What is an accent? An accent is a way of pronouncing a language. It is therefore impossible to speak without an accent.

Some people may think they do not have an accent. Or you may think that there are other people who do not have an accent. Everyone has an accent. The term 'accentless' is sometimes used (by non-linguists) about people who speak one of the high prestige 'reference' accents (such as 'General American' or, less commonly, 'RP'), which are associated with people from a fairly wide region and with people of high social class. But these are also accents. I will mention them again later in this FAQ. Your accent results from how, where, and when you learned the language you are speaking and it gives impressions about you to other people. People do not have a single fixed accent which is determined by their experiences. We can control the way we speak, and do, both consciously and unconsciously. Most people vary their accent depending on who they are speaking with. We change our accents, often without noticing, as we have new life experiences. How accurate people are in knowing about you from your accent depends not only on the features of your accent, but also on who the listener is, and what they know about the other people who speak with a similar accent to you. Your accent might be one that is associated with people from a particular place (for example, with being from New York, London, or Delhi). Some people might just hear you as simply being from the US, England, or India. Your accent might give the impression that you spoke some other language before the one you are speaking at the moment (you might speak French with an English accent, or English with a Korean accent). It's impossible to speak without conveying some information through your accent. All languages are spoken with several different accents. There is nothing unusual about English. And not everyone who comes from the same place speaks the same: in any place there is a variety of accents. Language changes over time. We get new words, there are grammatical changes, and accents change over time. If you listen to recordings made by people from your own language community 100 years ago, you will hear for yourself that even over that time accents have changed. Try out some of the links from the Spoken Word Archive Group , for example. Why do languages develop different accents? Human nature. In all sorts of ways, we behave like those we mix with. We are members of social groups, and within our social group we like to behave in similar ways and show that we belong. We do this in language as well as in other ways (e.g. what we wear, what we eat). When groups become distinct, the way they speak becomes distinct too. This happens socially and geographically, but is easiest to illustrate by geographical differences. If a single group splits into two (imagine that one half goes to Island A and one half to Island B), then once they have separated, their accents will change over time, but not in the same way, so that after just one generation the accent of Island A will be different from the accent of Island B. If they stay completely separated for centuries, their dialects may become so different that we will start wanting to say they are speaking two different languages. Humans like to travel. Since humans left their place of origin in East Africa, more than 100,000 years ago, they have spread all over the world. And they have moved in waves in some places, mixing with, or conquering, people who were there earlier. One of the last places humans

reached was New Zealand, which Polynesian people (now known as 'Maoris') settled in the fourteenth century (CE), joined by Europeans four hundred years later. English developed in England as a result of people moving to England from across the North Sea in the fifth century (CE) -- they were at least the fourth major wave of humans to reach the island of Britain, and the descendants of the previous waves were still there when they arrived to mix with them. In modern times (the last 400 years) the activities of aggressive and acquisitive Europeans has resulted in them moving all over the world and taking their languages (especially English, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch and French) with them. Why are the accents a particular place like they are? Separate development accounts for some accent variation. But sometimes we need to talk about the first generation of speakers of a particular language brought up in a new place. The first children to grow up in a new place are very important. The children who grow up together are a 'peer group'. They want to speak the same as each other to express their group identity. The accent they develop as they go through their childhood will become the basis for the accents of the new place. So where does their accent come from? The first generation of children will draw on the accents of the adults around them, and will create something new. If people move to a new place in groups (as English speakers did to America, Australia and New Zealand) that group usually brings several different accents with them. The children will draw on the mixture of accents they hear and create their own accent out of what they hear. The modern accents of Australia are more similar to London accents of English than to any other accent from England -- this is probably because the founder generation (in the eighteenth century) had a large component drawn from the poor of London, who were transported to Australia as convicts. The accents of New Zealand are similar to Australian accents because a large proportion of the early English-speaking settlers of New Zealand came from Australia. The mix found in the speech of the settlers of a new place establishes the kind of accent that their children will develop. But the first generation born in the new place will not keep the diversity of their parents' generation -- they will speak with similar accents to the others of their age group. And if the population grows slowly enough, the children will be able to absorb subsequent children into their group, so that even quite large migrations of other groups (such as Irish people into Australia) will not make much difference to the accent of the new place. Most parents know this. If someone from New York (US) marries someone from Glasgow (Scotland, UK), and these two parents raise a child in Leeds (England, UK), that child will not speak like either of the parents, but will speak like the children he (I know of such a child!) is at school with. To understand what happened in the past we need strong evidence from both language and history. We need to know about the places that migrants came from, and something about the kinds of accents they are likely to have had. Is there a Standard English accent? There is not a single correct accent of English. There is no neutral accent of English. All speakers of English need to cope with many different aspects and learn how to understand them. Some accents are associated with social groups who have high prestige (the kinds of accents spoken by highly educated people, for example), but there are also many of these high prestige accents, all of them regionally based. The accents that are traditionally taught to nonnative speakers of English are high prestige accents from various places. The two most commonly taught accents (in the world as a whole) are both rather artificial: 'General American' (more or less a Mid-Western and West Coast accent, and used by some

