Talk:Comparison of American and British English

Talk:American and British English Differences (Archive 1)

Am I right in thinking that Canadians, perhaps in an attempt to preserve some differences from their southern neighbours, also use tap rather than faucet? jimfbleak

Tap is much more common in Canada; I believe there's even research on it. I've heard tap all my long life, though, so in that period it wasn't introduced as a deliberate alternative to faucet. Jfitzg

I've just thought of one difference. In Europe, we say 'two thousand and three' for 2003 (I to be alkward say 20-0-3!) whereas americans say 'two thousand three' not using the 'and'. Is this widespread or just a phenomenon associated with news anchors? JTD 07:52 Feb 19, 2003 (UTC)

That's pretty widespread. Here in Canada I even had someone try to "correct" me when I wrote "one hundred and twenty dollars" on a cheque, with the claim that meant $100.20, which I thought was ridiculous. Bagpuss

(There's another one: US - news anchors. UK + Irl: newscasters or newsreaders) JTD 07:52 Feb 19, 2003 (UTC)

(newscasters is not unheard of, though rare, newsreaders is unknown to me) I think most Americans would just two-thousand-three -- I would, anyway. Tuf-Kat

Newsreaders is an old term from the time when actors rather than journalists 'read' the news, becoming professional newsreaders. (Kenneth Kendel in the UK and Charles Mitchell in Ireland spring to mind.) By the 1980s, most stations used professional journalists, who to show their journalistic cred insisted on being called newscasters to show they weren't mere actors reading someone else's script. Call a newscaster a newsreader is a bit like calling Rev. Jerry Falwell a catholic: you better duck before you get a punch!!! (But the term still is used, to the fury of journalists. JTD 08:03 Feb 19, 2003 (UTC)

Could someone say how an American would interpret "Highly Inflammable"? - in the UK, contrary to appearances it normally appears in warning signs, meaning "very likely to catch fire". Arwel 22:02 Feb 19, 2003 (UTC)

"Wait, inflammable means the same as flammable? What a crazy language!" - Dr. Nick Riviera

Taking, as I do, the Simpsons as my guide to America, they have the same thing there. Bagpuss

The word inflammable is not used in American English. I suspect that many Americans would be highly confused by it. They might guess that it means "fireproof", the opposite of flammable, which is what warning signs in the US say. However, if an American saw inflammable on a warning sign, they could possibly figure the correct meaning out from context. (fireproof would be an advertising claim, not a warning)

According to my dictionary, flammable and inflammable mean the same thing. Flammable is always used on warning signs in the US. The use of inflammable, though technically correct, is considered too confusing.

The terms combustible, flammable, highly flammable, explosive etc., used on warning signs in the US, have precise meanings which depend on characteristics, such as flash point, of the material involved. Bluelion 23:38 Feb 19, 2003 (UTC)

I've seen inflammable used in writing, but warning signs here in the NE US all seem to say flammable. Perhaps because the ones saying inflammable all have burned down? <g> Mkweise

IIRC, "inflammable" was still common in USA English into the 1960s, but "flammable" became more common and started replacing it in the 1970s. -- Infrogmation

Damn, you must be even older than I am! Mkweise

The words 'flammable' and 'flammability' are in effect deliberate coinages. There are very few older citations in the OED. For 'flammable' it has quotes from 1813 and 1867, then the next one is 1959: it's from the BSI (British Standards Institute), suggesting the adoption of the word 'flammable' for safety reasons, in place of 'inflammable'. Likewise, 'flammability' has two sporadic quotations in the seventeenth century, but next appears in 1942, and in 1963 the BSI again call for the word 'flammability' to be adopted in place of its dangerous synonym 'inflammability'. Gritchka 13:26 27 May 2003 (UTC)

Many fireproof signs have burned down as well. Bluelion 23:47 Feb 19, 2003 (UTC)

The reason "flammable" and "inflammable" have the same meaning is that children and illiterates get confused by the "in-" and think that "inflammable" means "not combustible" when it means "combustible". -- 65.57.137.165 04:22 Feb 20, 2003 (UTC)

The fact that tea refers to a meal (as well as a beverage) in British English should be added, but I'm not sure where exactly. Mkweise

Errr... I don't think there's a North/South divide on tea being an evening meal, it's more of a class thing. Mintguy

Well, when I was a kid on our north Wales farm in the 60s, we had breakfast, dinner (about noon), tea (about 3p.m., or after we got back from school), and supper (about 6p.m.). Oh, and a snack before bedtime. And people were surprised when we put on weight... Arwel 02:14 Feb 20, 2003 (UTC)

Mintguy is correct. It is a matter of class. In Ireland too, we called the midday meal dinner, and the evening meal tea, largely because the meal was based around tea. However upper middle class and upper people tend to have a light 'lunch' in the middle of the day, and a large dinner for the evening meal.

