Talk:American English/Archive 3

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This is an archive of past discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page. If you wish to start a new discussion or revive an old one, please do so on the current talk page.

Small omission

Sorry I don't know how to fix this myself, but I noticed that there is an article for Trinidadian English (well, a stub), but it is not listed in the table on the side of this article. Someone who knows out how to edit that table should add it in.

Sources needed for these derivations

I've moved these words to the discussion page because it's not obvious why they're in the section for words derived from French.

jambalaya: rice cooked with herbs, spices, and ham, chicken, or seafood
zydeco: a native Louisiana style of music

(In the case of zydeco, there's a suggestion that it comes from a song beginning, "Les haricots...", but the Wikpedia article says this is contested and it certainly seems a long way from les haricots to zydeco.)

If someone can provide good sources for the derivation of these words, perhaps they could put them back in an appropriate section with the source. Adrian Robson 08:33, 12 September 2005 (UTC)

Questionable loanwords

The loanwords list is goofy. Many of the loanwords, I'd guess 30%, are generally not considered English. They are considered foreign words, but everyone knows what they mean; there is a profound difference. Cojones, frijoles, jefe, hombre, lagniappe, pirogue, Barangay, klahanie, skookum, da kine, and sayonara are no more considered English than the equally commonly used agua or adiós. Tempshill 21:52, 22 September 2005 (UTC)

Totally agree, for a loanword to be relevant it needs to express something not available in the host language. "Machismo" would seem correct, but "hombre" is just a figure of speach. Stamford spiney 19:38, 25 September 2005 (UTC)

I'm not convinced that a list of actual loanwords is even relevant, is it? NickelShoe 23:38, 25 September 2005 (UTC)

For the record, I have every intention of editing the article to get rid of the list in a few days if no one says anything. I think that the concept of loanwords in American English is relevant, but a list of them should only be used (in this article) to illustrate that concept, and, as such, only about five good examples would be reasonable. NickelShoe 16:06, 1 October 2005 (UTC)

I won't shed a tear to see the list trimmed or even eliminated. It's POV and reeks of OR. --Angr/_{tɔk tə mi} 16:52, 1 October 2005 (UTC)

It certainly needs to be clarified. What does it mean to say that this is a list of words common in American English but not common in British English? Take raccoon for example. I don't suppose there are any raccoons in Britain, so the need for the word is relatively limited. But that doesn't mean that the word is unknown. I would guess that 99.9% of the population has seen them on American films and has no trouble coming up with the word when needed. Americans see raccoons more often so they use the word more often. But so what?

By contrast, turkey and potatoes, both exports from America to Britain, have their names used all the time in Britain because people see them both every time they visit a supermarket. So all three words are known in both countries but the subject of one of them (raccoon) is seen more often in one country than the other. This may tell us something about the wildlife of the two countries but does it tell us anything useful about the language?

In the rest of the list I would guess that most British know the words in the following list. But I doubt whether it's particularly relevant in an article about American English whether these words are commonly used by the British (or the Australians, or Canadians, or South Africans or anyone else, for that matter.)

Cookie (used all the time), stoop (standard word in South Africa), caboose (cowboy films), café au lait, bonsai (has British enthusiasts, too), Ginseng (any health store), hunky-dory (standard in British speech), origami (books tell you how to do it), sushi (an alternative to sandwiches for lunch), sayonara, karaoke (the average pub would be surprised that this is an American import), bayou (Roy Orbison), hickory, that neck of the woods (sounds British), powwow (cowboy films again), raccoon (see above), skunk (same as for raccoon), squash (buy them at the local supermarket), woodchuck (used in a tongue twister), moccasin, (look at the British shoe style labels), adobe (a kind of software - okay, maybe not), burrito, (get them in the supermarket), desperado (cowboy films again), enchilada (supermarket again), gringo (cowboy films), hacienda (actually that might not be widely understood), hombre (no problemo), jalopy (standard British), peccadillo (standard English since 1591 - OED), savvy (cowboy films) vamoose (cowboy films), boondocks. Adrian Robson 17:58, 1 October 2005 (UTC)

It might be interesting to have a list of English that verifiably first entered the language in the United States (with no assertions concerning their recognizability in Britain, Australia, and elsewhere), but such a list should be a separate article, not part of this one. --Angr/_{tɔk tə mi} 18:50, 1 October 2005 (UTC)

I removed the whole section on loanwords. If somebody wants to put a condensed version back in, I'd suggest tying it into the main article a little better instead of just making a list. NickelShoe 15:25, 8 October 2005 (UTC)

Public school

Public school Public school (UK)

There is a hot debate taking place over at Talk:Public school (UK) and Talk:Public school regarding the differences between language and culture in Scotland and England, with the Scottish definition being in line with the US, Canadian, Australian and the rest-of-the-world. But a small number of English patriots seem to want to keep the various colonies in their place and have the English definition dominate the two articles.

Personally, I'm not even sure that there should be a separate article on English public schools, as they are simply a sub-topic of private schools, but if there must be an article it should be called Public school (England) and not Public school (UK) (sic).

