American English

It would not be an exaggeration to say that to-day English is the

only language which has so many varieties and is used by such
diverse races, and cultural entities scattered across the vast
geographical areas like the Carribean isles, West African
countries, Pacific Islands, eartwhile British colonies, Canada,
Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and the USA. Curiously
enough, this is also perhaps the only language with widely
divergent forms that make the Indian English appear so different
from the Trinidadian English, and Singaporian English distinct
from the Nigerian English.
However, we must differentiate between these various forms of
English used by those who are not the native speakers of the
language, from the varieties that divergent 'native' speakers use as
in U.S.A., Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa. In
these countries English has become the native language of the
people, though each one of these forms is marked by individual
characteristics, that make it appear so different from the British
English.
The place of American English is somewhat unique among all
these. It was here that the British variety was first transported and
developed into a distinctly divergent form. As Dick Leith says,
'only in America, it seems, have there been attempts to elevate the
status of the colonial variety to that of a language separate from the
English in England.

The question of 'a national tie", a national identity and distinct

character has been very important with the people who settled in
America since early 17th century. 'Among other things language
became a tool whereby Americans, fired by the zeal of nationalism,
forged their separate national character and what country wanted it
more than America? Many Americans thought that now they had
won independence their usage would diverge increasingly from
that of England; and that this would be a good thing. Webster
himself continued to make it different by changing spellings'.

In this manner emerged new pronunciation, new stress patterns,

new
vocabulary, new usage and new syntactic structures. American
English is now recognized by many not just a variety like the Indian,
S.A. or Australian NZ English, but an independent language. Some
even prefer calling it American rather than by a more explanatory
name like American English or English. It is not possible to
dissociate its evolution from the potent historical condition.

The North American continent began to be settled along the

Atlantic seaboard in the seventeenth century, Jamestown being
founded as the earliest settlement. The population mostly came
from the British Isles. Plymouth, Massachusettes. Dover and
Portsmouth, New Amsterdam and Boston followed. This was the
first phase of settlement. Most of the American linguistic traits
pertain to this phase.

The second phase saw the migration of the Irish people in the
late eighteenth century and early nineteenth century caused by
failure of agricultural crop at home. Political disturbances in
Germany also in 1848 led to large-scale movement of population
to the west of Appalachians. They occupied Cincinnati,
Milwaukee and St. Louis. As early some German emigrants had
begun to settle in Pennsylvania. These people came from the
Rhenish Palatinate, and later on developed a language 'consisting
of a compromise of their own various dialects with a strong
admixture of English'. (Albert H. Marckwardt : 51). The
Germans came once again and inhabited Chicago, Detroit,
Cleveland, Buffalo, and New York. The tenacity with which they
clung to their language and cultural identity marked them out as
distinct group in these areas. They even published their German
language newspapers till the middle of this century. During this
period the French explorers, trappers, traders and missionaries
came here to fill the valleys of the St. Lawrence and the
Mississippi led by Champlain and La Salle. French people also
settled around the Great Lake, and gave the names of cities like
St. Louis and New Orleans. These people carried a sort of prestige
value. The cultivated English-speaking families prided in
possessing knowledge of the French language: The influence of
French thought was at its maximum during the latter half of the
eighteenth century. Franklin and Jefferson were not only its
advocates but actively promoted its spread.

The Spaniards colonized the western regions of the country

adjoining the Rockies mountain chain, the Pacific and the Gulf
of Mexico. Their culture and language have left deep and
permanent mark on the life and speech of this part in which the
large individual haciendas subsisted as independent units. This
hacienda culture, commonly encountered in Mexico as recently as
the first decade of the present century was characteristic of Texas
and the southwest.

Another prominent racial stock which is represented in the USA

is the Dutch. The English settlers dispossessed these people from
Denmark in 1660s from New Amsterdam and adjoining places.
They were concentrated in the Hudson Valley. Washington Irving
gives a fine account of these people in his Knickerbocker History.
Their contribution to the making of American English is
considerable. Swedes and Norwegians also form an important
component in this country's ethnic composition.

The Negros, who form quite a significant portion the American

population, were brought from Africa in the seventeenth century
and used as. labour force particularly in the southern and eastern
regions. Black English is spoken in New York, Chicago, Detroit
and Texas region. It has grown into a distinct variety of the
American English.