high prestige speakers outside this region too); and the British accent 'RP' (which developed in the private boarding schools of the nineteenth century, and is associated with high prestige groups in England). Both these accents are used over a wide geographical area, though in world terms both are regional accents (General American is a US accent, and RP is an accent of England). They are heard more, by more people in the country, than are accents which are associated with a smaller area: so people are familiar with them. These accents are the ones transcribed in dictionaries. Because they are used over wide areas, and used by people of high social class, they are seen as being suitable to teach to foreign learners of English. For this reason, they are called 'reference varieties'. When radio was developed in the early twentieth century, many radio stations in the US and the UK selected their continuity presenters and news readers by their accent. So 'General American' is sometimes known as 'Network English' and 'RP' is sometimes known as 'BBC English.' The effect of these policies of course was to add even further to the prestige of the reference accents, and to increase the population's exposure to them. The BBC, incidentally, no longer has this policy and now uses news readers and presenters with a wider range of accents. In all languages some accents have higher prestige than others. Tests of judgment have been made in many languages which show that people within a community often share judgments. In the UK, for example, the accent associated with the city of Birmingham consistently comes out as being 'ugliest' while London accents tend to be heard as 'criminal'. These judgments are based on stereotypical associations. If British accents are played to Americans, they do not make the same judgments, because they have not learnt to associate different British accents with the same stereotypes British people have. In the US many speakers are prejudiced against 'Southern' accents, but British people would not judge Southern accents badly in the same way. Judgments like this are not based on anything in the accent itself -- if different accents of English are played to Russians who speak no English, they cannot distinguish the high prestige from the low prestige accents. You should try to speak neutrally about different accents, and not suggest that one accent is better than another. The reference varieties are not 'Standard Accents', because no one is required to use them: compare this to spelling -- we are expected to use the Standard Spelling and do our best to correct mistakes. The reference varieties are not more 'careful' or more 'correct' than other accents -- it's just an accident of history that their speakers were the ones with power. Which English accent is closest to the spelling? English spelling is based on the pronunciation of the fourteenth century. No one speaks in that way now. English spelling therefore represents all accents of English equally well, or equally badly. As there are so many accents of English, it is fortunate that we have such an old spelling system which we can all use; otherwise we would be arguing about which accent we should base our spelling on! No modern English accent is exactly like any accent of the past. All accents change over time. It has been suggested that some isolated rural accents (such as in rural Virginia) preserve more features of older accents than do cosmopolitan and mixed urban accents. This is controversial. A very large change took place in some accents of England that seems to have started in the seventeenth century. Speakers in parts the south and east of England started to pronounce /r/ only when it was followed by a vowel. This ed to changes in the way the vowels were pronounced. This change has spread over most of England, and is also found in accents (like Australian, Singapore, and New Zealand English) which developed from English accents of the