Oh. Well pretty much everyone I've met from the south has lunch and dinner. I'll agree that in the north the posh types will probably use the same, but I'm not sure about the lower classes in the south. Bagpuss

Of course, at school, whether you are in the North or South, you still get school dinners, served by dinner ladies (paid for with dinner money) during the lunch break. It's a confusing world. (I am, of course, referring to the midday meal).

If a Briton said - "My brother is a vet". Everyone would understand that his brother is a veterinarian. If an American said the same thing, would people automatically assume that he is a war veteran, or might there be some confusion as to whether he is a veterinarian or a war veteran? Mintguy

"Vet" does have both meanings in the U.S. and, in abscence of solid context, it can sometimes cause confusion, but usually the intended meaning can be easily determined by context. nknight 12:53 Mar 14, 2003 (UTC)

Q: I am British, and for the noun-form of admonish I say admonishment.

Fred received an admonishment from his teacher for untidy work.

My American wife says admonition.

Fred received an admonition from his teacher for untidy work.

Is this a UK/US difference, are they just alternative words, or is one of us plain wrong! -- Chris Q 09:24 Mar 3, 2003 (UTC)

For what it's worth, I'd say the first, but I wouldn't think the second was wrong. Bagpuss

On an old NOVA production on visual agnosia, one English guy describes another guy's apartment as "an upside down". What does that mean?Arthur 19:30 Mar 14, 2003 (UTC)

Possibly meant that there were two floors and the entrance was on the top one. Not certain on this. Bagpuss

Discussion about the use of double-hyphens for em-dashes and the suggestion to automatically transform them into appropriate markup moved to meta:Automatic transformation of hyphens and dashes

I removed the following claim, on the grounds that there is no body authorized to designate official spellings, and that American dictionaries typically give the -er spellings as standard. (This is regarding words like center/centre.)

"The official American spellings end in -re, but the American people use the -er spelling almost exclusively."

Mark Foskey 03:38 Mar 15, 2003 (UTC)

I like that change. Meant to do it myself on same grounds but forgot. Arthur 21:39 Mar 16, 2003 (UTC)

Does "lounge" really mean "bar" in the States? Bagpuss 23:45 Mar 16, 2003 (UTC)

I think of a specific kind of bar, a relatively quiet place with some sort of generally unobtrusive live music (i.e. a lounge singer, lounge music). Tuf-Kat

Okay, it's not one I'd heard of. UK pubs sometimes have a lounge, a large room with couches (a small one would be the snug). Bagpuss

In the most common usage of "lounge" in the US, it does not mean a "bar". It could mean a bar, but it's much more likely that it simply means a place to relax.

Bagpuss. - You're probably too young to remember this, but most pubs used to have two or more bars, the "public bar" or "saloon bar" was for working men (in workman's clothes perhaps) and might have had lino (linoleum) or possibly even sawdust on the floor, whilst the other bar (the "lounge bar") would be for women in company and the more refined customer and would have had carpet and some soft chairs. A pub might have also had a "snug bar" which would have been a small room for a few people to enjoy their own company. Mintguy (Actually this should go in the the entry on pubs).

It's still like that in Scotland for the most part. -- Derek Ross

I'm surprised the UK doesn't use lounge meaning bar. It is so common in Ireland a pub will often have a separate lounge, with it described as that in the signage. A lounge is usually more comfortable, with soft seating, softer music, carpeted floor, more relaxing. In many ways, a lounge is more feminised, a bar more masculinised, with harder seats, seats at the bar counter, wooden or tiled floor, with Sky sports blaring on a TV (God I hate Sky Sports!). It never dawned on me that that term didn't exist in the UK. STÓD/ÉÍRE 21:03 Apr 7, 2003 (UTC)