Anyway, we Scots would appreciate some input from our "co-definitionists" in the USA!--Mais oui! 20:51, 27 September 2005 (UTC)

Americo-centrism/Amerigo-centrism

The few lines about mid-west english being closer to 17th century english than modern times is a bit brave and certainly inaccurate!? -max rspct 00:28, 18 October 2005 (UTC)

It's probably too strong a statement; as the following discussion shows, there are many ways in which American English is more conservative than English English, but there are also many innovations AE has gone through, and in those respects EE is more conservative. But even if the statement is too strong, I don't see that there's anything "Americo-centric" about it. --Angr/_{tɔk tə mi} 07:17, 18 October 2005 (UTC)

It may be a brazen-sounding statement, but the fact of the matter is that Webster would likely have advocated abandoning "unnecessary r"s, if they were not pronounced in that day and age... Since he was one of the strongest advocates of retaining only "necessary" letters [and indeed, would have liked to have seen the abandonment of a great many that remain in American English spelling], I think that it would serve us best to give the benefit of the doubt to scholars who insist that General American, and the Midwest American English from which it stems, is the closest reflection of the pronunciation of that time, rather than some entirely contrived pronunciation that developed as a rebellious reaction to 17th century English imperialism... Tom e r ^TALK 06:40, 8 November 2005 (UTC)

Two Thirds?

Where has the statistic "As of 2005, it is estimated that more than two thirds of native speakers of English use various forms of American English" come from? It seems about correct but it really needs some kind of reference. Especially given a substantially population of India and other countries have Commonwealth English as their mother-tongue... Deano 20:37, 24 November 2005 (UTC)

Presumably someone has vaguely calculated that the USA population is approx 2/3 of the total populations of all countries that are "English speaking". I agree that this figure appears to be unsubstantiated. For example, if my quoted method of how this figure is arrived at is correct, then this would be to ignore the substantial number of the population in the US for which English is not their first language, and also to ignore the large number of people in other countries, for example, Sweden, Jordan and India, who speak English perfectly albeit as a second language (and which, by and large, tend to favour a non-American English flavour of English). What, after all, is a "native speaker" - the term seems rather ill defined, and is only being used because of common usage in the US educational community, where presumably it is equally ill defined if people were to think--jrleighton 15:01, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

Native speaker is a very clearly defined technical term of linguistics. The statement is based on the same information as this chart, whose source is a British council report (PDF file, see page 10), whose source is David Crystal's 1997 book English as a Global Language (Cambridge University Press). These sources estimate that there are 337,297,000 native speakers of English, of whom 226,710,000 ~~thousand~~ live in the United States. (They estimate only 320,000 native speakers of English in India.) There may a problem identifying "native speakers of English who live in the United States" with "native speakers of Ameican English". After all, there are native speakers of other dialects of English who live in the United States, and there are native speakers of American English who live in other countries (like me!). Nevertheless, the vast majority of people are pretty stationary, so the estimate probably isn't too far off. --Angr (t·c) 15:28, 29 November 2005 (UTC)

Blimey 226,710,000 thousand! Rich Farmbrough 18:10, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

I am still suspicious of this statistic. Think of all the native English speakers in England, Canada, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand, India and other places that were formerly English colonies. It is hard to believe that they don't add up to more than 110 million native English speakers? --Ssilvers 04:26, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Assorted Comments

I'm really enjoying this article - nicely done! I would like to put a vote for doing a pass throughout the article to ensure that easily understood examples of the often arcane characteristics discussed are present. These really help make the article readable by anyone (with a bit of skimming over the scary looking technical bits of it by us mere mortals) when given, and I would love to encourage more! An example of this might be in the:

English words obsolete outside the U.S.

The subjunctive mood is livelier in North American English than it is in British English; it appears in some areas as a spoken usage, and is considered obligatory in more formal contexts in American English. British English has a strong tendency to replace subjunctives with auxiliary verb constructions.

Here, I was a little unclear (after reading the subjunctive mood link) on just what this was in the end - an example would be great for who are unfamiliar with this.

Again, those portions of the article that provide simple examples of the issue being discussed are just golden, and make the article enjoyable for anyone to read. Dxco 23:25, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

Nasalization patterns in American English

Can anyone provide any insights into the nasalization patterns in American English? I think they're pretty distinctive of Am.E. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 171.64.133.51 (talk • contribs) 23:52, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

Unsourced? Sure! Vowels preceding [n] are nasalized most of the time, especicially if they are followed thereafter by another consonant phoneme. As I've said elsewhere previously, "can" (the modal verb (not the object, which is [kʰæn]), is [kʰən] and "can't" is [kʰæⁿʔ]. Interestingly enough, "cant" is actually usually [kʰæntʰ], my guess is because of the infrequency with which it's used in common speech. A particular favorite of mine, pursuing this example, is that a sentence in vernacular upper Midwestern such as "You can't help me?" is pronounced as [ju kʰæⁿ nɛlp̚ mi] or emphatically (emphasis on any of the words) [ju kʰæⁿʔ hɛɫp̚ mi] or a positive question "you can help me?" [ju gn̩ ɛɫp̚ mi] or emphatically (on the "can") [ju kʰæⁿn hɛɫp̚ mi] or emphatically with emphasis on any of the other words, [ju kʰn̩ ɛɫp̚ mi]. Delving further into this (which I find fascinating) will require bringing intonation markers into the IPA symbology as well. Whereas languages like Spanish and even German bring the emphasized word forward in a sentence, English instead changes the stress pattern of the sentence or phrase in a schema parallelling that of Yiddish and Hebrew. Tom e r ^talk 09:41, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

