American and British English differences

[bagzi94]

Hi! How are you? I would like to learn British English,
so, for start, I need to know differences.
Are you willing to write me some?

PS You can also tell me something about Australian.

 

[birdeen's call]

This is a very broad subject. You may want to start with American and British English differences - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Rover_KE]

Try entering your thread title into the google search box, bagzi.

You'll find links to more information than you probably want.

Good luck with that.

Ask us again if you have any more specific questions.

Rover

 

[Mehrgan]

Though this may not be a good idea for a start, but have a look at www.effingpot.com.

I very much like it!

 

[davilan]

Actually, I recently put "British vs American English into yahoo com The wikipedia links that came up and the links inside the articles are quite excellent and extensive. I copied them into a word doc that filled 250 pages which I use as a guide for teaching English teachers some of the differences.


American and British are two different languages with the same roots


Sorry I had to remove the links in order to post

 

[bagzi94]

... Please, delete this message.

 

[birdeen's call]

American and British are two different languages with the same roots

This is not a generally accepted statement. It has its supporters, but many people consider AmE and BrE dialects of the same language.

 

[davilan]

They are defiantly not the same in my opinion. American became it's own language by necessity-American life from the moment the first English speakers arrived-forced the language to deal with words and expressions not available in the original English language.

Adding to that how many other modern languages are contributors to American and how many words are 100% attributed as only America and it's easy to see how in the last 3-400 years the languages have evolved into not dialects but different languages with the same roots. Each has its own set of rules. Very much as British English is derived from Germain roots, American is derived from, not a dialect of, British roots.

 

[davilan]

"This is not a generally accepted statement. It has its supporters, but many people consider AmE and BrE dialects of the same language"

by the way-are any of those people on the American side of the pond?

 

[birdeen's call]

They differ and they have the same roots, that's indisputable. The problem is the definitions of language and dialect. Some say that to be a distinct language, a dialect must become incomprehensible enough to other speakers. Most dialects of BrE and AmE are almost perfectly mutually intelligible, so, if we accept mutual intelligibility as the main criterion, we end up with two dialects, not two languages.

There are many other criteria and depending on which we choose to use we will get different classifications. For example, BrE and AmE are spoken in different states, have their standardized (to some extent) forms that differ from each other, and are prestigious enough, which could indicate that they're actually different languages.

It's all about definitions.

 

[davilan]

now that I can posts links-this is a pretty good article about what I was writing about:

American English - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

other excellent British vs American links:

American and British English differences - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
British English - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
American and British English pronunciation differences - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[birdeen's call]

"This is not a generally accepted statement. It has its supporters, but many people consider AmE and BrE dialects of the same language"

by the way-are any of those people on the American side of the pond?

From Wikipedia:

British and American English, spoken by close political and military allies, are almost universally regarded as dialects of a single language

Not the most reliable source for such statements, but it's true what they say. ;-)

 

[davilan]

They differ and they have the same roots, that's indisputable. The problem is the definitions of language and dialect. Some say that to be a distinct language, a dialect must become incomprehensible enough to other speakers. Most dialects of BrE and AmE are almost perfectly mutually intelligible, so, if we accept mutual intelligibility as the main criterion, we end up with two dialects, not two languages.

There are many other criteria and depending on which we choose to use we will get different classifications. For example, BrE and AmE are spoken in different states, have their standardized (to some extent) forms that differ from each other, and are prestigious enough, which could indicate that they're actually different languages.

It's all about definitions.

You sound American-if so, have you EVER been in the UK!

"a dialect must become incomprehensible enough to other speakers"

Thank you for making my case! UK English that is not on the BBC news is incomprehensible to me.

Welsh English even more so

 

[birdeen's call]

You sound American-if so, have you EVER been in the UK!

I've been to both the UK and the US.

 

[davilan]

I just noticed that you are not a native English speaker-just wanted to note that from what you've written here I wouldn't know.

If I'd met many UK speakers that sounded like you-I might buy that American is an English dialect. It has it's own language rules, grammar and sentence structure, spelling etc. and there are now more non British English words in an American dictionary as British English words. That is a language.

 

[AlexAD]

May I just ask why is it important to learn one or another English dialect? (or whatever they call that) Why not choose a neutral approach? I can hardly believe that two men who speak different English dialects won't understand each other. May be they'll be confused with some details but this is not a surprise for me because this is about all languages.

 

[Barb_D]

I just noticed that you are not a native English speaker-just wanted to note that from what you've written here I wouldn't know.

-- I do agree with you here. BC is most proficient!

It has it's own language rules, grammar and sentence structure, spelling etc. and there are now more non British English words in an American dictionary as British English words. That is a language.

I agree that we spell several words differently, but not at all that we have a different sentence structure and certainly not that there are more "non British word" (by this I assume words that would not be in a dictionary used in England) than "British words).

That's crazy. I know the 100 most commonly spoken words are identical in both dialect and I'm willing to bet that the vast majority of the nex 200 are as well - spelling aside.

Simply becaue one calls something a truck and the other calls it a lorry makes them no more different than three parts of the US where one thing is called a spigot in one place and tap in another and a facucet in the third.

I can't understand why you would want to devote 250 pages to teaching the differences when they are 98% the same. (My estimate - but I surely don't believe it's less than 95%.)

 

[bagzi94]

May I just ask why is it important to learn one or another English dialect?

Because I don't want to mix two languages.
And I think most of the people speak AE.

 

[bhaisahab]

-- I do agree with you here. BC is most proficient!



I agree that we spell several words differently, but not at all that we have a different sentence structure and certainly not that there are more "non British word" (by this I assume words that would not be in a dictionary used in England) than "British words).

That's crazy. I know the 100 most commonly spoken words are identical in both dialect and I'm willing to bet that the vast majority of the nex 200 are as well - spelling aside.

Simply becaue one calls something a truck and the other calls it a lorry makes them no more different than three parts of the US where one thing is called a spigot in one place and tap in another and a facucet in the third.

I can't understand why you would want to devote 250 pages to teaching the differences when they are 98% the same. (My estimate - but I surely don't believe it's less than 95%.)

I agree, American English is no more different from standard BrE than Irish English or Scots English, or even some English English dialects.

 

[nyota]

Because I don't want to mix two languages.
And I think most of the people speak AE.

Most people speak Chinese. ;-)