Don't let the Englishmen confuse you, JTD. There are still plenty of hotels and public houses with lounge bars, public bars (and even snugs) in the UK of just the type that you describe. Maybe they're dying out in some parts of England but they are still going strong in Scotland. -- Derek Ross 04:37 25 May 2003 (UTC)

What is this idea implied in one of the tables that "flat" does not mean "apartment" in the US. It most certainly does! - especially in the case a apartments that are flats. As is stated in the text, "apartment" has been gradually displacing "flat" in much of the world. My experience is that the generation before mine used the word "flat" instead of the word "apartment". How is the status of the word 'flat' any different in the US than it is in much of the world? Bluelion 00:25 Mar 17, 2003 (UTC)

Well if it's wrong it's a popular misconception in the UK. Bagpuss

I think most Americans are aware of the word, but think it's a Britishism. I don't think I've ever heard an American use it. Tuf-Kat

Well, I've heard lots of Americans use the word "flat" to refer to an "apartment' although, admittedly, some were of a generation before mine. It is , perhaps, somewhat regional, but "Flat for Rent" signs are available at many hardware stores in the US. Believe me, that is a fact. I have current sign catalogs to prove it. Such signs are readily available even today in the US. I doubt sign companies would be selling signs using a word that isn't commonly understood. Bluelion

As a fairly young'un on the US west coast, I've never in my life heard "flat" used to describe an apartment except as a Britishism. I have though managed to google up this page which seems to indicate that "flat" is current in upstate New York and that it's considered exceptional enough elsewhere for an expat to mention it as a regional peculiarity. --Brion 02:25 Mar 17, 2003 (UTC)

I'm not so young and, in my younger days, I heard LOTS of Americans refer to apartments as "flats". In fact, they were pretty disdainful of the word "apartment" - only people "putting on airs" used that word, according to them. That's my experience, growing up in the 'show-me' state of Missouri. And I've seen more "Flat for Rent" signs than I'd care to count. Bluelion 02:38 Mar 17, 2003 (UTC)

Just to add to the confusion, in New Zealand English "apartment" is a fairly specific term while "flat" may mean an apartment but could mean almost any form of rented accomodation including part of a house. "Flatting" used as a varb describes the situation where a group of people who are not a family share any rented accomodation even a whole house.

From above because it's relevant

"This can result either with some variations becoming extinct (as, for instance, apartment has been gradually displacing flat in much of the world) or that wide variations are accepted as "perfectly good English" everywhere. "

I'd have thought that "flat" was more an example of the latter. It's certainly not extinct in the UK. The main reason new buildings contain "apartments" is that "flat" sounds downmarket, due to council flats. A decent example of a now extinct word or phrase required. Bagpuss

In Ireland, an apartment is usually a new development, largely middle class. A flat is usually either council owned or a converted part of an older building, which may have been subdivided. Apartments usually are larger, more modern and almost invariably less well built than older buildings that have been converted into flats. STÓD/ÉÍRE 20:40 Mar 14, 2003 (UTC)

Similar. Either way "flat" is not extinct. Bagpuss

Perhaps "flat" is now extinct in the US but not in the UK. Bagpuss

In Toronto a flat is, or at least was, an apartment which is not self-contained (you share a kitchen or a bathroom). The term is dying out as flats die out.

"Complexion" is still standard British English. PML.

The article claims that "phi is "fie" to Britons and "fee" to Americans". φβκ in "American" though would seem to be "fie beta kappa" not "fee beta kappa": American dictionaries also seem to give the pronounciation "fi": is φ indeed pronounced as "fee" by most Americans? -- Someone else 02:25 Mar 22, 2003 (UTC)

Regarding this time - Full stops/Periods in abbreviations - Americans tend to write "U.S.", "U.N.", "Mr.", "Mrs." etc., while most British will write "US", "UN", "Mr", "Mrs", etc. I regularly get letters from the UK addressed to 'Mr.' and from the US as 'Mr' as were always taught in Ireland that leaving outh the period was dead wrong. So NEVER write St when you mean St. (street or saint), never write Mr. or Mrs. without a period, etc. So whatever about U.S. versus US, saying that putting in a period is an Americanism not found in the UK seems dead wrong. STÓD/ÉÍRE 21:03 Apr 7, 2003 (UTC)

See Guardian style guide http://www.guardian.co.uk/styleguide/page/0,5817,184844,00.html - for abbreviations and http://www.guardian.co.uk/styleguide/page/0,5817,184832,00.html and Times style guide here - for saint. Mintguy