(A couple of irrelevant points. You should be using square brackets, like this: [skw̥ eː'bɹækʰəts], because you're giving a very detailed account of the sounds, not slashes, which are only used when you're showing phonemes. Also, in the IPA, [y] is a front rounded vowel, French u or German ü; the glide spelt in English with a y is spelt in the IPA as [j]. The American habit of pronounced "can't" so that it sound like "can" as you mention is very annoying. You should also stop it, and start pronounce "can't" like me, as /kaːnt/. —Felix the Cassowary | toːk 14:14, 26 January 2006 (UTC))

fixZor3d! (I actually knew both those things, but I wasn't um...entirely sober at the time :-p ) Tom e r ^talk 04:00, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

No way, dude. The way Aussies pronounce that word is just way too close a different word altogether. Ick. --Angr 20:18, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

Does not! The colon makes all the difference. And I'd permit you to say /kɑnt/ if it pleases you more. —Felix the Cassowary | toːk 14:25, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

Didn't say identical, said too close. Especially for those of us speaking dialects without distinctive vowel length. And /kɑnt/ already means something else for me. --Angr 14:35, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

Yeah-yeah, the colon's enough to make it not even close. No-one said languages couldn't have homonyms, and considering that a surname and a modal verb are substantially different parts of speech, I doubt any confusion is conceivable. (Ironically, I pronounce his surname /kæːnt/, the same as I say the word "cant" as in jargon. It's just as well the spelling gives us an alternative route to the borrowing than just pronunciation and/or said borrowing happened a fair while ago.) —Felix the Cassowary | toːk 16:24, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

I recall a recent article in the Journal of the IPA mentioned that although lexically four and for are homonyms, the latter (and many other function words and pronouns) is more likely to have a reduced vowel. so "I can dip that" would be [aɪkn̩d] or [aɪkə̃nd]while "I canned it in June" would be [aɪkæ̃ndɪ] (notice they aren't stressed) while when both words are stressed they are the same. AEuSoes1 21:49, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

Interesting. Also, I can't think of a time when "four" is unstressed in a phrase. In "my" English, for and four are homonyms when "for" is stressed ([foɹ], [fɔɹ], ['fo·ɹ̩] or ['fɔ·ɹ̩], depending on how you think you hear it/'re listening to—I think the only two that are real pronunciations are [fɔɹ] and ['fo·ɹ̩], the latter probsibly actually being ['foʷ·ɹ̩]) but for becomes almost homonymous ([fɹ̩]) with fir and fur ([fɹ̩:]) when unstressed. Tom e r ^talk 04:00, 27 January 2006 (UTC)

'Quit'

Now I live in England, and 'quit' doesn't just mean leaving a location. We certainly use 'quit' as in an action, for example 'to quit smoking.' Also, 'to quit a job.' Certainly not obsolete out side the USA. Shirelord, 2040 GMT 31/01/2006.

I just saw that and thought "huh?" as well. "Quit" is definitely used in the context of "ceasing an activity" over here (England). (195.92.168.170 01:41, 2 April 2006 (UTC))

Accentless Dialect

I have done a lot of observations as to determine what exactly the "typical" accentless General American dialect is. Far from being closed-minded or arrogant, I believe I speak with such a dialect. I have grown up in Eastern Pennsylvania between Harrisburg and Philadelphia, which means I am pretty much far enough away from "Pittsburghese" and the "wooder" of Philadelphia. I retain the rhotic "r" sound and only merge a few vowels. "Marry" is different from "Merry" and "Mary", which sound the same to me. "Pin" and "Pen" have very different vowel sounds. For me, "Cot" and "Caught" sound exactly the same to me, unlike the New York accent, where they drink cooahfee and wook the doo-og. I do not execute Canadian Raising as well (fire/fuire and about/aboat). I think these are the main characteristics of such a theoretical accentless American dialect. There may be others. Oftentimes dialects vary even in well-defined dialect regions. For example, the Rochester, NY accent pronounces the city as "Rachester" and they eat "sneeacks". This very much resembles some of the mountain dialects of the south. People from rural areas on the eastern seaboard seem to have very similar pronounciations whether they live north or south of the Mason and Dixon line. These are just some of my cursery observations.

cot caught

"The merger of [ɒ] and [ɔ]. This is the so-called cot-caught merger, where cot and caught are homophones. This change has occurred ...from the Great Plains westward. " I doubt that! I don't ever recall hearing this merge in California. Can some-one check the literature? Kdammers 06:02, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

The literature doesn't need to be checked. You just weren't listening. Almost all native Californians (including myself) have this merger. Nohat 06:28, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

Wow, way to be a dick, Nohat.