Initially these various racial immigrants tended to retain their

cultural identities and used their separate languages. As Dick Leith
observes, 'only about 30 percent of the population of New Mexico
could speak English but a statute of demanded schooling in
English, and eighty years later some Texan schools were
discouraging the use of Spanish in the playground'. We have noted
case of the Dutch and the German settlers in and around
Pennsylvania who maintained very little cultural contact with the
hosts. They were highly ethnic in the beginning, given to isolated
living and even published Germ an-language newssheets for a long
period.
"However, in the climate that was growing, demanding greater
participation of all enterprising people in the American
enterpreneurship, it was inevitable that all speak one language - the
language of the first settlers, English. Part of the typical
Americanism can be described as due to the confluence of these
diverse racial types who forged a new common speech, Though
there is said to be little observable regional or dialectal variation in
American speech, certainly not as marked as in the British English,
regional features that clearly distinguish one regional speech
from another by peculiarities of its own are easily identifiable.
Prominent American dialects are southern, South Midland, North
Midland, Inland Northern, New York city, Eastern New England.
Archaisms in American English
It has become commonplace that in more than one way
American English" represents the forms of English spoken by the
17th and the 18th century colonists. What have grown out of the
British language habits remained preserved in American speech.
As C.L. Wrenn says, many seventeenth century usages have
survived in standard American. Archaisms such as the
preservation of gotten as the past participle of set, fall for
'antumn' and aim to for the later English use of aim at, and the
word faucet for tap. To quote Cable-Baugh. Archaism is a
prominent quality of American English, 'the preservation of old
features of the language which has gone out of use in the standard
speech of England. Our pronunciation as compared with that of
London is somewhat old-fashioned. It has qualities that were
characteristic of English speech; in the seventeenth and eighteenth
centuries. The preservation of r in General American and a flat a in
fast, path, etc, were abandoned in southern England at the end of
the eighteenth century. In many little ways standard American
English is reminiscent of an older period of the language.

Someone has compared it to a tree that has been uprooted from

the original soil to be re-planted but since has stopped growing at
all. The simile is striking to some extent.

Pronunciation

What strikes one as a prominent feature of American

English, even when one is not much familiar with it, is its 'drawl'
and the 'nasal tone’. From the first when the early colonists
came, divergence in pronunciation began gradually to develop.
'This has been due in part to changes that have occurred here,
but has resulted still more from the fact that the pronunciation of
England has undergone further change and that a_ variety of
southern English has come to be recognised_as the English
received standard' (Cable-Baugh : 365). Americans use different
vowel sounds in such words as half, past, path, fast, dance, can’t.
The three British RP vowels /D/, /ae/, and /a:/ have merged into
two American English_/a/_and_/ae/. This has also led to a difference
in the distribution of vowels in many sets of words. While most of
the words containing RP /ae/ remain unchanged in Am. English
e.g. cat, bad, man, RP /a/ changes to /ae/ in many words as seen
examples cited above. ‘It is believed by most authorities that the
language of Shakespeare contained no 'broad’ [a] sounds
whatsoever. Accordingly, the fast, calf, bath group of words was
pronounced in England of the sixteenth century as it is in_most of
America today. There is some disagreement over the precise way
and the time at which the broad [a] developed, but there is reason
for believing that even as late as the mid-eighteenth century it had
not yet been adopted. Sheridan's pronouncing dictionary published
in I780, gives no indication of the existence of an [a] vowel in
England _for words of this group’ (Marckwardt: 70).
Similarly, the RP /o/ tends to change to a low back /a/ in
Am. English as in pot, not, lot, hot with a loss of lip-rounding
resulting in a quality akin to /a/ in father.