In common usage people in UK, Australia etc. do often use full stops after Mr, Mrs, but the house style preferred by most proper publishers is to omit the full stop for a contraction, i.e. where the last letter is included: so Str. for Street but Rd for Road. Gritchka 13:26 27 May 2003 (UTC)

changed .... which are likely to be misunderstood by most speakers of British English. to ... which could be misunderstood by speakers of British English.. I think that many younger English people have enough exposure to US tv and films to know these terms. There are a lot of people who wouldn't but I would not like to say "most"

Someone who assumes that all British are English, hmmm... Ah, well, Let's see if I can clarify this anyway. Exposure to TV doesn't have anything to with it. I speak from personal experience. I was once the first person (and only) person to attend a car accident in Scotland in which a car had left the road and dropped twenty feet down an embankment before landing on its roof. Luckily the occupant, a Californian, wasn't badly hurt -- a cut on his head -- but when I asked the fuel type (for safety reasons), he told me that it was a gas car. Now I'm well aware that Californians, normally mean petrol when they say gas, but this was a Californian in the UK driving a British car and cars in the UK may use Diesel fuel, petrol, or propane gas as fuel, so perhaps he really did mean gas. Whereas Diesel fuel or petrol are unlikely to explode, a damaged bottled gas tank is an extremely dangerous item for two different reasons. This was one case where it was better to assume that the car really was fuelled by gas rather than petrol and beat a hasty retreat, so we did. I was not going waste time to try and clarify things with someone who was possibly concussed when a possible explosion was looming over us.

The case where a single concept has an American word for it and a different British word, doesn't normally cause confusion. TV and film certainly help there (and most older people have had more exposure than younger people because they've been around longer). The problems arise with words like suspenders or gas where one word can be used for two different concepts. Normally the confusion doesn't matter but merely knowing what is probably meant doesn't mean you know what was actually meant. Sometimes the difference is obvious or unimportant but sometimes you really need to know. -- Derek Ross

Is there any empirical evidence for the following assertion, which I have removed from the article?:

Letter-writing: When starting a letter, Americans usually write a colon after the greeting ("Dear Sir:") while Britons usually write a comma ("Dear Sir,").

Seems doubtful to me. Jfitzg

I've seen the colon as at least an alternative in Am. usage, but I don't know how common it is. I can't recall ever seeing a colon in Br. usage. Gritchka

I was the one who added the assertion. I am British, and have seen Americans use colons many times, which I had never seen over here. However, sorry, there is a subtlety which I did not first realis/ze, that Am usage uses the colon only for a formal letter, while still using a comma for personal letters. A Google search with term "dear Sir" comma colon gives various references to this, e.g.:

http://www.cogs.susx.ac.uk/local/doc/punctuation/node52.html http://newark.rutgers.edu/~jlynch/Writing/c.html (section Colon) http://www.louisville.edu/a-s/writingcenter/semiandcolons.html (scroll near to bottom)

Please could you reinstate the comment, but with the modification that the difference only applies to formal letters.

Alan

Thanks for the clarification. I didn't realize the British used commas in formal letters. More sensible, though. I'll restore it. To the right place, I hope. Jfitzg

This bit:

...in some Northern dialects, while means "until". Not knowing this caused a number of fatalities when automatic level (railway) crossings were first introduced with signs saying "do not cross the track while the lights are flashing"; people in the North waited for the flashing lights before crossing the line. Similarly instructions on equipment "do not press start while this cover is removed" have had to be changed for England.

Sounds like an urban legend to me. I asked about it on the Wordcraft board, and no-one British believed it to be true. Is there any evidence for it?

Pauld

Chambers Dictionary gives 'until (Northern dialect)' as one sense for the conjunction and 'until (Shakesp; Northern dialect)' for the preposition. The admirable Michael Quinion at http://www.quinion.com/words/qa/qa-whi2.htm discusses BrE v. AmE use of 'while'/'whilst' but doesn't mention this traditional story, and I'm inclined to think he would know it if it was true. Gritchka

Yes, indeed. I agree that while can mean until in some Northern dialects, but I'd think this is largely in speech, and that even speakers of the dialect would have no trouble at all with the written "while". I just don't believe that "this caused a number of fatalities" or that there was good reason to change the equipment instructions, if indeed they were changed. Sounds much more like an urban legend popular because it puts "stupid Northerners" in a poor light; same family as "Irish milk-bottles have Open other end written on the bottom".

