost invariably "fee" (as in "the oiler fee function" -- i.e., Euler's φ function, with stress on the "fee"). A check of my AHD gives "fie" and only "fie" as a pronunciation for the word phi. User:18.24.0.120 03:04, 2 Jan 2004 (UTC)
Just to add a tiny bit to 18.24.0.120's point: Outside of scientific and Greek-language contexts (such as in names for fraternities), "fie" is almost always heard. Even scientists and classicists say "fie bayta kappa", though they would say "fee" when talking about the letter in their work. Most utterances of the letter come out as "fee", but most people call the letter "fie" (when they call it anything at all). --User:Atemperman 21:47, 29 May 2004 (UTC)
== Dots in abbreviations ==
Regarding this time - Full stops/Periods in abbreviations - Americans tend to write \"U.S.\", \"U.N.\", \"Mr.\", \"Mrs.\" etc., while most British will write \"US\", \"UN\", \"Mr\", \"Mrs\", etc. I regularly get letters from the UK addressed to 'Mr.' and from the US as 'Mr' as were always taught in Ireland that leaving outh the period was dead wrong. So NEVER write St when you mean St. (street or saint), never write Mr. or Mrs. without a period, etc. So whatever about U.S. versus US, saying that putting in a period is an Americanism not found in the UK seems dead wrong. User:Jtdirl 21:03 Apr 7, 2003 (UTC)
:See Guardian style guide http://www.guardian.co.uk/styleguide/page/0,5817,184844,00.html - for abbreviations and http://www.guardian.co.uk/styleguide/page/0,5817,184832,00.html and Times style guide [http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2941-579,00.html here] - for saint. User:Mintguy
:In common usage people in UK, Australia etc. do often use full stops after Mr, Mrs, but the house style preferred by most proper publishers is to omit the full stop for a contraction (linguistics), i.e. where the last letter is included: so Str. for Street but Rd for Road. User:Gritchka 13:26 27 May 2003 (UTC)
::An interesting new twist that I've seen, using US Postal Service-approved mailing software, is the preference for removing all periods in address information (but not names or titles). Such comformance also includes standardized abbreviations for street components and states, and combining two-line street data into a single abbreviate line. Thus, one commonly finds things like:
:::ACME Corp.
:::1500 N Fairfax Ave Ste 100
:::Mesa, AZ 85211
::which translates to "1500 North Fairfax Avenue, Suite 100, Mesa, Arizona". Frankly, I've come to like it, especially since the postal clerks seem delighted to take my mail, and it always arrives quickly. I only wish more nations would adopt similar (but country-specific) formal condensations and abbreviations. I find it hard to cram seven lines onto some of my UK mailings! Sometimes bowing to the exigencies of the computer age can have its advantages. (I also learned of the much more logical British use of commas and periods with quotations this way.) ☺ — User:Jeffq 08:57, 15 Sep 2004 (UTC)
::::Totally off this topic, but still, I think, a pertinent question: the difference in pronounciation of "clerk". In the US "clerk" rhymes with "work"; in the UK it sounds like the man's name "Clark" http://www.hio.ft.hanze.nl/thar/clerk.rm. My IPA is rusty; would that be US /klerk/ vs UK /kla:k/ ??? (Mac OS X will type/copy/paste unicode IPA but Safari browser mangles it on submit...) Perhaps another addition for the pronunciation guide?
:::I doubt if many addresses in the UK need 7 lines. Mailing software here also simplifies things. All that is required for a unique address is the house number/name and postcode, though the sreet name and post town are often included. People often like to "decorare" their addressses with district names and things that are not in the official address. For Example, an official address of
::::23 Bong St
::::LEEDS
::::LS1 1AA
:::could be written as
::::James Jameson,
::::The Retreat,
::::23 Bong St.,
::::Chapel Allerton,
::::Leeds,
::::The West Riding,
::::West Yorkshire,
::::LS1 1AA
:::Of course you would add ENGLAND if posting from abroad. See [http://www.columbia.edu/kermit/postal.html#england] for more info -- User:Chris Q 14:52, 15 Sep 2004 (UTC)
:::-- User:Chris Q 14:52, 15 Sep 2004 (UTC)
::::Thanks for the info, Chris! — User:Jeffq 16:04, 15 Sep 2004 (UTC)
I have addressed letters as "#28, NG2 6LJ" and my dad 100 miles away has got them the next morning. User:Nickshanks (UK)
:UK postcodes apply to 15-20 unique addresses only, so a house number and the post code is all that's required. You can buy access to the Post Office's database and look up the "full" address from there. --User:Auz 10:59, 14 Nov 2004 (UTC)
== Confusion arising in the populace ==
changed ''.... which are likely to be misunderstood by most speakers of British English.'' to ''... which could be misunderstood by speakers of British English.''. I think that many younger English people have enough exposure to US tv and films to know these terms. There are a lot of people who wouldn't but I would not like to say "most"
:Someone who assumes that all British are English, hmmm... Ah, well, Let's see if I can clarify this anyway. Exposure to TV doesn't have anything to with it. I speak from personal experience. I was once the first person (and only) person to attend a car accident in Scotland in which a car had left the road and dropped twenty feet down an embankment before landing on its roof. Luckily the occupant, a Californian, wasn't badly hurt -- a cut on his head -- but when I asked the fuel type (for safety reasons), he told me that it was a gas car. Now I'm well aware that Californians, normally mean petrol when they say gas, but this was a Californian in the UK driving a British car and cars in the UK may use Diesel fuel, petrol, or propane gas as fuel, so perhaps he really did mean gas. Whereas Diesel fuel or petrol are unlikely to explode, a damaged bottled gas tank is an extremely dangerous item for two different reasons. This was one case where it was better to assume that the car really was fuelled by gas rather than petrol and beat a hasty retreat, so we did. I was not going waste time to try and clarify things with someone who was possibly concussed when a possible explosion was looming over us.