Pronunciation of neither and either with the high front

vowel for the diphthong as in British speech is again reminiscent
of pronunciation a couple of centuries ago. This has changed
since then, but not in America. 'The American pronunciation of
schedule with sk rather than sh appears to have been an earlier
British pronunciation; The one now prevailing in England was
probably generally adopted during the second quarter of the
nineteenth century. The inter-vocalic r was very much
pronounced in the time of and before Shakespeare. In fact in his
age different vowels were moving and merging to produce new
set of vowels affecting the quality of r sound in such words as
firm, earl, word, etc. The jaw was in approximately mid-position
with the tongue neither excessively advanced nor retarded, but
with its point usually turned upward toward the roof of the
mouth. 'It is this inverted or retroflex position of the tongue
that gives the sound its r-like quality. Presumably, as time
went on, the vowel of err came to be pronounced in southern
England with the tongue less and less inverted, until by the close
of the eighteenth century, the r-colouring appears to have been
lost altogether. The same development took place with r before
consonants, as in ford,-far'.
(Marckwardt: 72)

This r- pronunciation continues to be retained in American

English. Tendency to pronounce 'short 0' with [a] - like quality in
such words as got, crop, hoi, god, stock, frog appears to have had
its origin in a fashionable pronunciation of the seventeenth
century'. Comedies of the Restoration period abound in spellings
suggesting unrounded vowels in these words 'both by the fops
and the true-witcharacters'. Many other books purporting to teaeh
pronunciation to foreigners compare the English short o with the
French or German a. This characteristic has been preserved in Am.
English but has changed in England since then.
In the matter of stress pattern also it is easy to see that Am.
English has largely preserved the archaic system. In such words as
secretory, dictionary, necessary, oratory, the Americans tend to shift
the primary stress to the third syllable. Shakespeare's prosody
indicates a similar pattern in stressing -ary, -ery, -ory as in Hamlet's
line 'Customary suits of solemn black'. It is later on that the British
considerably weakened the third syllable. The following list shows
the differences in the stress distribution pattern in both American
and British English.

Margaret Schlauch observes, 'so far as intonation is concerned,

the American pattern is strikingly monotonous. Sentence melody
begins on a lower level than the corresponding British melody, and
remains close to that level throughout.' Galinsky thus represents
the difference for instance between American and British
intonation of question, calling for an answer of yes or No:

American British
Did it all happen yesterday ? Did it all happen yesterday?
The rhythm of general American speech shows characteristics of
its own, connected with the treatment of unstressed and
secondarily stressed syllables. A more even distribution of
conspicuous syllables reflects an older pronunciation of many
polysyllabic words. This conservatism, possibly connected with
the level intonation, was no doubt fortified by school masters who
in the 18th and the 19th centuries consciously opposed the
reduction of accent and slurring of syllables'. (Hans Galinsky in
Die Sprache des Amerikaners).
Vocabulary
Another area in which the Americans have left their mark is
vocabulary.
'When the settlers arrived from farflung places, they were left
with little " option but to invent new words such as divide, gap,
watershed, foothill, bluff and a whole range of similar terms.
Many words were borrowed from the local Red Indian
population, like raccoon, moose, skunk, chipmunk; some were
bizarre coinages, bullfrog, groundhog, gartersnake, reid
bird, woodchuck, mush 'rat, squash, quahog, wigwam, chinook,
hooch, totem, etc.
However, what strikes one is the typical American preference for
certain set of words to denote common objects for which the
British used certain other set of words. For instance, the British
luggage becomes baggage in American, a lift is an elevator, and
the liftboy is elevator operator. A timetable is a schedule, inquiry
office is information bureau; British braces become suspenders in
America, Chemist's shop is a drugstore, goodswaggon is freight
car, sweets is candy, lorry is truck, spanner is monkey wrinch, to
ring is to call, tin is can. Let us look at the list of words given below.

In addition, some words have developed additional or

different connotations in American English. For example, homely
means in British English domestic or down to earth, in Am.
English it is 'ugly'; pavement means 'footpath' in England while
in U.S. it signifies 'road-sarface’ By dumb the English mean
'mute' for the American it denotes 'stupid'; regular in England
means 'constant', in American 'average' or 'normal'. Differences in
meaning in some other words are given below.

Word Common meaning Additional American

cute endearing meaning
attractive, charming
good fine, nice valid (as of licence, tickets,
to ship to transport by ship to transport by ship, train,-
nervy nervous air or road bold, cheeky

Compound Words
 American predilection for compound words is well known.
Advances made in the field of science and technology exerted
influence in the cultural and social fields also. It is natural that such
a society 'given over to enormous and even excessive working -
the most riotous scene in the world since the break-up of Latin'
(Potter: 162), must rely on the easy word-forming process :
compounds. Recent times have witnessed birth of a large
number of compound formations, and more seem to be on the
way almost every day : Hide-out, for example, is a 'place of
concealment', shake-up is a reshuffle of the staff, get together, a
meeting of any kind, a quick escape is get-away, send-off is
farewell, come-down is a drop in social prestige. Besides, we hear
in day-to-day use such expressions as go-getter, push-over,
dropout, writeup, pickup, set up, feed in, check up, lockout, knock
out, knock up, pay off,'show down, build up, walk away, brush
off, work out, set back, try out, sitdown, output, inlay, outlay,
inset, pullout (newspaper supplement), hand-out, war weary,
carefree, cock-eyed, call girl, baby sit, etc.