Some speakers, especially those in San Francisco, retain the distinction. According to A Course in Phonology by Rocca and Johnson, the vowel of caught can be lowered "to [ɒ] in North America, from where it can unround into [ɑ]" and the vowel of cot can also be "unrounded to [ɑ], and then often advanced to [ɑ̟] or even [a̠] in most words in GA and in most of the US south." AEuSoes1 07:29, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

See also Phonological history of the low back vowels, which has a section on the "cot-caught merger" including a map showing the extent of the merger, and references to major research on the topic. Nohat 08:29, 21 February 2006 (UTC)

I've looked at some of the lit. now. The natives I heard who didn't merge were in fact from in and around SF (The others, who didn't merge, were not necessarily Cal. natives.) But looking at the maps, it seems that most of the merging takes place among inland and southern Californians. Kdammers 04:14, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

Those maps are not entirely accurate. The area of non-mergers in San Francisco is pretty much restricted to the city of San Francisco. Everywhere else in the Bay Area, the merger is regular among natives from the area. I have lived in the San Jose area my entire life (except when I went away to college and learned about the existence of the /ɔ/ phoneme), and have asked many people about their accents, and have never found anyone who grew up here but did not have the merger. I also work with several linguists who grew up in the Bay Area, and they agree that the cot-caught merger is a completely standard part of the local accent. I think the Phonological Atlas maps that claim San Francisco as an exceptional area is based on an extremely small set of data for the area. Not to mention the fact that San Francisco isn't even the largest population center in the Bay Area. Nohat 19:29, 22 February 2006 (UTC)

Okeh, I'll accept that my experience in and north of SF and near and in HMB and in LA is not typical, since I only lived there a year. But the artile should be changed to explain the merger. As it stands, there is no explanation what the merged phoneme is! Kdammers 04:27, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

The explanation is at Phonological history of the low back vowels. It would be going off on too much of tangent here at the article American English to explain the merger. It's not even really possible to say what the merged phoneme is, because it's different in different areas. In most places, the merged phoneme is /ɑ/, but in Eastern New England it's /ɒ/. Angr/talk 06:59, 2 March 2006 (UTC)

Grammar

Are there really differences in grammar between American English and British English, concerning standard language and not slang? --Abe Lincoln 10:06, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

Yep. See American and British English differences#Grammar. Nohat 10:12, 27 April 2006 (UTC)

Non sequitur

Can someone explain what the following sentence from the article means?

The conservatism of American English is largely the result of the fact that it represents a mixture of various dialects from the British Isles.

I don't understand how "being a mixture of dialects" implies "conservatism". At the moment this sentence looks like a non sequitur. Can someone clarify the original intention of the writer? Adrian Robson 07:51, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

Not only is it a non sequitur, but it's wrong as well. Non-central dialects of a language (dialects away from the main cultural hub of a language or from its point of origin) tend to be more conservative, and this goes for most languages; the idea that English has its own special reason for following this very typical pattern needs some strong support. Removed. -Branddobbe 08:10, 3 May 2006 (UTC)

American English v. British English

During my year in Wikipedia, I've found that the subject of "American English" and "British English" is often disputed in articles. So, I have proposed a solution, why not have (instead of just English) an American English and British English Wikipedia? Please contact me on any comments! --MasterPayne22 19:46, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

I think that is a horrible idea! So some morons get into edit wars over the spelling of aluminum/aluminium or whether Radiohead is a band or Radiohead are a band. That's their problem. The vast majority of users can overlook and/or deal with these small disagreements and realize that we speak the same language and that our efforts should be combined for the greater good, not divided by petty differences of spelling and grammar. Boo! --Hraefen 14:58, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

It's not even worth discussing. Personally I think all articles should be written in Canadian English, conveniently splitting the difference between American and British usage (centre and colour, but realize and aluminum). Angr (t • c) 15:08, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

It wouldn't succeed, anyway. Far too much effort for virtually no benefit. Even enthusiasts would soon give up the idea. In a vocabulary of 500,000 words, the differences probably represent 0.001 percent of the total language. In fact, the differences are so few that it's often difficult to tell from their writing where people are from. I couldn't say whether the first two contributors were British, American, Australian or whatever from their writing. I couldn't even see any clues in the writing of the Canadian supporter! Adrian Robson 15:27, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

And if you had, they wouldn't have been the expected ones. I'm American and use American English. But if there were to be one unified spelling on Wikipedia, then I think it should be Canadian by compromise. Angr (t • c) 15:34, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Angr, the adoption of Canadian spelling would be even better than contriving a feigned "international" spelling system---kind of an unlikely Holy Grail, we better lay out to reinvent the wheel :-) And, as H. L. Mencken put it, it's not to be forgotten that spelling is the least of all the factors that shape and condition a language. (btw, why isn't The American Language a reference for this article? It might be a tad dated and somewhat biased, but contains a heap of still valuable information and can be read online for free.) But vocabulary differences are way more troublesome---remember that "gasoline vs. petrol" squabble? Check out how much bullshit pours off of that talk page! --JackLumber 12:50, 17 May 2006 (UTC) And people trying to move sidewalk to pavement or even backpack to rucksack...

Mencken's quote is an overstatement. I have frequently said (for example on the Reference Desk) that spelling has nothing whatever to do with language, an idea that makes a lot of people angry. As for gasoline vs. petrol, sidewalk vs. pavement, backpack vs. rucksack, I think the Wikipedia policy of "Go with whatever the first editor wrote" should apply. Angr (t • c) 13:16, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

That's what I myself think, but every now and then crops up someone who disagrees. Many people get mad at us about spelling probably because it's the most conspicuous tell-tale sign of the origin of a writer. Many of them indeed erroneously think that differences between American & British spelling were occasioned by Americans only. Add American so-called "patriotism" and British so-called "insularism" and the scenario is complete... --JackLumber 13:25, 17 May 2006 (UTC) hey, just another overstatement...