:The case where a single concept has an American word for it and a different British word, doesn't normally cause confusion. TV and film certainly help there (and most older people have had more exposure than younger people because they've been around longer). The problems arise with words like ''suspenders'' or ''gas'' where one word can be used for two different concepts. Normally the confusion doesn't matter but merely knowing what is probably meant doesn't mean you know what was actually meant. Sometimes the difference is obvious or unimportant but sometimes you ''really'' need to know. -- User:Derek Ross
== Letter writing ==
Is there any empirical evidence for the following assertion, which I have removed from the article?:
* Letter-writing: When starting a letter, Americans usually write a colon after the greeting ("Dear Sir:") while Britons usually write a comma ("Dear Sir,").
Seems doubtful to me. User:Jfitzg
:I've seen the colon as at least an alternative in Am. usage, but I don't know how common it is. I can't recall ever seeing a colon in Br. usage. User:Gritchka
I was the one who added the assertion. I am British, and have seen Americans
use colons many times, which I had ''never'' seen over here. However, sorry,
there is a subtlety which I did not first realis/ze, that Am usage uses the
colon only for a formal letter, while still using a comma for personal letters.
A Google search with term ''"dear Sir" comma colon'' gives various references to
this, e.g.:
http://www.cogs.susx.ac.uk/local/doc/punctuation/node52.html
http://newark.rutgers.edu/~jlynch/Writing/c.html (section Colon)
http://www.louisville.edu/a-s/writingcenter/semiandcolons.html (scroll near to bottom)
Please could you reinstate the comment, but with the modification that the
difference only applies to formal letters.
Alan
:Thanks for the clarification. I didn't realize the British used commas in formal letters. More sensible, though. I'll restore it. To the right place, I hope. User:Jfitzg
:For the Americans, do you suspect that we are here perpetuating some (possibly British) myth that Americans use colons in the salutation ?
::I am American and I was definitely taught in school to use a colon after a salutation in a "formal" letter. However, I'd guess that because we Americans are so formality-averse the colon usage is very uncommon, as we maintain an air of informality even in formal situations. I guess this is because, at least in American culture, being extra formal about things often comes off as rude and/or condescending. But certainly letters addressed "To whom it may concern:" usually take a colon. --User:Nohat 20:24, 2003 Dec 14 (UTC)
::A check of the style guide used when I was in secondary school (''Basic English Revisited'' by Sebranek et al, fifth ed.) says (paragraph 153): "A colon may be used after the salutation of a business letter." Interestingly, I was taught a stronger rule than that; specifically, that a comma should only follow the salutation in informal letters. I have invariably hewed to this rule, but I wouldn't notice if all of my (preprinted form-letter) correspondence suddenly started arriving with commas (assuming it hasn't already). User:18.24.0.120 02:59, 2 Jan 2004 (UTC)
::The use of colons is to be restricted to business letters in the USA. Friendly letters use a comma. However, such niceties are no doubt eroding in the face of corporate takeover of our culture.User:Dogface 22:20, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC)
What about the ending of letters? In the UK the ending of a letter commencing "Dear Sir/Madam" ends "Yours faithfully" and one begining "Dear Mr (name)", ends "yours sincerely". I have seen Yours truly and yours very truly in the US but do not know the protocol of use. User:Dainamo 14:25, 21 Aug 2004 (UTC)
:I don't think it's quite so hard-and-fast as you suggest British usage is. In formal letters, I think the single most common closing is "Sincerely yours", but there are several alternatives, any of which would be unremarkable: "Sincerely", "Yours truly", "Very truly yours", and probably a few others that aren't coming to my mind right now. User:JamesMLane 04:45, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)
::It's long been my impression, living both in Canada and the U.S., that ''Yours sincerely,'' is usual whereas ''Yours truly,'' is for use by lawyers in a legal context. In the U. S. Navy, the closings ''Very respectfully,'' and ''Respectfully,'' are usual in memos and e-mail. User:Cameronc 17:47, 12 Oct 2004 (UTC)
== While meaning 'until'? ==
This bit:
:...in some Northern dialects, while means "until". Not knowing this caused a number of fatalities when automatic level (railway) crossings were first introduced with signs saying "do not cross the track while the lights are flashing"; people in the North waited for the flashing lights before crossing the line. Similarly instructions on equipment "do not press start while this cover is removed" have had to be changed for England.
Sounds like an urban legend to me. I asked about it on the Wordcraft board, and no-one British believed it to be true. Is there any evidence for it?
user:pauld
: Chambers Dictionary gives 'until (''Northern dialect'')' as one sense for the conjunction and 'until (''Shakesp; Northern dialect'')' for the preposition. The admirable Michael Quinion at http://www.quinion.com/words/qa/qa-whi2.htm discusses BrE v. AmE use of 'while'/'whilst' but doesn't mention this traditional story, and I'm inclined to think he would know it if it was true. User:Gritchka
Yes, indeed. I agree that ''while'' can mean ''until'' in some Northern dialects, but I'd think this is largely in speech, and that even speakers of the dialect would have no trouble at all with the written "while". I just don't believe that "this caused a number of fatalities" or that there was good reason to change the equipment instructions, if indeed they were changed. Sounds much more like an urban legend popular because it puts "stupid Northerners" in a poor light; same family as "Irish milk-bottles have ''Open other end'' written on the bottom".
