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The Spelling Differences between American and British English

The Spelling Differences between American and British English. History of English Language Professor Michael Cheng Presenter Helen Cheng. Historical Origins. English spelling was standardized after the publishing of influential dictionaries

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The Spelling Differences between American and British English

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  1. The Spelling Differences between American and British English History of English Language Professor Michael Cheng Presenter Helen Cheng

  2. Historical Origins • English spelling was standardized after the publishing of influential dictionaries • British-Samuel Johnson’s A Dictionary of the English Language (1755) • American- Noah Webster’s American Dictionary of the English Language (1828)

  3. Samuel Johnson • A Dictionary of the English Language • aks. Johnson's Dictionary (1755) • The pre-eminent English dictionary before the OED • “one of the greatest single achievements of scholarship” • Deduce to the origin • Illustrate with literary quotations • Provide Multiple definitions • With illustrations

  4. Noah Webster A Compendious Dictionary of the EnglishLanguage (1806) • Introducing American spelling and words • American Dictionary of the English Language (1828) • Expanding to 70,000 entries • Spelling reform

  5. Spelling Reform • based on the Webster’s combined vision of logic and aesthetics • principle of uniformity: words that were alike, nouns and their derivatives, should be spelled alike. (e.g. musick=>music (musical)) • respell anomalous British spellings(e.g. gaol/jail)

  6. Common Spelling Differences between BrE and AmE • Greek Spelling: -our/-or; -se/-ce; -re/-er • Latin-derived Spelling: -ise/-ize; -yse/-yze; -ogue/-og • Doubled Consonants: -ll • Dropped “e”

  7. Greek Spelling-ise/-ize • British usage: both –ise(more frequent) and –ize (Oxford spelling) e.g. organise, realise, and recognise • American usage: –ize e.g. organize, realize, and recognize • Originated from Greek -ιζειν, Latin -izāre; with the pronunciation /z/ • -ise was influenced by the special French spelling in -iser

  8. Latin-derived Spellingunstressed –our/-or • Nowadays=> -our for British English and -or for American English e.g. colour/color, labour/labor, and flavour/flavor • Derived from Latin non-agent nouns having nominative –or • Borrowed into English from early Old French ending -or or -ur • After the Norman Conquest =>-our in Anglo-French in an attempt to represent the Old French pronunciation • After the Renaissance, some such borrowings from Latin =>original -or • In16th and early 17th century some British scholars => -or for words from Latin and -our for French loans

  9. Doubled Consonants • General rule: when adding a suffix beginning with a vowel to words with final stressed syllable and ending with a single vowel followed by a single consonant • The British English “l” doubling is required for all inflections (-ed, -ing, -er, -est) and noun suffixes -er and –or e.g. counsellor, cruellest, modelling, quarrelled, signalling, traveller, and travelling • In American usage, the spelling of words is unchanged when they form the main part (root) of other words e.g. wil(l)ful, skil(l)ful, thral(l)dom, fulfil(l), fulfil(l)ment, enrol(l)ment

  10. Dropped “e” • British English: usually keep silent e when adding suffixes except it is unnecessary to indicate pronunciation (e.g. believable,bluish) • American English: usually eliminate silent e except for some ambiguous cases (e.g. die=>dying vs. dye=>dyeing) e.g. likeable/likable, ageing/aging, arguement/ argument

  11. Conclusion • Language serves as an indicator of cultural and social differences • Language is changing with time and space • The variants of a single language makes it diverse

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