What a truly awful idea! Moncrief 23:13, 7 June 2006 (UTC)

Why do some Americans feel the need to be so rude? I'm not talking about the contributors above, but i've often come across profiles proudly declaring that American English is the only true form of English and any use of what they insist of calling "British" English will be met with derision. Could we just have some manners here? I fail to understand why someone gets so upset by the spelling of "colour". 217.196.239.189 10:53, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

Those userboxes you've seen on profiles were a response to the ones some Brits wrote first, saying things like "This user does not understand the American 'English' 'language' artificially created by Noah Webster in 1828 for no other reason than just to be 'different', and bloody well doesn't want to." So the question is, why do some Brits feel the need to be so rude, and why would anyone get so upset by the spelling of "color"? User:Angr 11:35, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

The real issue is, many people *really DO believe* that American English was created by Noah Webster. I hope this very article could help educate and inform the whole mass of the people. ;-) Oh, Angr, you forgot to mention This user dislikes American 'English' (common grammatical and spelling errors mistaken for dialect). Btw, people apparently continue to mistake "spelling" for "dialect." Check this out. Kinda depressing. JackLumber. 13:01, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

That's it exactly. Just as in the case of Spanish and Portuguese, New World users of English numerically outweigh those of the UK and its former colonies. What galls is the suggestion that American English is some sort of déclassé, upstart, bastardized speech. Fowler's Modern English Usage even stooped so low as to make fun of place names like "Pennsylvania," as if "Weston-super-Mare" and "Woking" were their superiors in euphony. British English continues Samuel Johnson's late eighteenth century norms, while American English follows Webster's early nineteenth century ones: a piddling difference from this remove, as are the spelling differences themselves. Smerdis of Tlön 16:33, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm not finding an entry for Pennsylvania in Fowler. Where does he make fun of it? User:Angr 17:36, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

Actually, Fowler's mocking "Pennsylvania" is in The King's English, under Neologisms: "With the strictly scientific words, writers have not the power to decide whether they shall accept them or not; they must be content to take submissively what the men of science choose to give them, they being as much within their rights in naming what they have discovered or invented as an explorer in naming a new mountain, or an American founder a new city. Minneapolis, Pikeville, and Pennsylvania, may have a barbaric sound, but there they are; so telegram, or aesthophysiology." Smerdis of Tlön 18:32, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

I don't get why people think our two dialects are so different. So American spelling is slightly more latinized/latinised and British spelling is slightly more Frenchified. We sound almost the same, we use 99.99% the same words, and my guess is with the world "shrinking" our dialects are going to move closer together.Cameron Nedland 17:18, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

expense as verb

The American Heritage online dictionary lists expense as a verb as archaic. But the Wik text seems to say that Am Eng originated expense's use as a verb. Can some-one with an OED check wheter this really originated in America? Kdammers 12:33, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

I have the OED and I can look, but keep in mind that the OED is often not all that helpful with Americanisms.--Hraefen 14:32, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

Archaic? What are you talking about? It's definitely current (keep in mind it's a business term.) And American in origin. First recorded in the 1909 supplement to the Century Dictionary. JackLumber. 14:51, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

Re "What are you talking about?" - I'm just reporting what I saw and where I saw it. We seem to have a contradiction between two dictionaries: AHD and Century. Hraefen, could you please tell us if the OED has any info for us here. Or does any-one else have any-other useful dictionary? Kdammers 13:05, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

American Heritage obviously does NOT say that expense as verb is archaic, and the OED clearly says it's "orig. U.S." There's no contradiction whatsoever. I wrote the entire "Vocabulary" section, and you can rest assured that all I write is verifiably true. Yes, often what I write could use some spiffing up---but that's beside the point :-) JackLumber. 13:18, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

TRANSITIVE VERB: Archaic Inflected forms: ex·pensed, ex·pens·ing, ex·pens·es

1. To charge with expenses. 2. To write off as an expense. http://www.bartleby.com/61/57/E0285700.html

American English and German roots

Hi Angr- I also thought there were some problems with the new paragraph in the intro history section, but calling them "speculative" is not quite right. It's not sourced, to be sure, but the idea that American English is closer to the non-Norman roots of English is not speculative. I would certainly want a source for the idea that the British wanted to "beautify" English, but a slight variation on that notion wouldn't be very controversial either: that many in England, especially Samuel Johnson, held the view that Norman spellings were more "fine." I think rewriting that new paragraph would be better than expunging it (if only to encourage contributions by people who seem to be serious). I've no time at the moment, but I might take a stab at it in a couple days, unless you or others would object. --Cultural Freedom talk 08:31, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

For the sake of discussion, here's the paragraph in question again:

American English is considered closer to its Germanic roots in spelling and phonology than British English, which attempted to "beautify" the language by taking on many aspects of the Romance languages, especially French. The "a" in "bath," for example, is open and round in British English, whereas American English uses the ae-sound, as in the Germanic "ä". Many speakers of American English argue, then, that if someone says "can" with a flat a, then the word "can't" should be no different. Multiple examples of British English deviation from its Germanic roots exist. Also, words used in American English are reminiscent of those of the Middle English spoken and written by Chaucer, such as "fall" for "autumn" and "sick" for "ill," or "I guess" for "I suppose." American English intonation is more monotone and flat in comparison to the highly aspirated and up-and-down British.