Pauld 10:16 28 Jun 2003 (UTC)

I've got an e-mail back from Michael Quinion scorning the story, so I think we can dump it. He agrees with your points that (a) the signs never said that, and (b) standard 'while' would certainly be understood standardly in context. Gritchka 17:17 28 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Thanks Gritchka. My perception (as a British writer) is that whilst and while are almost interchangeable, although whilst feels slightly more old-fashioned than while. As great efforts have been made in recent years to write signs and official documents in straightforward English, I'd be very surprised if they now "nearly always"" use whilst. As a google of a couple of UK Government departments' sites gives about four times as many hits for while as for whilst, I've rewritten the para. Pauld 00:34 29 Jun 2003 (UTC)

I changed the supposed reference to while in the story on Northern railway signage to whilst. If whilst was seen as meaning until then the sentence must have been used with whilst not while. If it used while there could have been no confusion. Also - saying that whilst seems slightly old fashioned is POV. Whilst is still widely in many parts of Britain and Ireland and is still widely used in legislation.

BTW re the above comment about the Irish and milk bottles, the Irish don't use milk bottles they use cartons and have done for many many years. FearÉIREANN 14:24 29 Jun 2003 (UTC)

It's while that is used by Northerners to mean until. (My husband's from Lincolnshire and they say it all the time, eg. "I'll wait while you're ready.") Whilst means something else entirely and would not be used on a sign like that, so I've taken the liberty of changing it back. Deb 21:45 29 Jun 2003 (UTC)

Yes, I have fixed the article. I removed the "not often used in speech" because in areas where while has a different meaning whilst is very frequently used in speech. -- Chris Q 06:33 30 Jun 2003 (UTC)

FearÉIREANN, my point was the the story about level-crossing fatalities is untrue, in the same way the the "Irish milk-bottle" joke is untrue. If the Irish don't in fact have milk-bottles, it's irrelevant -- the story isn't told by Irish people, and (presumably) it's not supposed to be true.

Chris Q, you didn't in fact "fix" the article, because the second para started "because of this" which you made to refer to the fact that official docs use whilst. Also the claim that official docs use whilst "to avoid misunderstanding" is POV, and has the feeling of the level-crossing story about it. I've tried a small re-ordering.

I've also restored aeroplane to the list of spelling differences; 62.64.141.46 took it out (but not the American airplane) as one of a list of otherwise excellent changes. Not sure why he/she took it out. Pauld 11:33 30 Jun 2003 (UTC)

I guess it was removed because it was not a straight ae -> e substitution like the rest, in fact a different word rather than a different spelling. I will remove it again because I don't see it as a "spelling difference", but since it is a bit of a judgment call I won't argue or remove it again if anyone reinstates it. -- Chris Q 08:57 1 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Makes sense to me. -- Pauld 12:20 1 Jul 2003 (UTC)

The most recent edit has made the following out of what was previously a badly formed sentence. "The British use the American spelling of encyclopedia as part of their language." I'm not sure this is what the original author intended. I certainly don't think it's true. Mintguy 18:50 24 Jul 2003 (UTC)

Well, yes, but before it said

The British accept use the American spelling of encyclopedia as part of their language. (My emphasis)

... which to me at least suggests that the American spelling has been imposed against the will of the British, but they accept it as something they have to live with, and so is arguable POV (of course, I agree with said POV, so...). Also, I agree that what it's been replaced with, as it were, suggests something that isn't true, but I can't think of a concise way of putting it that is NPOV.

James F. 19:15 24 Jul 2003 (UTC)

I've changed it. See what you think now. Pauld 13:25, 31 Jul 2003 (UTC)

That seems fine. Thanks.

James F. 04:09, 1 Aug 2003 (UTC)

I have another list that I have been working on for a while; will someone attempt to incorporate? --Kaihsu 05:40, 17 Aug 2003 (UTC)

On Wikipedia I sometimes see something like "Washington State, named for George Washington, ...", whereas I would normally write "Washington State, named after George Washington, ...". Is this a British/American difference or is this just me being ignorant? Mintguy 11:30, 20 Aug 2003 (UTC)