last 300years (in these accents 'sauce' might be pronounced the same as 'source' and 'spa' pronounced the same as 'spar'). But accents which developed from English accents older than that (such as most US accents of English) still pronounce /r/ at the ends of words and before consonants. Because this is such a large change, the accents that have kept this 'post-vocalic r', like most kinds of US English, Scottish English, and Irish English, seem more like accents of the seventeenth century than do those of accents which have lost the /r/. But in those accents too, there have been many other changes in the last 400 years. Can I change my accent? Yes. Accents are not fixed. Our accents change over time as our needs change and as our sense of who we are changes and develops. Usually this happens naturally, and often unconsciously. Accents can be expected to change until we are in our early twenties. This is usually the time we come to some sort of decision about who we are. But even after that, if you want (and need) to change your accent, you can. To change your accent you have to want to. Really want to, deep down. This usually happens without much effort because you move to a new place, mix with different people, or develop new aspirations. If a change hasn't happened naturally but you want to change your accent, you should ask yourself why. What is it about the messages you give to people that you don't like? Are you finding it difficult to be a member of a group you want to join because you don't speak in the way the group expects? Do you need to change your badge of identity? Sometimes it is other people's prejudice that you are responding to. Some popular prejudiced against certain groups (many Ask-A-Linguist postings suggest that a lot of people in the US are prejudiced against people from the Southern US). Do you want to accept other people's prejudice? I myself changed my pronunciation of words like book, lookbecause of pressure. I used to pronounce look the same as Luke (/lu:k/), which a lot of people found funny, so I changed look (to the vowel of 'put') to be more like other people. But it is sad to succumb to pressure like this -- it is no different from dark skinned people using skin whitening creams to look like pale skinned people, or East Asian people having their eyelids operated on to get European looking eyes. Anyway, if you do decide you have good reasons for changing your accent, and you want to put in some effort these are some things to do. Identify the accent you want to speak. Expose yourself to the accent you want as much as possible. Try to get some friends who speak with the accent you want. Try to make sure you are not mixing with people who will criticise you for changing your accent.

Here is what is recommended as a method by one of our panelists, Suzette Hayden Elgin. If you do this, it is best to choose recordings of someone of your own gender.: I suggest the following procedure, which has worked very well for many people: 1. Get a cassette tape of someone who speaks English with the accent that you would like to have, at least twenty minutes long. 2. Listen to the entire tape all the way through once or twice, just to become familiar with its content. Don't write it down or try to memorize it. 3. Listen to a brief sequence -- just a sentence or two. Rewind the tape to the beginning of that sentence.

4. Say the sentence aloud _with_ the tape. Don't repeat it after the tape as is done in traditional foreign language courses -- speak with the speaker. Don't worry about making mistakes, just do your best to speak simultaneously with the speaker. 5. Rewind to the beginning of the sentence and do this again, several times. (Ten times is not too many.) 6. Move to the next sentence and do the same thing. 7. Continue until you've worked your way through the whole tape speaking with your chosen model speaker. The amount of time it takes for this to yield good results varies from one individual to another, depending on many factors. I'd suggest working in at least fifteen minute sessions and at least three days each week. When you become so familiar with the tape that you know it by heart or you're so bored with it that you can't stand it, choose a different tape that uses the same accent and repeat the process. Be careful not to work with any one tape so long that you start sounding as if you were trying to do an impersonation of the speaker.

This is one of a series of articles about the differences between British English and American English, which, for the purposes of these articles, are defined as follows: British English (BrE) is the form of English used in the United Kingdom. It includes all English dialects used within the United Kingdom.