I find little or nothing salvageable here. "Closer to its Germanic roots in spelling and phonology" is just nonsense. The vast majority of words spelled differently in Britain and America are words of Latinate origin (French, Latin, or Greek) anyway. The issue of when American English is phonologically and lexically more conservative and when it's phonologically and lexically more innovative than British English is already discussed on this page, in a much more coherent manner. The broad A of bath is a regular phonological change that, like all phonological changes, happened subconsciously in the speech of users of some dialects; to imply it was a conscious effort to make the language sound somehow "more like French" is absurd. As for American English being monotone, it might be possible using published sources to show that American English has less variation in intonation than British English, but even if it is, that doesn't support the poster's contention that American English is somehow less Romance-influenced than British English. And I don't have any idea what "highly aspirated" is supposed to mean; intonation has nothing to do with aspiration, nor have I ever heard that British English in general has more heavily aspirated stops than American English in general. (Cockney is said to have heavy aspiration, but not all British English is Cockney.) User:Angr 09:12, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

I agree completely that the bit about the broad A and "aspiration" is highly questionable. As for the rest, I was trying to "interpret sympathetically." That the matter of American linguistic conservativism is discussed later on in the article, and doesn't need to be mentioned here, I can agree with. But the matter of the Normanophilia of British English (what the person meant, I think, by "beautify" -- again, I'm trying to interpret kindly) is an important aspect of the history of the divergence of American and British English, one that I think is worth salvaging. This matter has been studied somewhat extensively, in part by Shakespeare scholars. (Take a look at his first folios -- which can be found via a Google search within around 40 seconds: the question of why the first folios contained mostly -or spellings of words like color, along with, mostly, "center" instead of "centre," was one of the empirical data points examined by people looking into this Normanophilia.) Then there's Samuel Johnson's dictionary. --Cultural Freedom talk 2006-06-26 09:27 (UTC)

I can't point to anything specific right now, but I've learned that the tendency toward the broad A in British English was an attempt to emulate the a of the Latinate languages in general, not necessarily just French. Remember that during Shakespeare's time and after many writers were pretty enamored with Italian. And although we might have a hard time finding a citation for this, I think the "fall" for "autumn" and "sick" for "ill," or "I guess" for "I suppose" idea has some merit.--209.242.228.152 18:26, 26 June 2006 (UTC)
I agree that the fall/autumn & guess/suppose idea has some merit, but sick (from OE) and ill (from ON) are both Germanic, so I don't know where the contributor got this bit.--Hraefen 20:08, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

I always thought that the main reason Americans pronounced the 'a' in bath the way they do is because most English speakers who went to America were from either Northern England or Ireland. The long A, (is it called a Broad A) is only used in Southern England, and I think I've read in Melvyn Bragg's History of English that it originated in the cockney (working class London) dialect. Does anyone know any more about this?

The most obvious attempts in Britain to "beautify" English are 19th Century attempts to introduce French words for culinary instruments, cuisine etc. hence words like cuisine (which Americans use too, don't they?) courgette instead of zuchinni, aubergine instead of eggplant. 217.196.239.189 10:58, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

I'm pretty sure the main reason Americans use the "flat A" in bath is because the "broad A" currently used in the south of England hadn't developed yet at the time America was first being settled by English people; or at least, it hadn't spread far enough yet. I don't know whether or not it started in Cockney, but I don't think it started until the 19th century. User:Angr 12:03, 31 July 2006 (UTC)

Is this symbol the broad a:ɒ?Cameron Nedland 19:33, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

No, that's the vowel of hot in British RP (and a few New England dialects), and also the vowel of bar for some American speakers. This is the broad a: [ɑ]. JackLumber. 19:44, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks dude. ɑ,ɒ, and ɔ are all merged in my dialect, but I'm not sure which one it is.Cameron Nedland 20:23, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Note however that the New England broad a (pahk the cah in Hahvud Yahd) is more accurately transcribed with [a], a vowel that speakers who rhyme father and bother normally don't have, unless they're from the Inland North, where this vowel is a common realization of the "short o"... unless it's even closer to [æ]—for example, a block in Chicago sounds like black to someone from, say, NYC. On the other hand, a band in London is a bond in Detroit... but that's a whole other story. JackLumber. 19:53, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Doesn't the debate (fist pounding argument) in England about the beautification of English go back to the 16thC., when the construction of new words from classical roots was considered by some to be a source of romanisation? Perhaps there was a conscious effort in the new world colonies to eschew these developments. Also, English people often remark that the Irish accent is much closer than their own to the American. Then they launch into a twangy trans-Atlantic verse of House of the Rising Sun (recorded by an English band) and spill beer over their shoes.--Shtove 21:08, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

Addition of "confusing" box

E946- Is your addition of the "confusing" box motivated solely by there being many words in the section that you don't understand? I'm not sure that's a good reason to have that particular warning there. --Cultural Freedom talk 2006-06-30 07:00 (UTC)

I think I can speak pretty well for the common user--I know very little about language and speaking and various terms, and in general, have absolutely no clue what most of this article is talking about.

Though you can always just link to a term's main article in order to explain what it means, the article becomes very difficult to read when every thid word is a link to a new term.

