Why/How is British English different from American English?

[brianthainess]

2 hours ago, Smokin Joe said:

 

Actually you should be grateful that we allow the language to continue to be called "English". We could have renamed it to "American" long ago.

 

 

We the English have already re-named it. 

[Mises]

Remember to keep telling the yanks that they can’t even spell colour - what a bnch of stpid fcking cnts!

[brianthainess]

41 minutes ago, goldenbrwn1 said:

Can I bum a fag off you mate?  That one goes down a treat in the US 😂 

Can I have a suck on your Fag ? What a Drag. 

[toofarnorth]

Turning the English around.  If going out for something my Thai wife says 'For what ' , I would say " What for ". Which is better ?

[tjintx]

2 hours ago, Victor Laszlo said:

Y'all have a nice day now...

Not correct, you were speaking to more than an individual.   The proper form in such a case would d "All y'all have a nice day now."

 

Bless your heart.

[Surasak]

3 hours ago, Smokin Joe said:

 

Actually you should be grateful that we allow the language to continue to be called "English". We could have renamed it to "American" long ago.

 

 

But at what Cost?

[Surasak]

2 hours ago, novacova said:

If someone is under the delusion that their language/dialect/idioms is more superior to others then obviously they haven’t gotten out much in their life. Being able to speak to others from a different region must be difficult for some with an impediment of prejudices.

Wherever did you find the word 'gotton'? It is not in any English dictionary. It is even underlined in red to show it is a mistake.

[saintdomingo]

There is correct English (previously known as Oxford English) and there is incorrect English.

Currently known as incorrect, simplified, babyish English for semi-literates.

[Surasak]

5 minutes ago, saintdomingo said:

There is correct English (previously known as Oxford English) and there is incorrect English.

Currently known as incorrect, simplified, babyish English for semi-literates.

Which word in the Oxford English dictionary is spelt incorrectly?

[saintdomingo]

1 minute ago, Surasak said:

Which word in the Oxford English dictionary is spelt incorrectly?

I give in, please tell me.

[GammaGlobulin]

On 4/29/2024 at 9:45 AM, VocalNeal said:

^ Can i get a coffee?

 

You can, if you can find one in this heat.

Why would you want one, anyway?

 

[Mises]

2 minutes ago, saintdomingo said:

I give in, please tell me.

 

Incorrectly

[Gandtee]

1 hour ago, Callmeishmael said:

That is an interesting example of how American and British have become so different from each other.  If you go back several hundred years the past tense in English was -en rather than -ed.  While English speakers adopted -ed for most words, a few retained the older -en form.  In the 1600s, when my English ancestors moved from England to the Plymouth Bay Colony (now Massachusetts) all English speakers used gotten as the past tense of got.  Sometime in the past 400 years the British dropped the -en while the Americans kept the original version of that word.

 

 

The same reason they still use miles and Fahrenheit.

[GammaGlobulin]

2 hours ago, Gandtee said:

No Brit would say' For bloody' sake. He or she would say 'For god, or, for Christ sake. And the writer does not understand 'She let her hair down.  And certainly not pants. Pants for the Brits are men's underwear. I'm going to relax and have a fag. A cigarette, that is.

 

Geeeze!

I cannot BELIEVE I said pants, when I know that I should have said trousers for the British-sentence example!

Such negligence....

 

[GammaGlobulin]

25 minutes ago, saintdomingo said:

I give in, please tell me.

 

Please, don't give up that easily.

 

[0ffshore360]

Aluminium

[0ffshore360]

Nuclear

[Gandtee]

9 minutes ago, GammaGlobulin said:

 

Geeeze!

I cannot BELIEVE I said pants, when I know that I should have said trousers for the British-sentence example!

Such negligence....

 

Never mind. Just let your hair down, with gay abandon. Gay. As in the original meaning. 😀

[GammaGlobulin]

9 minutes ago, 0ffshore360 said:

Aluminium

 

Fortunately, we can, both, properly pronounce the word conduminium.

 

[brewsterbudgen]

Can't we just say there's "English" and "American"?  Quite the Americans wanted to speak "English" when they had just broken away from the empire, I have no idea.  Not the brightest, perhaps?

[0ffshore360]

8 minutes ago, GammaGlobulin said:

 

Fortunately, we can, both, properly pronounce the word conduminium.

 

With an "o" it favours the tongue. Condominum feels awkward.

If nucular is acceptable then  nuclus also?

[HappyExpat57]

The thing about aluminum vs aluminium - years back, Alcoa Aluminum became a household name and aluminum became synonymous for aluminium, the same as Xerox went from a noun to a verb. Yes, the element is aluminium and the foil is aluminum.

[GammaGlobulin]

10 minutes ago, 0ffshore360 said:

With an "o" it favours the tongue. Condominum feels awkward.

If nucular is acceptable then  nuclus also?

 

Not sure why condo is spelled with the 'o', instead of my preferred.... conduminium, which is more 'congruent' with aluminum.

 

 

[retarius]

I'm sure someone has pointed this out, but there is no such thing as 'British English'. The English is what is spoken in Britain. Everything else derived from that n needs a qualifier to explain that it is not pure English  American English, Canadian English etc  People in Spain don't say they speak Spanish Spanish do they? 

[GammaGlobulin]

13 minutes ago, HappyExpat57 said:

The thing about aluminum vs aluminium - years back, Alcoa Aluminum became a household name and aluminum became synonymous for aluminium, the same as Xerox went from a noun to a verb. Yes, the element is aluminium and the foil is aluminum.

 

I love Nylons on a woman.

It's ok of men wear Nylons, too.

Nylons on a man....don't make me Hoover,

Strangely enough.

 

What some people do not realize is that nylon (not Nylons) is tough.

 

And, men should be free to wear anything, including Nylons, or nothing at all.

Men are tough, and so is pantyhose (Nylons) made from nylon.

 

 

 

 

 

Namath, just as Aluminum, was once a household name.

 

Due to the British Pronunciation, this English-language teacher, and indeed ALL English who teach almost any academic subject, always sound far more learned using a British pronunciation.

 

This is why many English children receive such a well-rounded classical education.

 

 

[0ffshore360]

15 minutes ago, GammaGlobulin said:

 

Not sure why condo is spelled with the 'o', instead of my preferred.... conduminium, which is more 'congruent' with aluminum.

 

 

Prefer away!

[Yagoda]

1 hour ago, brianthainess said:

Can I have a suck on your Fag ? What a Drag. 

The Welsh just gobble up faggots dont they?

[transam]

8 minutes ago, retarius said:

I'm sure someone has pointed this out, but there is no such thing as 'British English'. The English is what is spoken in Britain. Everything else derived from that n needs a qualifier to explain that it is not pure English  American English, Canadian English etc  People in Spain don't say they speak Spanish Spanish do they? 

English derives from England, English spoken outside England (UK) is adopted, as in the USA. In the UK Wales and Scotland had and still do have their own language, though they speak mainly English.

 

As for your Spanish, can you tell me, what language they speak in Mexico and another 20 countries..............?  🤔

[GammaGlobulin]

Can anyone answer this simple question:

 

Why do so many in the UK, such as in Ireland and Scotland, and elsewhere, refuse to use the past participle?

 

Also, on the Forum:

It just, sometimes, seems as though the past participle had never been invented.

Why is this?

 

https://kpu.pressbooks.pub/effectiveenglish/chapter/__unknown__/

 

I find the refusal, by some on this Forum, to use the past participle, when needed, to be quite jarring.

Surely, this oversight cannot be due to laziness....!

 

Nobody's asking anybody to do anything irregular, after all.

 

 

 

[Baht Simpson]