User:Pauld 10:16 28 Jun 2003 (UTC)
: I've got an e-mail back from Michael Quinion scorning the story, so I think we can dump it. He agrees with your points that (a) the signs never said that, and (b) standard 'while' would certainly be understood standardly in context. User:Gritchka 17:17 28 Jun 2003 (UTC)
Thanks Gritchka. My perception (as a British writer) is that ''whilst'' and ''while'' are almost interchangeable, although ''whilst'' feels slightly more old-fashioned than ''while''. As great efforts have been made in recent years to write signs and official documents in straightforward English, I'd be very surprised if they now "nearly always"" use ''whilst''. As a google of a couple of UK Government departments' sites gives about four times as many hits for ''while'' as for ''whilst'', I've rewritten the para. User:Pauld 00:34 29 Jun 2003 (UTC)
I changed the supposed reference to ''while'' in the story on Northern railway signage to ''whilst''. If whilst was seen as meaning ''until'' then the sentence must have been used with ''whilst'' not ''while''. If it used ''while'' there could have been no confusion. Also - saying that ''whilst'' seems slightly old fashioned is POV. Whilst is still widely in many parts of Britain and Ireland and is ''still'' widely used in legislation.
BTW re the above comment about the Irish and milk bottles, the Irish ''don't'' use milk bottles they use cartons and have done for many many years. User:Jtdirl 14:24 29 Jun 2003 (UTC)
:It's ''while'' that is used by Northerners to mean ''until''. (My husband's from Lincolnshire and they say it all the time, eg. "I'll wait while you're ready.") ''Whilst'' means something else entirely and would not be used on a sign like that, so I've taken the liberty of changing it back. User:Deb 21:45 29 Jun 2003 (UTC)
::Yes, I have fixed the article. I removed the "not often used in speech" because in areas where ''while'' has a different meaning ''whilst'' is very frequently used in speech. -- User:Chris Q 06:33 30 Jun 2003 (UTC)
FearÉIREANN, my point was the the story about level-crossing fatalities is untrue, in the same way the the "Irish milk-bottle" joke is untrue. If the Irish don't in fact have milk-bottles, it's irrelevant -- the story isn't told by Irish people, and (presumably) it's not supposed to be true.
Chris Q, you didn't in fact "fix" the article, because the second para started "because of this" which you made to refer to the fact that official docs use ''whilst''. Also the claim that official docs use ''whilst'' "to avoid misunderstanding" is POV, and has the feeling of the level-crossing story about it. I've tried a small re-ordering.
I've also restored ''aeroplane'' to the list of spelling differences; 62.64.141.46 took it out (but not the American ''airplane'') as one of a list of otherwise excellent changes. Not sure why he/she took it out. User:Pauld 11:33 30 Jun 2003 (UTC)
:I guess it was removed because it was not a straight ae -> e substitution like the rest, in fact a different word rather than a different spelling. I will remove it again because I don't see it as a "spelling difference", but since it is a bit of a judgment call I won't argue or remove it again if anyone reinstates it. -- User:Chris Q 08:57 1 Jul 2003 (UTC)
Makes sense to me. -- User:Pauld 12:20 1 Jul 2003 (UTC)
== While/Whilst, Among/Amongst, Amid/Amidst ==
As an American, I'd always choose the former in each of these pairs, and I rarely hear Americans say the latter. Is this a US/Britain difference? User:Fg2 07:37, Sep 16, 2004 (UTC)
: I'm not a Briton, but I've lived here (Cambridge) for a little over a year. "Whilst" and "while" seem interchangeable when the word means "even though", but when it means "when" or "during", "whilst" seems more formal than "while". I suspect we're in a state of change on these, and perhaps in 200 years, no one on either side of the Atlantic will say "whilst". --User:Atemperman 17:30, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC)
== The British and their acceptance of these demmend colonials ==
The most recent edit has made the following out of what was previously a badly formed sentence. "The British use the American spelling of encyclopedia as part of their language." I'm not sure this is what the original author intended. I certainly don't think it's true. User:Mintguy 18:50 24 Jul 2003 (UTC)
: Well, yes, but before it said
:: ''The British accept use the American spelling of encyclopedia as part of their language.'' (My emphasis)
: ... which to me at least suggests that the American spelling has been imposed against the will of the British, but they accept it as something they have to live with, and so is arguable POV (of course, I agree with said POV, so...). Also, I agree that what it's been replaced with, as it were, suggests something that isn't true, but I can't think of a concise way of putting it that is NPOV.
:User:Jdforrester 19:15 24 Jul 2003 (UTC)
:: I've changed it. See what you think now. User:Pauld 13:25, 31 Jul 2003 (UTC)
::: That seems fine. Thanks.
