3. Grammar peculiarities of American words

Grammatical peculiar features are not numerous: a) the substitution of the past simple for present perfect. The present perfect tense is more common in British English than in American, where the simple past tense is usually used instead. For example, I have lost my key. Can you help me look for it? In American English the following is possible: I lost my key. In British English the above would be considered incorrect. However, both forms are accepted in standard American English; b) there are two forms to express possession in English: Have or Have got. (She has a new car. – She has got a new car.).

While both forms are correct and accepted in both British and American English, “have got” is preferred form in British English while most Americans employ the “have”. American English allows “do” as a substitute for “have”, e.g. American: “Have you any food? Yes, I do.” British: “Have you got any food? Yes, I have.”; c) the past participle of the verb get is gotten in American English. For example, He’s gotten much better at playing tennis. British English – He’s got much better at playing tennis.

Nouns of direction with -wards: British forwards, upwards, afterwards, etc.; American forward, upward, afterward.

Collective nouns like team and company that describe multiple people are often used with the plural form of a verb in British English (the team are concerned), and with the singular form in American English (the team is concerned).

There are also a few differences in preposition use:

British English American English

at the weekend on the weekend

Monday to Friday Monday through Friday

please write to me please write me

do something again do something over

fill in a form fill out a form

stay at home stay home

apart from aside from

different from different than

4. Lexical peculiarities of the two variants

Probably the major differences between British and American English lie in the choice of vocabulary. Some words mean different things in the two varieties, e.g. “smart”: American English – clever, British English – well dressed; “bathroom”: AE – a room containing a toilet, BE – a room containing a bath or shower; “homely”: AE – ugly, BE – pleasant; “public school”: AE – fee-paying school, BE – state school; “wash up”: AE – wash face and hands, BE – wash dishes after a meal.

There are words in both variants describing the same meaning:

Meaning BE AE

• the dot and the end full stop period

of a sentence

• unit of paper currency note bill

• mathematics maths math

• the season after summer autumn fall

• day when offices are closed bank holiday legal holiday

• the name of the final letter zed zee

of the alphabet

• large bag carried by females hand bag purse

• place where the goods shop store

are bought

• place where medicines chemist drug store

are bought

• payment in a restaurant bill check

• the business part of a city town centre downtown

• code used when sorting mail postcode zip code

• fuel for vehicles petrol gasoline

• ticket for one trip single one way

• device for obtaining water tap faucet

• portable battery-operated torch flashlight

light source

• contest between two teams match game

• a group of people waiting queue line

for their turn

In some cases a notion may have two synonyms used on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean, but one of them is more frequent in Britain, the other — in the USA. Thus, in the pairs post — mail, timetable — schedule, notice — bulletin the first word is more frequent in Britain, the second — in America. So, the difference lies only in word-frequency.

Different words using in British and American English and express the same things, are called lexical analogues, e.g. lift (BE) – elevator (AE); tin (BE) – can (AE); luggage (BE) – baggage (AE); sweets (BE) – candy (AE); railway (BE) – railroad (AE).

The same word denotes different objects are called divergent, e.g. dresser – BE – кухонный шкафчик, AE – тумбочка.

The 20^th century contributed a great amount of new vocabulary to the English language. For example, the yuppie (Young Urban Professionals), the high-earning 25-30-year-old business executive with the smart car, the mobile phone (or cellphone) and the laptop (or palmtop). The media was transformed: DBS (direct broadcasting by satellite) and dishes appeared.

Some new words have become part of Standard English which is used throughout the world: web site (a document or set of linked documents, usually associated with a particular person, organization, or topic); home page (a document created in a hypertext system which serves as a point of introduction to a person, institution, or company); nettie (a regular user of Usenet, a system of online discussion groups); netiquette (acceptable e-mail behaviour); bad hair day (a day on which everything seems to go wrong); Euroland (a name for a political unit consisting of the countries within the European Union).

Many new words in American English reflect cultural changes in the society. For example, soccer mom – a typical, professional woman with school age children; to homeschool – to teach school subjects to one’s children at home rather than send them to school; to veg (out) – to do nothing, to relax passively; spam – to send junk e-mails.

There can be provided a long list of word pairs of the British and American variants.

British English American English

shop centre mall

to think to guess

flat apartment

underground subway

lorry truck

pavement sidewalk

post mail

tin-opener can-opener

government administration

leader editorial

teaching staff faculty

cinema movie

biscuit cookie

time-table schedule

car auto (mobile)

ground floor first floor

rubbish garbage

primary school elementary school

carriage car (of train)

post mail

kiosk news-stand

parcel package

porridge oatmeal

seaside beach

stalls orchestra stall

tin can

waistcoat vest

waterproof, mackintosh raincoat

corn maise