One of the best examples is the following bullet from the section:

Laxing of /e/, /i/ and /u/ to /ɛ/, /ɪ/ and /ʊ/ before /ɹ/, causing pronunciations like [pɛɹ], [pɪɹ] and [pjʊɹ] for pair, peer and pure.

Nowhere above in the article is it explained what any of those mean, now is it clear from looking at them. As a result, I have NO CLUE what that bullet is describing.

I understand it's difficult to convey differences in pronunciation through text, but I think it would go a long way to clearing the section up by using more general terms.

E946 07:17, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

The only technical term in the above quote is "laxing". Besides adding a link to tenseness (where the concept of tense and lax vowels is explained), I don't see what else can be done to improve its comprehensibility. Perhaps sound files illustrating the difference between [pɛɹ]/[pɪɹ]/[pjʊɹ] and [peɹ]/[piɹ]//[pjuɹ]? User:Angr 07:25, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

E946- Got it. Thanks for the explanation. Angr, your idea is excellent. Have a microphone handy? :) Another idea might be to draw more attention to the "Note: This page contains IPA phonetic symbols..." box. E946, if you follow the link to the IPA symbols, does that help? --Cultural Freedom talk 2006-06-30 08:10 (UTC)

No longer in common usage?

Some of the words they claim are no longer in common usage in Britain are just plain wrong. Sick, obligate (in its various forms, such as obligated, obliged etc etc), doghouse, rider, pavement, faucet, plat, pillow, night table....all of these are used still and thats at least half the list thats there. --Narson 14:57, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

For starters, obligate and oblige are two different words (kinda like acclimate and acclimatize, or burglarize and burgle) and this is about obligate, not oblige. Note the restricted meanings---isn't a pavement in Britain what we call a sidewalk in the U.S.? Pillow is only in the "cushion" sense, not a bed pillow. The very doghouse and tap (valve) articles say doghouse and faucet are American words. I quickly searched .uk sites for plat and I didn't find any matches. As for rider, the Google ratio bus passengers/bus riders is 5100:1 on gov.uk sites and 0.87:1 on .gov sites! How can you say that rider "passenger" is not an Americanism? It can be just a regional thing---*all* sources and *all* dictionaries say these words are Americanisms. If you feel they are not anymore, you can consider moving some of them to the minilist of words that "remained as regionalisms or were later brought back, to various extents, especially in the second half of the 20th century." Catchya on the flipside, JackLumber. 21:24, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

The pavement is indeed what is known as the sidewalk in American English, the equivilant of American English pavement simply being the road. However pillow is used in the sense of bed pillow in English as well as American English Mbthegreat 22:07, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

Pin-pen merger

This merger originated in Southern American English but is now widespread in the Midwest and West as well. According to the article on the merger, it has only been observed in certain parts of the Midwest and West, which doesn't count as "widespread" in my book. I'm going to change the sentence to "parts of the Midwest and West" instead. Is there any reason for the original language? --68.0.212.218 04:58, 5 August 2006 (UTC)Joe

Dialect development on the Eastern Seaboard

Remarks by User:Cwalenta:

OK - I have been attempting to edit the article on American English. Essentially the article argues that the greater range of accents in the eastern US vis-a-vis the western US is due to imitation of prestidgous forms of British English. While I acknowledge that there are MANY facotrs influencing the development of regional accents, the single greatest cause of language divergence is isolation. I specifically discount the imitation of British prestidgous British pronounciation because as little as 50 years after Jamestown, people begin to remark about colonial accents and the like and by 1776 there is clearly an 'American' accent.

If you take 20 people who speak English, split them into two groups and continue to isolate those two groups for 1000 years, odds are their progeny will speak two different languages. Essentially only two developments and the general increase in literacy have changed the pace of language divergence. The first was the printing press which standardized lexicon and syntax. The second was modern media, which was essentially the radio but of course the television cannot be ignored. This invention permits people to actually listen to a 'standard' form of the language over distances that in pre-industrial eras used to be isolated from each other. The longer any given area is in isolation the more language divergence you will see. In medieval times, isolation was much more common and we see this effect in the modern forms of English as spoken on the British isles. Considering the size of the UK its difficult to imagine how such language divergence could occur until you consider the length of time these areas were isolated from each other (really, people didn't travel like they do today, there is no interstate!) before the advent of the printing press and before the advent of modern media. In the case of Germany, the issue becomes even clearer: cross the Alps from Baden Wurtemburg into Switzerland and you travel from one German dialect to another that can't understand the others dialect.

Furthermore, while the word dialect is technically correct, the term accent is more descriptive in this case. The distinction between British English and American English and the various varieties really don't rise to the level of a different dialect in my view because the various forms are mutually intelligible, the spelling, syntax and grammar differences are relatively insignificant.

Nevertheless I have attempted to edit this article on several occasions and it continues to be edited back. I finally logged on and created a username. I went to the edit page and it acknowledges my theory but says that it should go up for discussion first. I am not particularly familiar with this system. But really this change should be made.