::: User:Jdforrester 04:09, 1 Aug 2003 (UTC)
== Another source of information ==
I have [http://www.digitas.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/wiki/ken/BritishVsAmerican another list] that I have been working on for a while; will someone attempt to incorporate? --User:Kaihsu 05:40, 17 Aug 2003 (UTC)
== Preposition of 'naming' ==
On Wikipedia I sometimes see something like "''Washington State, named for George Washington, ...''", whereas I would normally write "''Washington State, named after George Washington, ...''". Is this a British/American difference or is this just me being ignorant? User:Mintguy 11:30, 20 Aug 2003 (UTC)
The example in section 6 about double consonants in first syllables, i.e. that the 'a' in ''parrot'' is pronounced like the 'a' in ''sat'', is simply not true for most speakers of American English. The vowels in, ''bad, bed,'' and ''bade'' are all the same before 'r', so for most Americans, the first syllable of ''parrot'' sounds like ''pair''. Perhaps a better example of this phenomenon would be helpful. -- User:Nohat 04:06, 2003 Sep 11 (UTC)
:Um, which "most speakers of American English" are you talking about? If I heard an American pronounce parrot as "pair-ot", I would assume they were from Fargo, North Dakota. User:AdmN 20:08, 18 Aug 2004 (UTC)
::PAIR-it would be a better way of describing how everyone *I* know pronounces it, anyway. User:Elf | User talk:Elf 05:40, 19 Aug 2004 (UTC)
:::In NYC, "PAIR-it" is virtually nonexistent. When I lived in Ohio and North Carolina, I would've expected to encounter it. Hence, my limited experience would suggest that "PAIR-it" reflects a Southern/Midwestern accent. I wouldn't be surprised at ''anything'' I heard out of California, because so many Californians come from somewhere else -- but if I heard a national newscaster use the word, I'd expect the ''a'' to rhyme with the ''a'' in ''sat''. User:JamesMLane 03:55, 20 Aug 2004 (UTC)
::::Well, I'd say that the "a" in "parrot" would be /e/ or /eI/ in most of the Upper Midwest, not /{/, which the "a" in "sat" would be. /{r/ really isn't possible there, for the most part, except via eliding a phoneme between /{/ and /r/, thanks to the Mary/merry/marry merger. 02:40, 21 Aug 2004 (CDT)
:::::Try saying that ten times fast! User:Nickshanks
Fixed.--User:Atemperman 22:06, 29 May 2004 (UTC)
== Just plain wrong 'misspellings' ==
"But compelled, excelling, propelled, rebelling in both, although Americans also use exceling, propeled, rebeling."
What's up with ''this''? I know American English and those spellings like "exceling", "propeled" and "rebeling" are just plain WRONG! User:Wiwaxia 01:15, 14 Sep 2003 (UTC)
:Like the user who calls himself Someone Else, I also use "fie" for the pronunciation of "phi" at the university (or in any other context, for that matter).
:''arguement, exceling, propeled, rebeling'' - As User:Wiwaxia pointed out above (for the last three), these are just plain misspellings. They do not appear in Merriam-Webster and a Google search shows them occurring less than 1% of the time of their correct counterparts (except 'rebeling' at 1.6%). User:Spellbinder 12:00, 10 Dec 2003 (UTC)
== Pluralisations ==
''You'' may not say 'drugs dealer' or 'sport page', but I do, as do many others, as does the BBC and other media outlets some times; it is a recognised common (and often thought more 'accurate', for some reason, not my POV) alternative to the form used exclusively in the Americas. I added the line:
: ''Note that some British would now find this usage odd.''
...to point out that it is not wholly common. Please do not keep just reverting it to blankness.
User:Jdforrester 23:47, 27 Oct 2003 (UTC)
:"Sports page" is certainly the American usage. What else would you say? "Sport page"? User:RickK 23:55, 27 Oct 2003 (UTC)
:: Sorry, that was a typo. Corrected now.
:: User:Jdforrester 23:59, 27 Oct 2003 (UTC)
Removed ''Note that some British would now find this usage odd.''
If you put it back please make it clear whether you mean they find the American or British usage odd. Personally "drugs delaer" sounds odd to me!
User:Chris_Q 08:27, 28 Oct 2003 (UTC)
: Done. Please sign your comments on talk pages.
: User:Jdforrester 10:26, 28 Oct 2003 (UTC)
---
I agree with Seglea's summary comment - "(oh come on. This pluralisation thing is ridiculous)".
Doing a google on the exact phrases shows:
"sports page" - 248,000 occurrences
"sport page" - 19,700 occurrences
and, in direct contradiction to what is stated, "sport page" appears to be MORE common in America, whereas it's listed as British usage in the article. (The first three occurrences are utexas.edu, USATODAY.com, and the 'Ohio Wrestling Sport Page'.)
For the other phrase, we get:
"drug dealer" - 135,000 occurrences
"drugs dealer" - 1,290 occurrences
I would agree from the google entries that "drugs dealer" is more likely to be British, but there are plenty of British examples of "drug dealer" - including the Guardian, Observer and the BBC.