'Journalistic writing in the United States has fostered

such linguistic creations in great numbers. ... Such forms
are especially favoured in journalism because they, like
the block compounds, permit the shifting of a concrete
image from a postponed dependent position to the
leading position in a phrase' (Schlauch: 203).

Clipped words are also considered typical American innovation;

so we hear ad in place of advertisement, lube for lubricating oil, co-
ed (first used in 1889) for co-educatinal, enthuse for enthusiasm,
gas for gasoline (1904), movie (1906) 'moving film', talkie for
'talking film' (1913), gym (1897) for gymnasium, prefab (1942)
'prefabricated', prep for 'preparatory', phone for telephone, pike
for turnpike, maths for mathematics and exam for examination.
Blends or portmanteau words also abound in Am. English as they
are effective answer to the growing need for word-creation. One of
the common words is travelogue which is a combination of travel
and monologue. This blend is claimed to have been coined in
1903; cablegram (cable + telegram) appeared in 1868, newscast
(news + broadcast) in 1937, camporee (camp jamboree) in 1940.
Other blend formations that we often hear and read are
paratrooper, airathon, aerobic, hydramatic, skycycle, urinalysis
(urine analysis), citrange ((citron orange), motel (motor hotel),
racon (radar beacon), tiglon (tiger lion), minicam (miniature
camera), amtrac (amphibious tractor), radiotrician, beautician,
mortician, brunch, yellocution. Such coinages have served to
bridge the gap between the formal and informal American
English. In fact, one can say that the distinction doesnot exist in
the US in the sense in which it does in England. A number of slang
terms which were not used formerly in 'dignified' English has
found easy and ungrudging acceptance. Some examples are, drool,
scoop, release,
strike, stag dinner (stag meaning 'a man not escorting a lady'), stag party,
shellout, go it blind, go in for, steam roll, brain storm, to high light, to pin
point, streamline, probe, reds, flimsies, funnies, basics.
Syntax
Charles C. Fries has made exhaustive study of the American English. He
identifies three levels of usage,
i) In the first category are placed those speakers who enjoy a particular social
prestige, are educated and their speech is considered standard form.
ii) In the second class belong the colloquial or 'common' speech.'
iii) Speakers who have had no education or just minimum of it are placed in this
class. Their speech is considered the 'lowest' or 'vulgar'.
'Common' English or the 'vulgur' variety is easily recognised by certain traits.
'Double negatives' are quite commonly heard, for example in We don't have no
ideas, I know not nothing about them, I won't never tell him, etc. This is also a
preserved archaic structure. It is not at all difficult to find double negatives in
Shakespeare's plays or many writers and playwrights of the Elizabethan period.
Here also this is put in the mouth of common fools. He/She don't for he/ she
doesn't, you was for you were and aint for isn't are also common expressions.
Another interesting feature is the use of them for those : 'put them boxes here';
us and our home (for 'we and our home'), him (he) and his brother, indicating
interchange of nominative and accusative cases. In this class of speakers it is
common to hear 'shifting of strong verbs to the weak conjugation, and the
reduction of three principal parts of strong verbs to two: 'I have wrote1, 'she has
gave', 'he seen', 'he done'. Incidentally, this is how in some regional dialects of
England people speak. Charles Dickens, a meticulous observer of common
peoples' mannerisms and habits, often records in their speech such
constructions. This again confirms that the 'typical Americanisms' are nothing
but oldish forms which have simply resisted changes. To quote Margaret
Schlauch once again, 'All these deviations from the standard have origins or at
least analogues in British speech, whether past or present, standard or regional,
or substandard. We have seen that standard writers of the 18th century
employed forms like 'has wrote'. Colloquial English, as represented in dialogue
passages of the 19th century novels, employed both ain't and he don't. The use
of them as a 'demonstrative which is heard in Anglo-Irish, has been traced back to
the 16th century. Southern English dialects like that of Dorset have shifted the
cases of pronouns more extremely than has low colloquial American, though not
in the same way'(193).
A part from these colourful deviations, in the upper class educate'' stratum
that are as conscious of the prestige value attached to their speech,a considerable
difference in the grammatical construction of sentences i$ noticeable between
the English man and the American.
1) For example in Am. English
'a number of irregular verbs has been
regularized, while remaining irregular in Br. English' (Trudgill-Hannah)
Whereas the Englishman would use burnt, learnt, smelt, spelt, spilt, spoilt
the American would add -ed to these words, burned, learned, smelled,
spelled, spilled, spoiled. 89 with dreamt, (dreamed), knelt(kneelefl\. lennt
[leaned), leapt (leaped). '
2) Shall is rarely used in American English except in formal styles or
legal matters. Shan't is hardly used. Will is commoner.
Britis
h American
a) I shall ask you later I will ask you later
Shall I close the door ? Should I close the door ?
I shant be able to do it. I won't be able to do it.
b) Would often takes the place of the habitual modal used to,
When he was stronger, he [ used to (Br. Eng.) do
heavy work, would (Am. Eng.) do heavy work.
c) Would and will in British English is often used in predictive sense
whereas in Am. Eng. should or must is used.
Br. Eng. : That will be the postman Am. Eng. : That
mart ) be the postman should )
Br. Eng. : Would that be the book you want ?
Am. Eng. : Is j that the book you want ?
should J (be)
d) Ought to is more often used in interrogative and negative
instructions in Br. Eng. than in the Am. Eng.
BnEng. Am. Eng.
Ought we always to tell you ? Should we always tell you ?
You oughtn't ) to have done You shouldn't have done that, ought
not / that
e)-Dar« and need are rare in Am. English. They are used in set stylized