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:JackLumber". JackLumber. 22:03, 18 August 2006 (UTC)

Basically, neither theory should appear without citing reliable sources. I personally feel the explanation that Eastern Seaboard accents are distinct because of British influence to be more compelling, because frankly they weren't isolated from the rest of America; but my personal beliefs are neither here nor there. We need to find what the published sources say about it, and cite them. As for the difference between dialect and accent, it's true that "dialect" has several different meanings. The meaning you're thinking of -- largely mutually unintelligble spoken varieties that use the same standard written language -- is called "traditional dialect" by some people (J.C. Wells for example) and is more commonly used in reference to languages in Europe (not only Germany but also Britain: Yorkshire dialect, for example, means the traditional dialect that's virtually incomprehensible to everyone else; some Scottish people also refer to speaking Scots as "speaking dialect"). But the meaning of dialect that's usually intended by theoretical linguists -- especially when referring to American English -- is more like "set of idiolects sharing a large number of common features". Your accent is part of your dialect, but only the part pertaining to pronunciation/phonology. So we have to see what specific aspects of Eastern Seaboard English is being discussed. If it's only matters of phonology (non-rhoticity, "broad A", retention of the Mary/marry/merry contrast, etc.), then we can go ahead and refer to accents. But if the sources also claim that aspects of Eastern Seaboard vocabulary, morphology, or syntax are attributable to either British influence or isolation, then we have to say "dialect" rather than "accent". User:Angr 04:53, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

Source for my theory is the "Story of English" - and actually the notion that the 13 original colonies weren't completely isolated is true, but there is still a high degree of relative isolation. When Thomas Jefferson went to Philadelphia he described the experience akin to travelling to a foreign country. In the other examples that I cite, ie. the major differences in dialect between Baden Wurtemburg and Switzerland, its difficult to say that the German speaking Swiss cantons were COMPLETELY isolated from the rest of Germany. Many people did not leave the counties that they resided in. And frankly the root cause of 'greater' language divergence being imitation of prestidgous forms of the English language as spoken in the UK doesn't really make sense because the English ships were sailing to ALL ports at ALL times and in particular as English in England was in a 'state of flux' (English has been in a state of flux since the Saxon invasion). Relative isolation of linguistic groups has caused language divergence in virtually EVERY language, including Spanish (where a variant takes on the form of a completely different language in Portuguese), French (look at the development of Provencal), difference in Italian between North and South. Long before the fall of the Roman Empire, Latin had slowly begun its drift into the various Romance languages despite the Roman roads and significant trade. So, really I have to lobbby for this change in the article to be made.

Well, actually the sentence "...these areas were in contact with England, and imitated prestigious varieties of British English..." is in the section on *Phonology*. But the "Regional differences" section, which is broader in scope, clearly states that "...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." When it comes to vocabulary, grammar, and syntax, the extent of British influence on Eastern seaboard dialects is mostly negligible. But such phenomena as r-lessness and, in New England, the broad A clearly show imitation of British speech. 100 years ago many people thought that r-lessness was "correct," now most people think it's "wrong"; Franklin D. Roosevelt, for instance, was non-rhotic to his bones; r-lessness used to be the norm in, say, New York. Yet some East Coast areas have been fully rhotic from the very beginning. And anyway physical and social mobility in the U.S. have doubtless favored dialect leveling, much, much more than in England---we don't have "U" and "non-U" words, for example. The bottom line is that the disputed sentence can be actually misleading and should be probably downplayed a little. Just my two cents' worth (or pennyworth? ;-)... JackLumber. 13:20, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

American Lexicon: Red Light

I made a very small change to this section in the seventh paragraph, sixth sentence. I changed the terminology from "Jump" a red light to "run" a red light. The reason I changed this is that in all of my life I have never heard anyone refer to driving through a red light as jumping a red light. Rather, the normal colloquial use is running a red light. Maybe the original author lives in an area where this is said...but I have lived in the South, Midwest, Rocky Mountain West, Southwest, and West Coast of the United States and have never heard this before. It could be an East Coast thing, but I know a ton of Easterners from DC, NYC, Boston, and Philly that have never used it either. Just my two cents...if someone needs to change it back to jump all I ask is that someone notes what part of the country it's typically used in. Thanks. --Tbkflav 03:41, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

No doubt that run has replaced jump _in current U.S. usage_, but that's pretty irrelevant to the sentence you modified, which illustrates some American-born traffic/transportation-related words that are now used *outside of the U.S.* Run (a red light) is not such a word (yet)---and indeed it's featured on the List of words having different meanings in British and American English (I put it there myself a couple months ago); jump is, and it's American-born too (source: OED). JackLumber. 12:52, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

I generally hear run the light myself. I have, however, rarely heard the word jump, the context was 'jump the tracks' (ignoring red railroad crossing signals) - cwalenta

Jump a red light is commonly used in the uk Mbthegreat 22:09, 19 November 2006 (UTC)

WP policy on spelling

I came here hoping to find a link to WP's policy page on A v. B spelling - can someone post it please?--Shtove 20:50, 7 November 2006 (UTC)

flapping

deleted:

For some speakers, the merger is incomplete and does not occur 't' before a reduced vowel is sometimes not tapped following [eɪ] or [ɪ] when it represents underlying 't'; thus greater and grader are distinguished.

i've never heard of this; it needs citations if it's to go back in. Benwing 04:24, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

sound sample

How about a sound sample of typical American English pronounciation? -FrostyBytes 12:15, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

How about thirty? Æµ§œš¹ _{[aɪm ˈfɻɛ̃ⁿdˡi]} 20:37, 29 November 2006 (UTC)

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