Indeed, James F's assertion that the BBC
American and British English Differences
#REDIRECT American_and_British_English_differences
American and British English Differences
#REDIRECT Talk:American_and_British_English_differences
American and British English differences
This article outlines the differences between American English, the variety (linguistics) of the English language spoken in the United States, and British English, which is sometimes used to denote what is more precisely known as Commonwealth English. For the purposes of this article: *American English is the form of English used by the United states Government of the United States, Economy of the United States, Media of the United States, and Education in the United States. It does not include Canadian English; Canadian pronunciation is similar to that in the United States, but spelling often takes the Commonwealth form. Regions and countries that tend to use American English in teaching and publishing include much of Eastern Europe (including Russia), the Far East (especially Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and the Philippines; although largely excluding the former British colonies of Hong Kong and Singapore), the Americas (excluding Canada) and, in Africa, Liberia. The World Bank, the IEEE and the Organization of American States among other organizations also use American English. *Commonwealth English is the form of English used across the United Kingdom and its former colonies in the British Empire, most notably in much of Africa (including South Africa and Egypt), the Subcontinent (Pakistan and India), Australia and New Zealand, and portions of Southeast Asia (Myanmar, Singapore,Malaysia and Thailand), as well as Hong Kong. This form of English, mostly interchangeable with British English, is sometimes called Commonwealth English because most of its speakers live in nations that are members of the Commonwealth of Nations. Other nations and groups to use British English include the European Union and the United Nations. Many international organizations, like the International Olympic Committee, NATO, the World Trade Organization and ISO also use British English. The section on pronunciation assumes the received pronunciation of British English, from which there are many regional variations. *The form of English spoken in Canadian English exhibits features of both British and American dialects. *Ireland's version of English, sometimes described as Hiberno-English, is a variant of British English influenced by, ''inter alia'', the Irish language and a split with British English early enough to preserve rhoticity in most forms of English spoken in Ireland. Written English in Ireland tends to follow the UK usage. *English is one of the official languages of the European Union, and the form used within the EU follows usage in the United Kingdom and Ireland. Although American and British English are generally mutually intelligible, there are enough differences to occasionally cause awkward misunderstandings or even a complete failure to communicate. George Bernard Shaw once said that the United States and United Kingdom are "two countries divided by a common language"; a similar comment is ascribed to Winston Churchill. Henry Sweet predicted in 1877 that within a century, American English, Australian English and British English would be mutually unintelligible, but it may be the case that increased world-wide communication through radio, television, the Internet, and globalization has reduced the tendency to regional variation. This can result either in some variations becoming extinct (as, for instance, ''Truck (disambiguation)'' has been gradually displacing ''Lorry'' in much of the world) or in the acceptance of wide variations as "perfectly good English" everywhere. In addition to its use in English-speaking countries, English plays an important role as a technical language around the world, in medicine, computer science, air traffic control, and many other areas of concentrated expertise and formal communication among international professionals. Such speakers may be fluent in English within their discipline, but not generally fluent in English. ==Spelling== ''Main article: American and British English spelling differences'' Some words shared by all English speakers are ''spelled'' one way by Americans but are ''spelt'' differently in other English speaking countries. ==Slight lexical differences== * Miscellaneous lexical differences between British and American English * Verb past tenses with ''-t'': Commonwealth ''dreamt'', ''leapt'', ''learnt'', ''spelt''; American ''dreamed'', ''leaped'', ''learned'', ''spelled''. As with the "tre" words, the ''t'' endings are occasionally found in American texts. The forms with ''-ed'' are also common in Commonwealth usage, and preferred by many as they are weak verbs. (The two-syllable form ''learnèd'' , usually spelled simply as ''learned'', is still used to mean "educated", or to refer to academic institutions, in both British English and American English.) * Other verb past tense forms: Commonwealth ''fitted'', ''forecasted'', ''knitted'', ''lighted'', ''wedded''; American ''fit'', ''forecast'', ''knit'', ''lit'', ''wed'' (but ''busted''). The distinction is, however, not rigorous as the Commonwealth forms are also found in American, and both ''lit'' and ''forecast'' are standard in Commonwealth English.
Also, the past participle ''gotten'' is rarely used in modern British English (although it is used in some dialects), which generally uses ''got'' (as do some Americans), except in old expressions such as ''ill-gotten gains''. Commonwealth usage retains the form ''forgotten'', though. Furthermore, according to the Compact Oxford English Dictionary, "The form ''gotten'' is not used in British English but is very common in North American English, though even there it is often regarded as non-standard."
''Fitted'' is used in both conventions as an adjective ("fitted sheets" are the same size as the mattress) and as the past tense of ''fit'' ("to suffer epilepsy", for example, "Leavitt fitted" in ''The Andromeda Strain''); however ''fit'' and ''fitting'' do not denote epileptic seizure in ordinary British use (though that usage is common within medical circles), as the same effect is achieved by ''to have a fit'' or ''to throw a fit''.
The past participle ''proven'' is frequently used in American English, although careful speakers usually avoid it, and it remains ''proved'' in British English (except in adjectival use; and usage is different in Scottish law). American English further allows other irregular verbs, such as ''thrive'' (''throve''–''thriven'') or ''sneak'' (''snuck''), which remain regular in Commonwealth English, and often mixes the preterite and past participle forms (''spring''–''sprang'' (U.S. ''sprung'')–''sprung''), sometimes forcing verbs such as ''shrink'' (''shrank''–''shrunk'') to have a further form, thus ''shrunk''–''shrunken''. (The Associated Press Stylebook in American English treats some irregular verbs as colloquialisms, insisting on the regular forms for the past tense of ''dive'', ''plead'' and ''sneak''.)