American English (AmE) is the form of English used in the United States. It includes all English dialects used within the United States. Written forms of British and American English as found in newspapers and textbooks vary little in their essential features, with only occasional noticeable differences in comparable media[1] (comparing American newspapers with British newspapers, for example). This kind of formal English, particularly written English, is often called "standard English".[2][3] The spoken forms of British English vary considerably, reflecting a long history of dialect development amid isolated populations. Dialects, word use and accents vary not only among the countries of the United Kingdom, England, Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales, but also within these individual countries. Received Pronunciation (RP) refers to a way of pronouncing Standard English that is actually used by about two percent of the UK population.[4] It remains the accent upon which dictionary pronunciation guides are based, and for teaching English as a foreign language. It is referred to colloquially as "the Queen's English", "Oxford English" and "BBC English", although by no means all who live in Oxford speak with such accent and the BBC does not require or use it exclusively.[5]

An unofficial standard for spoken American English has also developed, as a result of mass media and geographic and social mobility, and broadly describes the English typically heard from network newscasters, commonly referred to as non-regional diction, although local newscasters tend toward more parochial forms of speech.[6] Despite this unofficial standard, regional variations of American English have not only persisted but have actually intensified, according to linguist William Labov. Regional dialects in the United States typically reflect the elements of the language of the main immigrant groups in any particular region of the country, especially in terms of pronunciation and vernacular vocabulary. Scholars have mapped at least four major regional variations of spoken American English: Northern, Southern, Midland, and Western.[7] After the American Civil War, the settlement of the western territories by migrants from the east led to dialect mixing and levelling, so that regional dialects are most strongly differentiated in the eastern parts of the country that were settled earlier. Localized dialects also exist with quite distinct variations, such as in Southern Appalachia and New York. British and American English are the reference norms for English as spoken, written, and taught in the rest of the world. For instance the English-speaking members of the Commonwealth often closely follow British English forms while many new American English forms quickly become familiar outside of the United States. Although most dialects of English used in the former British Empire outside of North America are, to various extents, based on British English, most of the countries concerned have developed their own unique dialects, particularly with respect to pronunciation, idioms and vocabulary. Chief among other English dialects are Canadian English, based on the English ofUnited Empire Loyalists who left the 13 Colonies,[8] and Australian English, which rank third and fourth in number of native speakers.

Historical background
The English language was first introduced to the Americas by British colonization, beginning in 1607 in Jamestown, Virginia. Similarly, the language spread to numerous other parts of the world as a result of British trade and colonization elsewhere and the spread of the former British Empire, which, by 1921, held sway over a population of 470570 million people, approximately a quarter of the world's population at that time. Over the past 400 years the form of the language used in the Americasespecially in the United Statesand that used in the United Kingdom have diverged in a few minor ways, leading to the dialects now occasionally referred to as American English and British English. Differences between the two include pronunciation, grammar, vocabulary (lexis), spelling,punctuation, idioms, formatting of dates and numbers, although the differences in written and most spoken grammar structure tend to be much less than those of other aspects of the language in terms of mutual intelligibility. A small number of words have completely different meanings in the two dialects or are even unknown or not used in one of the dialects. One particular contribution towards formalizing these differences came from Noah Webster, who wrote the first American dictionary (published 1828) with the intention of showing that people in the United States spoke a different dialect from Britain, much like a regional accent. This divergence between American English and British English once caused George Bernard Shaw to say that the United States and United Kingdom are "two countries divided by a common language";[11] a similar comment is ascribed to Winston Churchill[citation needed]. Likewise, Oscar Wilde wrote, "We have really everything in common with America nowadays, except, of course, the language" (The Canterville Ghost, 1888). Henry Sweet incorrectly predicted in 1877 that within a century American English, Australian English and British English would be mutually unintelligible. It may be the case that increased worldwide communication through radio, television, the Internet and globalization has reduced the tendency to regional variation. This can result either in some variations becoming extinct (for instance, the wireless, superseded by the radio) or in the acceptance of wide variations as "perfectly good English" everywhere. Often at the core of the dialect though, the idiosyncrasies remain.

Nevertheless it remains the case that, although spoken American and British English are generally mutually intelligible, there are enough differences to cause occasional misunderstandings or at times embarrassmentfor example some words that are quite innocent in one dialect may be considered vulgar in the other.

