British and American English: Difference between revisions

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imported>Ro Thorpe
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|flat/apartment<ref>Increasingly heard in British English; in San Francisco, California, at least, a city of small, shared buildings, both "flat" and "apartment" are used, mostly interchangeably. Purists, however, distinguish between the two: an "apartment" is in a building that has a shared main entrance; a "flat" has its own outside entrance door.</ref>
|flat/apartment<ref>Increasingly heard in British English; in San Francisco, California, at least, a city of small, shared buildings, both "flat" and "apartment" are used, mostly interchangeably. Purists, however, distinguish between the two: an "apartment" is in a building that has a shared main entrance; a "flat" has its own outside entrance door.</ref>
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|(Association) football
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|full stop
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|lorry/truck<ref>British trucks are traditionally small, and pulled, typically on rails.</ref>  
|lorry/truck<ref>British trucks are traditionally small, and pulled, typically on rails.</ref>  

Revision as of 19:43, 19 March 2008

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This article examines the differences between British and American English in the areas of vocabulary, spelling and phonology.

Vocabulary

Lexical differences are:

British American
autumn autumn/fall
car-park parking lot
chips (French/french) fries [1]
condom condom/rubber (vulgar slang)
crisps potato chips
curtains drapes/draperies/curtains
film movie [2]
flat flat/apartment[3]
(Association) football soccer
lift elevator
full stop period
lorry/truck[4] truck
nappy diaper
off-licence liquor store
pants underwear/underpants
pavement sidewalk
petrol gasoline/gas
road road/pavement
rubber[5] eraser
sweets candy
sweetshop candy store
trousers trousers/pants

Spelling

The most striking differences between the spelling of AmE and BrE are in these suffixes (the accents show stress and pronunciation, see English phonemes):

British - American -
-ence defénce -ense defénse
offénce offénse[6]
lîcence noun lîcense

Notes

  1. Though strictly, these are two different shapes, chips being broader than fries.
  2. ‘Movie’ is nowadays normal in BrE when talking Hollywood.
  3. Increasingly heard in British English; in San Francisco, California, at least, a city of small, shared buildings, both "flat" and "apartment" are used, mostly interchangeably. Purists, however, distinguish between the two: an "apartment" is in a building that has a shared main entrance; a "flat" has its own outside entrance door.
  4. British trucks are traditionally small, and pulled, typically on rails.
  5. A pitfall for British visitors to America, where 'rubber' is a vulgar term for a condom.
  6. In American sporting contexts, one may hear óffénse and dêfénse.