See also: wiktionary:Wiktionary_Appendix:Irregular_Verbs. * Directional suffix ''-ward(s)'': English ''forwards'', ''towards'', ''rightwards'', etc.; American ''forward'', ''toward'', ''rightward''. The forms with ''-s'' are only used as adverbs or prepositions. In American English, the ''-s'' forms are fast disappearing, except ''afterwards''. In British English, there is a semantic difference in the usage of the two possible forms. The Oxford English Dictionary states the following about ''forward'' and ''forwards'': "/.../ the latter expresses a definite direction viewed in contrast with other directions. In some contexts either form may be used without perceptible difference of meaning; the following are examples in which only one of them can be used: 'The ratchet-wheel can move only ''forwards''
(2) || || Many Americans use the Commonwealth pronunciation of this word. |-- valign="top" |''entrepreneur'' || || (1)
(2) || Similarly ''chauffeur,'' ''connoisseur,'' and ''liqueur'' |-- valign="top" |''garage'' || (1)
(2) || || The U.S. pronunciation is more in keeping with the original French one. The two Commonwealth pronunciations may represent distinct meanings for some speakers; for example, "a subterranean garage for a car" (1) vs "a petrol garage" (2). |-- valign="top" |''herb'' || || || The American pronunciation of the name "Herb" includes the initial phone, which not all Americans drop in the first place. Those who do not say in ''herb'' will not in ''herbal'' either, but most will in ''herbaceous'', ''herbicide'', ''herbivore''. |-- valign="top" |''lieutenant'' || (1)
(2) || || The 2nd British pronunciation is restricted to the Royal Navy. |-- valign="top" | ''of'' || || || |-- valign="top" |''often'' || (1)
(2) || (1)
(2) || |-- valign="top" | ''privacy'' || || || The American pronunciation is also often used by Commonwealth speakers. The Commonwealth pronunciation is the naturalised one, a consequence of the so-called trisyllabic laxing. |-- valign="top" | ''route'' || || || The Commonwealth pronunciation is very common in the United States, especially in the North and South, but not the West. |-- valign="top" | ''schedule'' || || || The American pronunciation is frequently encountered in the U.K. |-- valign="top" | ''scone'' || || || |-- valign="top" | ''shone'' || || || Past tense of ''shine'' |-- valign="top" | ''suggest'' || || || The Commonwealth pronunciation is a common variant in America. |-- valign="top" | ''thorough'' || || (1)
(2) || The difference between UK and U.S. pronunciations of ''borough'' is analogous. |-- valign="top" | ''want'' || || (1)
(2)
(3) || |-- valign="top" | ''was'' || || (1)
(2) || |-- valign="top" | ''what'' || || || |-- valign="top" | ''z'' (the letter) || || || The spelling of this letter as a word corresponds to the pronunciation: thus Commonwealth ''zed'' and American ''zee''. |} ===See also=== * International Phonetic Alphabet for English * IPA chart for English ==Miscellaneous== ===General trends=== While the use of American expressions in English is often noted in Britain, movement in the opposite direction is less common. But recent examples exist, including the idiom "to go missing," which had been a distinctively British expression but is used increasingly in American English, at least in journalism, and the noun "queue" and verb "queue up," which seem to be making inroads in the U.S. as well. (The usual American equivalent of "to go missing" is "to disappear" and that of "queue (up)" is "line (up).") ===Figures of speech=== Both English and American English use the expression "I couldn't care less" to mean the speaker does not care at all. In American English, the phrase "I could care less" (without the "n't") is synonymous with this in casual usage. Intonation no longer reflects the originally sarcasm nature of this variant, which is not idiomatic in British English and might be interpreted as anything from nonsense to an indication that the speaker ''does'' care. In both areas, saying "I don't mind" often means "I'm not annoyed" (for example, by someone's smoking), while "I don't care" often means "the matter is trivial or boring". However, in answering a question like "Tea or coffee?", if either alternative is equally acceptable, an American may answer "I don't care", while a Briton may answer "I don't mind". Either sounds odd to the other. ===Business=== In his history of the Second World War, Winston Churchill records that differences in the interpretation of the verb "to table" caused an argument between British and American planners. The British wanted a matter ''tabled'' immediately because it was important, and the Americans insisted it should not be tabled at all because it was important. In British English, the term means "to discuss now" (the issue is ''brought to'' the table), whereas in American English it means "to defer" (the issue is ''left on'' the table). In a similar vein, the verb "to slate" means "to schedule" in the U.S. but (informally) "to disparage" in the UK. Thus a headline such as "Third Harry Potter Film Slated" has two very different interpretations. One usage of the word "bomb" causes similar confusion: in the U.S. "the show bombed" means it was a total failure; in the UK "the show went down a bomb" means it was a great success. The American slang phrase "the bomb," however (perhaps inspired by African American Vernacular English), almost always indicates positivity. For example, the phrase, "That show was the bomb," would mean that the show was outstanding. ===Education=== In the UK, a student is said to "read" or to "study" a subject, while in the U.S., a student either "studies" the subject or "majors" in it. The latter refers only to the student's principal course of study, while the former may be refer to any class being taken. :"She read history at Oxford". :"She majored in history at Yale." In the UK, a student "revises" or "does revision" for an examination, while in American English, the student "studies" for it. When "taking" or "writing" the examination, a student in the UK would have that examination supervised by a "invigilator" whereas in American English it would be a "proctor". In the UK, a student is said to "sit" or "take" an exam, while in the U.S., a student "takes" an exam. In the UK, a