Grammar
Nouns
[edit]Formal and notional agreement In BrE, collective nouns can take either singular (formal agreement) or plural (notional agreement) verb forms, according to whether the emphasis is on the body as a whole or on the individual members respectively; compare a committee was appointed with the committee were unable to agree.[12][13] The term the Government always takes a plural verb in British civil service convention, perhaps to emphasize the principle of cabinet collective responsibility. [14] Compare also the following lines of Elvis Costello's song "Oliver's Army": Oliver's Army are on their way / Oliver's Army is here to stay. Some of these nouns, for example staff,[15] actually combine with plural verbs most of the time. In AmE, collective nouns are almost always singular in construction: the committee was unable to agree. However, when a speaker wishes to emphasize that the individuals are acting separately, a plural pronoun may be employed with a singular or plural verb: the team takes their seats or the team take their seats, rather than the team takes its seats. However, such a sentence would most likely be recast as the team members take their seats.[16] Despite exceptions such as usage in The New York Times, the names of sports teams are usually treated as plurals even if the form of the name is singular.[17] The difference occurs for all nouns of multitude, both general terms such as team and company and proper nouns (for example where a place name is used to refer to a sports team). For instance, BrE: The Clash are a well-known band; AmE: The Clash is a well-known band. BrE: Spain are the champions; AmE: Spain is the champion. Proper nouns that are plural in form take a plural verb in both AmE and BrE; for example, The Beatles are a wellknown band; The Saints are the champions, with one major exception: largely for historical reasons, in American English, the United States is is almost universal. [edit]Verbs [edit]Verb morphology See also: English irregular verbs The past tense and past participle of the verbs learn, spoil, spell, burn, dream, smell, spill, leap, and others, can be either irregular (learnt, spoilt, etc.) or regular (learned, spoiled, etc.). In BrE, both irregular and regular forms are current, but for some words (such as smelt and leapt) there is a strong tendency towards the irregular forms, especially by users ofReceived Pronunciation. For other words (such as dreamed, leaned, and learned[18]) the regular forms are somewhat more common. In most accents of AmE, the irregular forms are never or rarely used (except for burnt, leapt and dreamt).[19] The t endings may be encountered frequently in older American texts. Usage may vary when the past participles are used as adjectives, as in burnt toast. (The two-syllable formlearnd /lrnd/, usually written without the grave, is used as an adjective to mean "educated" or to refer to academic institutions in both BrE and AmE.) Finally, the past tense and past participle of dwell and kneel are more commonly dwelt and knelt in both standards, with dwelled and kneeled as common variants in the US but not in the UK.

Lit as the past tense of light is more common than lighted in the UK; the regular form is used more in the US but is nonetheless less common than lit.[20] Conversely, fit as the past tense of fit is more widely used in AmE than BrE, which generally favours fitted.[21]

The past tense of spit "expectorate" is spat in BrE, spit or spat in AmE.[22] AmE typically has spat in figurative contexts, for example, "He spat out the name with a sneer", or in the context of expectoration of an object that is not saliva, for example, "He spat out the foul-tasting fish" but spit for "expectorated" when it refers only to the expulsion of saliva.

The past participle of saw is normally sawn in BrE and sawed in AmE (as in sawn-off/sawed-off shotgun).[23]

The past participle gotten is never used in modern BrE (apart from in the dialects of North-Eastern and Western England), which generally uses got, except in old expressions such as ill-gotten gains. 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." The American dictionary Merriam-Webster, however, lists "gotten" as a standard past participle of "get." In AmE gotten emphasizes the action of acquiring and got tends to indicate simple possession (for example, Have you gotten it? versus Have you got it?). Gotten is also typically used in AmE as the past participle for phrasal verbs using get, such as get off, get on, get into, get up, and get around: If you hadn't gotten up so late, you might not have gotten into this mess. Interestingly, AmE, but not BrE, has forgot as a less common alternative to forgotten for the past participle of forget. In BrE, the past participle proved is strongly preferred to proven; in AmE, proven is now about as common as proved.[24] (Both dialects use proven as an adjective, and in formulas such as not proven).[25]