Persons under 18 need not apply. I dare say.... (rare

in Am. Eng.)
In American English these two modals are treated as lexical verbs, in
egative and interrogative sentences. British English treats them more as
'"Xihary verbs.
British (auxiliary) American (and British; as
lexical verbs)
Need you be so angry ? Do you need to be so angry ?
I daren't tell the truth I didn't dare (to) tell the truth.
Dare I tell the truth ? Do I dare (to) tell the truth ?
3. The copular verbs seem, act, look and sound are normally followed hy
the preposition like in Am. English; and seem by the infinite to be. In British
English, on the other nand^ by an indefinite NP~~
British American
If seems a long time It seems like a long time
She seems a clever girl She seems to be a clever girl
She acted real clever She acted like real clever
That sounds a bad idea That sounds like a bad idea
The car looks a nice one The car looks like a nice one
4. To follows help in Br. English, but it is deleted in Am. English.
British (and Am.) Typical American
She' 11 help to fix the tap She' 11 help fix the tap
She helped us to fix the tap She helped us fix the tap
5. Similarly, in Br. English order is followed by the passive verb tobe; while
this is also prevalent in Am. English, a typical tendency is to delete tobe.
British (shared by American) Typical American
He ordered town to be evacuated He ordered the town evacuated They
ordered it to be done soon They ordered it done soon
In England it is quite common to hear people use want in the sense of 'need'
with inanimate subjects.
This room wants cleaning Your car wants
repairing
Such usage is unheard of in American English. Another interesting aspect of
the Am. English is that with regard to such collective nouns as team, family,
government, etc. singular agreement and singular pronoun substitution is
usually used. In British English such nouns take the plural verb agreement and
plural pronoun substitution. Regarding this practice, Peter Trudgill and Jean
Hannah say, 'There is a tendency in Br. English to stress the individuality of
the members which is reflected in plural verb agreement and pronoun
substitution, whereas U.S. Eng. strongly tends to stress the unitary function of
the group, which is reflected in singular verb and pronoun forms'. (6Q-61)
Br. English: Your team are doing" we this year, aren't they?
Am. English: Your team is doing well this year, f isn't it
\ aren't they
Numerous other deviations mark the American English from the British
regarding preposition placing, use of adjectives and adverbs, etc. Extensive
studies are being carried on in the fields which show that the 'deviations' have
become established enough.