teacher "sets" an exam, while in the U.S., a teacher "writes" or "gives" an exam. The expression "he sits for" an exam also arises in British English, but only rarely in American English; American lawyers-to-be "sit for" their bar exams, but in nearly all other instances, Americans "take" their exams. :"I took my exams at Yale." :"I spent the entire day yesterday writing the exam. At last, it's ready for my students." :"I plan to set a difficult exam for my students, but I haven't got it ready yet." ===Numbers=== In the UK, "a couple of" tends to refer to exactly two of something, even though the term is informal. In American English, it often means a few (maybe rather more than two) and the "of" is frequently omitted. There are also variations in floor numbering between the two linguistic systems — the standard international usage maintains that the "first floor" is one above the entrance level while the entrance level is the "ground floor"; whereas normal American usage labels the entrance level as the "first floor" and does not use "ground floor." Some American buildings have a "ground floor," usually as part of a plan to cater to cosmopolitan persons. === Dates === Date formats are usually written differently in the short (numerical) form. Christmas Day 2000, for example, is 25/12/00 in Britain and 12/25/00 in the U.S., although occasionally other formats are encountered, such as the ISO 2000-12-25, popular among programmers. When writing long-form dates, the format "December 25, 2000" is generally encountered in the U.S., and widely encountered in the U.K.; however, the British are more likely than Americans to use the format "25th December 2000" although it is acceptable in both countries, and the American grammarians Strunk and White, among others, recommend it. Similarly, in American speech, "December twenty-fifth" is the most likely form, and "the twenty-fifth of December" is also not uncommon. In Britain the latter is more likely, and even when the month is presented first the definite article is still inserted in speech, thus "December ''the'' twenty-fifth". ===Transport=== Americans refer to ''transportation,'' while Britons refer to ''transport.'' Differences in terminology are especially obvious in the context of roads. The British term ''dual carriageway'', in American parlance, would be a ''divided highway''. ''central reservation'' on a ''motorway'' in the U.K. would be a ''median'' on a ''freeway'' or ''expressway'' in the U.S. The one-way lanes that make it possible to enter and leave such roads at an intermediate point without disrupting the flow of traffic are generally known as ''slip roads'' in the U.K., but U.S. civil engineers call them ''ramps,'' and further distinguish between ''on-ramps'' (for entering) or ''off-ramps'' (for leaving). When American engineers speak of ''slip roads,'' or ''slip ramps,'' they are referring to an on-ramp and off-ramp that have been rearranged (through use of a grade separation) to minimize weaving on a freeway segment between two interchanges that are too close together. In the U.K., the term ''outside lane'' refers to the higher-speed passing lane closest to the centre of the road, while ''inside lane'' refers to the lane closer to the edge of the road; these terms have the opposite meanings in American English, with the ''outside lane'' being the one near the edge and the ''inside lane'' being the one closer to the median — it is worth noting that Americans also drive on the opposite side to Britons, so that the British inside lane is, like the American one, the leftmost one (going in any given direction). ==See also== * American English * Australian English * British English * Canadian English * Caribbean English * Commonwealth English * Hiberno-English * Hong Kong English * Indian English * Jamaican English * Liberian English * Malaysian English * New Zealand English * Philippine English * Singapore English * South African English *Regional accents of English speakers *Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style ==External links== * [http://www.digitas.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/wiki/ken/BritishVsAmerican Proper Treatment: British vs. American] (Harvard University) * [http://www.peak.org/~jeremy/dictionary/ The American·British British·American Dictionary] * [http://english2american.com/ The English-to-American Dictionary] * [http://www.hps.com/~tpg/ukdict/ United Kingdom English for the American Novice] * [http://www.tysto.com/articles05/q1/20050324uk-us.shtml Comprehensive list of American and British spelling differences] * [http://www.zmaxmiez-jpn.net/Links_page.html British English vis American English with Portuguese/Japanese translation] * [http://www.economist.com/research/styleGuide/index.cfm?page=673931 Americanisms] (from The Economist's style guide) * [http://home.comcast.net/~helenajole/Harry.html Differences between British and American editions of a published novel] (example is Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone) * [http://canadianenglish1.narod.ru American Canadian British English lexical differences in one table] American and British English differences Phonology
American and British English differences
Talk:American and British English Differences (Archive 1) ---- == Adverbs-: missing 'ly' in American English == Since when have many adverbs lost the ending 'ly' in the US? It has become impossible to distinguish between the adverb and adjective in many cases. E.G: "He'll be here real soon now" (International: really soon now) Sounds very strange to this writer because I think 'real' is an adjective but the US example above treats it as an adverb (modifying the verb 'be') - Clive Formally speaking, 'real' is an adjective in American English and 'really' is the adverb. However, it is common in informal American speech to drop the -ly where there is no ambiguity, so whether or not that counts as a difference is a matter of interpretation. As an American, if I saw 'real' used as an adverb on wikipedia, I would correct it. - Rob "Many" adverbs have not lost the -ly suffix. Only a few have. However, as is often the case in irregularities in English dialects, they happen to be more common adverbs User:Dogface 22:09, 20 Jul 2004 (UTC) :I'm an American, and my dictionary (Webster's New World Dictionary of American English) says "real" is a colloquial expression for "very". "Really" would be more proper (I don't even recall myself ever using "real" in this sense). --User:Evice 16:47, Dec 30, 2004 (UTC) :No adverbs that have "-ly" endings have lost them in American English. It's that people sometimes incorrectly use adjectival forms instead of adverbial forms. The adverbs themselves haven't changed. User:Moncrief 20:22, May 21, 2005 (UTC) == Tap vs. faucet in Canadian English == Am I right in thinking that Canadians, perhaps in an attempt to preserve some differences from their southern neighbours, also use ''tap'' rather than ''faucet''? User:Jimfbleak :''Tap'' is much more common in Canada; I believe there's even research on it. I've heard ''tap'' all my long life, though, so in that period it wasn't introduced as a deliberate alternative to ''faucet''. User:Jfitzg == Using 'and' in a number == [continued from Tap vs Faucet] I've just thought of one difference. In Europe, we say 'two thousand and three' for 2003 (I to be alkward say 20-0-3!) whereas americans say 'two thousand three' not using the 'and'. Is this widespread or just a phenomenon associated with news anchors? User:Jtdirl 07:52 Feb 19, 2003 (UTC) : That's pretty widespread. Here in Canada I even had someone try to "correct" me when I wrote "one hundred and twenty dollars" on a cheque, with the claim that meant $100.20, which I thought was ridiculous. User:Bagpuss : Yeah, I remember being taught in school (in California) not to put an "and" after thousands and hundreds, and I think that's still considered standard usage. --User:Atemperman 17:20, 6 Nov 2004 (UTC) :: I was taught the same thing in 8th grade in Ohio — only use "and" for separating fractional units from whole units — but in common speech I often hear it both ways. I've updated the article to mention this. I am wondering if there is some historical legal reason for it, because it's the way we're supposed(?) to spell out the dollars and cents when writing a check (cheque). I am wondering if at one time, the spelling was enforced by law, or if it has just been a matter of convention that became entrenched somehow. - User:Mjb 16:07, 31 Mar 2005 (UTC) So - What do Americans call "2001: A Space Odyssey"? I've never heard anyone call it anthing other than "Two thousand and one: A Space Odyssey". I've never heard it called "Twenty oh one: a Space Odyssey". What about One Hundred and One Dalmatians? User:Jooler 10:09, 1 Apr 2005 (UTC) : I call it "two thousand one," just like I call this year "two thousand five." Never heard anything but "a hundred and one" for the Dalmations, though. Like User:Mjb I was taught at a young age that "and" was only for introducing the fractional part. This was in Pennsylvania. In practice, though, using "and" after the hundreds or thousands is fairly common in the US. -- User:Coneslayer 15:47, 2005 Apr 1 (UTC) : "Two thousand one" here. I'd be surprised if I heard someone say "two thousand and one"! I wouldn't consider it necessary to 'correct' them on it, though. Strangely, I hear "one hundred one" and "one hundred and one" about equally often. - User:Mjb 19:49, 1 Apr 2005 (UTC) == News-: -anchors, -casters and -readers == (There's another one: US - news anchors. UK + Irl: newscasters or newsreaders) User:Jtdirl 07:52 Feb 19, 2003 (UTC) :(''newscasters'' is not unheard of, though rare, ''newsreaders'' is unknown to me) I think most Americans would just two-thousand-three -- I would, anyway. User:TUF-KAT Newsreaders is an old term from the time when ''actors'' rather than journalists 'read' the news, becoming professional news''readers''. (Kenneth Kendall in the UK and Charles Mitchell in Ireland spring to mind.) By the 1980s, most stations used professional journalists, who to show their journalistic cred insisted on being called news''casters'' to show they weren't mere actors reading someone else's script. Call a newscaster a newsreader is a bit like calling Rev. Jerry Falwell a catholic: you better duck before you get a punch!!! (But the term still is used, to the fury of journalists. User:Jtdirl 08:03 Feb 19, 2003 (UTC) :I don't believe the above is correct. I've lived in Nottinghamshire and Hertfordshire and in both places they are called newsreaders, the term is respectful and in no way undermines their credentials as journalists. ::It's not intentionally disrespectful, but it is wrong in the same way that the word "Air Hostess" has no intended insult, but women in such work tend to dislike it as sexist, preferring Air Stewardess (compare Air Steward) or the non gender specific (and for some more important sounding) title of Flight Attendant. User:Dainamo 21:27 Oct 27, 2004 (UTC) == Of 'flammable' and 'inflammable' == Could someone say how an American would interpret "Highly Inflammable"? - in the UK, contrary to appearances it normally appears in warning signs, meaning "very likely to catch fire". User:Arwel Parry 22:02 Feb 19, 2003 (UTC) : "Wait, ''inflammable'' means the same as ''flammable''? What a crazy language!" - Dr. Nick Riviera : Taking, as I do, the Simpsons as my guide to America, they have the same thing there. User:Bagpuss The word inflammable is not used in American English. I suspect that many Americans would be highly confused by it. They might guess that it means "fireproof", the opposite of ''flammable'', which is what warning signs in the US say. However, if an American saw ''inflammable'' on a warning sign, they could possibly figure the correct meaning out from context. (''fireproof'' would be an advertising claim, not a warning) According to my dictionary, ''flammable'' and ''inflammable'' mean the same thing. ''Flammable'' is always used on warning signs in the US. The use of ''inflammable'', though technically correct, is considered too confusing. The terms ''combustible'', ''flammable'', ''highly flammable'', ''explosive'' etc., used on warning signs in the US, have precise meanings which depend on characteristics, such as flash point, of the material involved. User:Bluelion 23:38 Feb 19, 2003 (UTC) ::I've seen ''inflammable'' used in writing, but warning signs here in the NE US all seem to say ''flammable''. Perhaps because the ones saying ''inflammable'' all have burned down?