AmE further allows other irregular verbs, such as dive (dove) or sneak (snuck), and often mixes the preterit and past participle forms (springsprang, US also sprungsprung), sometimes forcing verbs such as shrink (shrankshrunk) to have a further form, thus shrunkshrunken. These uses are often considered nonstandard; the AP Stylebook in AmE treats some irregular verbs as colloquialisms, insisting on the regular forms for the past tense of dive, plead and sneak. Dove and snuck are usually considered nonstandard in Britain, although dove exists in some British dialects and snuck is occasionally found in British speech. By extension of the irregular verb pattern, verbs with irregular preterits in some variants of colloquial AmE also have a separate past participle, for example, "to buy": past tensebought spawns boughten. Such formations are highly irregular from speaker to speaker, or even within idiolects. This phenomenon is found chiefly in the northern US and other areas where immigrants of German descent are predominant and may have developed as a result of German influence.[26] Even in areas where the feature predominates, however, it has not gained widespread acceptance as standard usage.

[edit]Use of tenses Traditionally, BrE uses the present perfect to talk about an event in the recent past and with the words already, just and yet. In American usage these meanings can be expressed with the present perfect (to express a fact[citation needed]) or the simple past (to imply an expectation[citation needed]). This American style has become widespread only in the past 20 to 30 years; the British style is still in common use as well. Recently the American use of just with simple past has made inroads into BrE, most visibly in advertising slogans and headlines such as "Cable broadband just got faster".

"I have just arrived home." / "I just arrived home." "I have already eaten." / "I already ate."

Similarly AmE occasionally replaces the past perfect with the simple past.[citation needed]

In BrE, have got or have can be used for possession and have got to and have to can be used for the modal of necessity. The forms that include got are usually used in informal contexts and the forms without got in

contexts that are more formal. In American speech the form without got is used more than in the UK, although the form with got is often used for emphasis. Colloquial AmE informally uses got as a verb for these meanings for example, I got two cars, I got to go. In conditional sentences, US spoken usage often substitutes would and would have (usually shortened to [I]'d and would've) for the simple past and for the pluperfect (If you'd leave now, you'd be on time. / If I would have [would've] cooked the pie we could have [could've] had it for lunch). This tends to be avoided in writing because it is often still considered non-standard although such use of would is widespread in spoken US English in all sectors of society. Some reliable sources now label this usage as acceptable US English and no longer label it as colloquial.[27][28] (There are, of course, situations where would is used in British English too in seemingly counterfactual conditions, but these can usually be interpreted as a modal use of would: If you would listen to me once in a while, you might learn something.)[29][30] In cases in which the action in the if clause takes place after that in the main clause, use of would in counterfactual conditions is, however, considered standard and correct usage in even formal UK and US usage: If it would make Bill happy, I'd [I would] give him the money.[29]

The subjunctive mood (morphologically identical with the bare infinitive) is regularly used in AmE in mandative clauses (as in They suggested that he apply for the job). In BrE, this usage declined in the 20th century in favour of constructions such as They suggested that he should apply for the job (or even, more ambiguously, They suggested that he applied for the job). However, the mandative subjunctive has always been used in BrE.[31]

[edit]Verbal auxiliaries Shall (as opposed to will) is more commonly used by the British than by Americans.[32][33] Shan't is almost never used in AmE, rather is almost invariably replaced by won't or am not going to. American grammar also tends to ignore some traditional distinctions between should and would;[34] however, expressions like I should be happy are rather formal even in BrE.[citation needed]

The periphrastic future "be going to" is about twice as frequent in AmE as in BrE.[35]

[edit]Transitivity The following verbs show differences in transitivity between BrE and AmE: agree: Transitive or intransitive in BrE, usually intransitive in AmE (agree a contract/agree to or on a contract). However, in formal AmE legal writing one often sees constructions such as as may be agreed between the parties (rather than as may be agreed upon between the parties).

