2nd group: words that are present in only one variety because they refer to things unknown in the other culture: BE - moor, heath, AmE – prairie, canyon.
3rd group: different words and phrases used to express the same meaning: AmE - truck, BE – lorry; BrE – petrol, AmE – gas (oline).
4th group: words shared by both varieties but they have fully different meaning: vest - AmE - waistcoat, BrE - undershirt.
5th group: both languages share an expression and its meaning and one or either have the further expression of the same thing not shared by the other language:
e.g. taxi in BE and AmE but cab only in AmE;
BrE and AmE pharmacy, but chemist’s only in BrE and drug store is typically American.
Let’s undertake a brief comparison of University lexis.
American English
faculty
full professor
associate professor
assistant professor
instructor
freshman
sophomore
junior
senior
department
head of department
president
to major
dormitory
term paper
semester
to grade a paper
exams are supervised by a proctor
BS
graduate student
MA- thesis
Doctoral dissertation
British English
staff
professor
reader
senior lecturer
lecturer
the first year student
the second year student
the third year student
the final year student
faculty
dean
chancellor
learn main or subsidiary subject
halls of residence, hostel
a long essay
term
to mark a paper
exams are invigilated by invigilator
BSc
past graduate
MA dissertation
Doctoral thesis
1.10. BRITISH ENGLISH AND AMERICAN ENGLISH:
SPELLING AND PUNCTUATION
Spelling and punctuation differences are, much like the majority of differences in pronunciation, not merely haphazard and unsystematic. Instead, certain principles are involved, including simplification, regularization, derivational uniformity and reflection of pronunciation. Of course, there are also a number of individual, unsystematic differences.
Simplification
This principle is common to both the British and the American traditions but sometimes it is realized differently in each. AmE has a greater reputation for simplification as often attested (удостоверять) by such standard examples as
Am.E Br.E
program - mme
(Br. E “program” for computer software)
The same with measurement words ending in
Am.E Br.E
-gram - gramme
e. g. Am.E Br.E
kilogram - mme
counselor counsellor
Simplification of ae and oe to e in words taken from Latin and Greek (heresy, federal) is the rule for all of English, but this rule is carried out less completely in BrE, where we find mediaeval next to medieval, foetus /fi:tes/ next to fetus and paediatrician next to pediatrician. This is especially noticeable in view of the existence of AmE forms with simple e compared with the non-simplified forms of BrE, for example,
AmE esthetics BrE aesthetics (also AmE)
maneuver manoeuvre
anemia anaemia
anapest anapaest
egis aegis
ameba amoeba
But many words have only ae and oe in AmE:
e.g. aerial
Oedipus
A further simplification in AmE is one which has not been adopted at all in BrE: the dropping ue of -logue in words such as dialog
monolog
catalog
This simplification, which does not extend to words such as Prague, vague, vogue is not accepted for use in formal AmE writing. Note the simplification of words such as BrE judgement to AmE judgment (though both spellings occur in both varieties).
BrE employs some simplified spellings which have not been adopted in AmE:
BrE skilful AmE skillful
wilful willful
BrE fulfil, instil may be interpreted as simplification. In AmE we find double “ll” in fulfill, instill, but both forms are used in AmE install(l), install(l)ment.
BrE may simplify –ection to –exion:
e.g. connexion, retroflexion, inflexion