AIRO INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL VOLUME 6 ISSN 23203714



Review, Comparison & Modern Changes in British &?American English Submitted by : TANU PRIYA? Research Scholar English ?Abstract The use of English in the United States was inherited from British colonization. The first wave of English-speaking settlers arrived in North America in the 17th century. During that time, there were also speakers in North America of Spanish, French, Dutch, German, Norwegian, Swedish, Scots, Welsh, Irish, Scottish Gaelic, Finnish, Russian (Alaska) and numerous Native American languages. 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 470–570 million people, approximately a quarter of the world's population at that time. ? Any American English?accent?or sound system perceived as free from recognizably local, ethnic, or cultural characteristics is popularly called "General American." The term supposes a mainstream form of American English, though linguists do not actually identify any single dialect as uniform and widespread enough to be regarded as the "standard" for English in the United States. More precisely, American English comprises a spectrum of different dialects.Introduction Although spoken American and British English are generally mutually intelligible, there are occasional differences which might cause embarrassment—for example, in American English a?rubber?is usually interpreted as a?condom?rather than an?eraser; and a British?fanny?refers to the female pubic area, while the American?fanny?refers to an?ass?(US) or anarse?(UK). Likewise the Australian?root?means to have sexual intercourse whilst in both British and American English it means to support someone for success. Review of Literature American English and British English (BrE) differ at the levels of phonology, phonetics, vocabulary, and, to a lesser extent, grammar and orthography. The first large American dictionary, An American Dictionary of the English Language, was written by Noah Webster in 1828; Webster intended to show that the United States, which was a relatively new country at the time, spoke a different dialect from that of Britain. Differences in grammar are relatively minor, and normally do not affect mutual intelligibility; these include, but are not limited to: different use of some verbal auxiliaries; formal (rather than notional) agreement with collective nouns; different preferences for the past forms of a few verbs (e.g. AmE/BrE: learned/learnt, burned/burnt, and in sneak, dive, get); different prepositions and adverbs in certain contexts (e.g. AmE in school, BrE at school); and whether or not a definite article is used, in very few cases (AmE to the hospital, BrE to hospital). Often, these differences are a matter of relative preferences rather than absolute rules; and most are not stable, since the two varieties are constantly influencing each other. Differences in orthography are also trivial. Some of the forms that now serve to distinguish American from British spelling (color for colour, center for centre, traveler for traveller, etc.) were introduced by Noah Webster himself; others are due to spelling tendencies in Britain from the 17th century until the present day (e.g. -ise for -ize, although the Oxford English Dictionary still prefers the -ize ending) and cases favored by the francophile tastes of 19th century Victorian England, which had little effect on AmE (e.g. programme for program, manoeuvre for maneuver, skilful for skillful, cheque for check, etc.). The most noticeable differences between AmE and BrE are at the levels of pronunciation and vocabulary. While written AmE is standardized across the country, there are several recognizable variations in the spoken language, both in pronunciation and in vernacular vocabulary. General American is the name given to any American accent that is relatively free of noticeable regional influences. After the Civil War, the settlement of the western territories by migrants from the Eastern U.S. led to dialect mixing and leveling, so that regional dialects are most strongly differentiated along the Eastern seaboard. The Connecticut River and Long Island Sound is usually regarded as the southern/western extent of New England speech, which has its roots in the speech of the Puritans from East Anglia who settled in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. The Potomac River generally divides a group of Northern coastal dialects from the beginning of the Coastal Southern dialect area; in between these two rivers several local variations exist, chief among them the one that prevails in and around New York City and northern New Jersey, which developed on a Dutch substratum after the British conquered New Amsterdam. The main features of Coastal Southern speech can be traced to the speech of the English from the West Country who settled in Virginia after leaving England at the time of the English Civil War, and to the African influences from the African Americans who were enslaved in the South. Although no longer region-specific, African American Vernacular English, which remains prevalent among African Americans, has a close relationship to Southern varieties of AmE and has greatly influenced everyday speech of many Americans. A distinctive speech pattern also appears near the border between Canada and the United States, centered on the Great Lakes region (but only on the American side). This is the Inland North Dialect—the "standard Midwestern" speech that was the basis for General American in the mid-20th Century (although it has been recently modified by the northern cities vowel shift). In the interior, the situation is very different. West of the Appalachian Mountains begins the broad zone of what is generally called "Midland" speech. This is divided into two discrete subdivisions, the North Midland that begins north of the Ohio River valley area, and the South Midland speech; sometimes the former is designated simply "Midland" and the latter is reckoned as "Highland Southern." The North Midland speech continues to expand westward until it becomes the closely related Western dialect which contains Pacific Northwest English as well as the well-known California English, although in the immediate San Francisco area some older speakers do not possess the cot-caught merger and thus retain the distinction between words such as cot and caught which reflects a historical Mid-Atlantic heritage. The South Midland or Highland Southern dialect follows the Ohio River in a generally southwesterly direction, moves across Arkansas and Oklahoma west of the Mississippi, and peters out in West Texas. ? Objective The main objective of this thesis is to get the current global acceptance of British and American English in the international context of communication mainly in corporate world. Through this work we understand the major differences and the way of acceptance and understand both the languages. Through review we got to know how and where with the differences these languages are being implemented and accepted with the lee. Hypothesis At present, the English language situates itself at a transitional point between two worlds: o the old world where all other usages than standard – informal speech, regional dialect – were considered to be inferior or corrupt, and thus excluded from serious consideration, and o the new world where informal and nonstandard usage is achieving a new presence and respectability within society. American English is increasingly becoming a minority dialect of world English, and, although it has exercised a greater influence on world English than any other variety, it seems to slowly lose its status as the dominant version. A good example in this direction is the situation of the Internet. Conclusion ? The conclusions are drawn in the theory and last chapters. The summary of the findings comes first, focusing on the fact that British English has been influenced by American English since the 17th century. Our research shows that this influence has been present in different fields of activity. In order to provide a detailed view of the Americanisms that entered the British English vocabulary, we classified the 793 words and phrases under two headings: everyday vocabulary (480 terms) and functional varieties (313 terms). In our opinion the whole world witnesses the increasing unification of English towards the status of a world language, as English has some kind of special administrative status in over seventy countries, it achieves a special role when it is made a priority in a country’s foreign-language teaching policy, and communication in the worlds of business and education is expected to be conducted in English. The final conclusion is that the influence of American English on British English was much greater in the beginning, but nowadays words and phrases are filtered and everything useless, pompous, or simply fashion is to be eliminated. The more necessary an item proves to be, the more quickly it will be absorbed into the language and it will accommodate in such a manner that will not be perceived as an intruder anymore References ? ? Airo Article Series 2006 ? Airo Article Series 2007 Airo Article Series 2008 AIEER Research Press 2009 Aruna & Archana: Communication Realities. Chapman, James A. Grammar and Composition IV. 3d ed. Pensacola: A Beka Book, 2002. ?"The names of sports teams, on the other hand, are treated as plurals, regardless of the form of that name. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000 "Conditional would is sometimes used in both clauses of an if-sentence. This is common in spoken American English." ? ................
................

In order to avoid copyright disputes, this page is only a partial summary.

Google Online Preview   Download