appeal (as a decision): Usually intransitive in BrE (used with against) and transitive in AmE (appeal against the decision to the Court/appeal the decision to the Court).[36]

catch up ("to reach and overtake"): Transitive or intransitive in BrE, strictly intransitive in AmE (to catch sb up/to catch up with sb). A transitive form exists in AmE, with a different meaning: to catch somebody up means that the subject will help the object catch up, rather the opposite of the BrE transitive meaning. cater ("to provide food and service"): Intransitive in BrE, transitive or intransitive in AmE (to cater for a banquet/to cater a banquet).

claim: Sometimes intransitive in BrE (used with for), strictly transitive in AmE.

meet: AmE uses intransitively meet followed by with to mean "to have a meeting with", as for business purposes (Yesterday we met with the CEO), and reserves transitive meet for the meanings "to be introduced to" (I want you to meet the CEO; she is such a fine lady), "to come together with (someone, somewhere)" (Meet the CEO at the train station), and "to have a casual encounter with". BrE uses transitive meet also to mean "to have a meeting with"; the construction meet with, which actually dates back to Middle English, appears to be coming back into use in Britain, despite some commentators who preferred to avoid confusion with meet with meaning

"receive, undergo" (the proposal was met with disapproval). The construction meet up with (as in to meet up with someone), which originated in the US,[37] has long been standard in both dialects. provide: Strictly monotransitive in BrE, monotransitive or ditransitive in AmE (provide sb with sth/provide somebody something).

protest: In sense "oppose", intransitive in BrE, transitive in AmE (The workers protested against the decision/The workers protested the decision). The intransitive protest against in AmE means "to hold or participate in a demonstration against". The older sense "proclaim" is always transitive (protest one's innocence). write: In BrE, the indirect object of this verb usually requires the preposition to, for example, I'll write to my MP or I'll write to her (although it is not required in some situations, for example when an indirect object pronoun comes before a direct object noun, for example, I'll write her a letter). In AmE, write can be used monotransitively (I'll write my congressman;I'll write him).

British English/American English Vocabulary

Here are some of the main differences in vocabulary between British and American English. This page is intended as a guide only. Bear in mind that there can be differences in the choice of specific terms depending on dialect and region within both the USA and the UK. British English anti-clockwise articulated lorry autumn barrister bill (restaurant) biscuit block of flats bonnet (clothing) American English counter-clockwise trailer truck autumn, fall attorney bill, check cookie apartment building hat

bonnet (car) boot bumper (car) caravan car park chemist's shop chest of drawers chips the cinema clothes peg coffin crisps crossroads cupboard diversion drawing-pin drink-driving driving licence dual carriageway dummy (for baby)

hood trunk bumper, fender trailer parking lot drugstore, pharmacy dresser, chest of drawers, bureau fries, French fries the movies clothespin coffin, casket potato chips intersection; crossroads (rural) cupboard (in kitchen); closet (for clothes etc) detour thumbtack drunk driving driver's license divided highway pacifier

dustbin dustman engine estate agent estate car film flat flat tyre flyover gearbox (car) gear-lever Girl Guide ground floor handbag high street holiday hood (car) jam jug

garbage can, trash can garbage collector engine, motor real estate agent station wagon film, movie apartment, flat, studio flat tire overpass transmission gearshift Girl Scout ground/first floor handbag, purse, shoulder bag main street vacation convertible top jam, preserves jug, pitcher

juggernaut lift lorry mad main road maize maths motorbike motorway motorway nappy naughts and crosses pants, underpants pavement pet hate petrol The Plough pocket money post

18-wheeler elevator truck, semi, tractor crazy, insane highway corn math motorcycle freeway, expressway highway, freeway, expressway, interstate highway, interstate diaper tic-tack-toe underpants, drawers sidewalk pet peeve gas, gasoline Big Dipper allowance mail

postbox postcode postman pub public toilet railway return (ticket) reverse charge ring road road surface roundabout rubber rubbish rubbish-bin saloon (car) shop silencer (car) single (ticket)

mailbox zip code mailman, mail carrier, letter carrier bar rest room, public bathroom railroad round-trip collect call beltway, freeway/highway loop pavement, blacktop traffic circle, roundabout eraser garbage, trash garbage can, trashcan sedan shop, store muffler one-way

solicitor spanner sweets taxi tea towel telly (informal), TV third-party insurance timetable tin toll motorway torch trousers tube (train) underground (train) vest waistcoat wallet wellington boots whisky

lawyer, attorney wrench candy taxi, taxi cab dish towel television, TV liability insurance schedule can toll road, turnpike flashlight pants, trousers subway subway undershirt vest wallet, billfold rubber boots, rain boots whiskey, scotch

windscreen zip

windshield zipper

British English Vs American English In India, USA, and many other countries, the English language was first introduced by the process of British colonization. After independence, India retained the British form of the language whereas USA decided to develop its own form. Noah Webster, compiler of the first American dictionary, can be held partially responsible for this. He felt that words ought to be spelt like they sound, and he also wanted USA (an emerging super power) to assert its cultural independence and was not keen on following the British form of the language. The two languages differ primarily in the following aspects. Vocabulary : Let us consider some vocabulary differences 1. Americans use the word apartment whereas in India (or Britain) the word is replaced with flat. 2. Trash is a common term in USA but British English uses the wordrubbish. 3. The term ill is specific to the British form of the language. In America, it is replaced with the word sick. 4. The word schedule too is specific to the American form. The British form of the word is timetable. 5. The commonly used term toilet or public toilet is hardly heard in America. If in need, ask for a rest room. Spelling : Let us consider some spelling differences 1. OUR VS OR - In America, words like favour are spelt without the U. The correct spelling according to the American form is favor. Another example would be the word labour which in USA is spelt as labor. 2. RE VS ER - British English spells words like centre, theatre and litre using RE however American English replaces the RE with ER so centre becomes center, theatre becomes theater and litre becomes liter. 3. ISE VS IZE - British English spells words like specialise, commercialise using ISE but American English replaces the ISE with IZE. 4. CE VS SE - Were used to spelling defence using CE but Americans replace the CE with SE and defence becomes defense. 5. AE VS E - British English spells archaeology with an AE(highlighted), Americans use only E and omit the A thus spelling the word as archeology 6. OEU VS EU - A similar rule applies to words like manoeuvre which British English spells with OEU whereas American English spells using only EU.

7. OGUE VS OG - British English spells words like Catalogue using OGUE whereas American English spells them as Catalog thus omitting ue and using OG. Let us now take a look at some more rules. British English American English Woollen, Jewellery , TravellingWoolen, Jewelry, Travel Omelette Omelet Pyjamas Pajamas Sulphur, Sulfur Draught Draft Ageing Aging Transferral Transferal Date and Time : Let us consider some differences in date and time 1. In the United States, dates are written in the month/date/year format (12/13/2011). Followers of the British form though are more familiar with the date/month/year format (13/12/2011). 2. British English teaches us to write time using a full stop (6.00). American English uses a colon in place of the period making it look like 6:00. Pronunciation : Certain words are pronounced differently by those who align themselves with American English and those whose loyalties lie with the British form. For e.g., hostile is pronounced to rhyme with file by the British whereas the Americans prefer to homophonise it with hostel, even though it is spelt the same way everywhere. The same applies to missile. Other examples include privacy, pronounced priv-uh-see by the British but prahy-vuh-see by the Americans, and semi pronounced sem-ee by the British and sem-eye by the Americans. Titles and acronyms : The British form omits the period after Dr, Mr, Mrs, etc, while American speakers feel the need for one. They would write, Dr., Mr., and Mrs., etc. The rule works differently when it comes to acronyms. The American form believes in the use of the period after each initial (U.S.) whereas the British form does not (US)