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British english vs. American EnglishEnglish, being a complex and more importantly a very confusing language to learn, especially if one is not exposed to it all the time (as in the case of most foreign learners), contains yet another complexity in today’s world- the differences between British and American english. British english is considered the authentic form of english, whereas American english is popularized more in the media. Thus, the dilemma- which one should you follow if you are not from either country? Of course, there are the australian and New Zealand forms of english, but they are both direct offsets of the British version with most of the differences being present in the spoken part of it. Both teachers and students need to know certain differences in the two primary forms of english, but which one they choose to use depends on the teacher and the student. Normally, a lot of people tend to use a mixed version of the two, which is nothing but a direct result of confusion or exposure of both versions. I myself will admit that I use a mix of the two, due to the mix of British english taught in school and the exposure of American english in the media. There is also another complexity in the two forms of the language- the spoken form and of course the accent! The accent however, is not something to be explained with words, so this article will deal mainly with the more technical aspects, that is, various aspects in grammar and spelling. Further, there is also the issue of the words used and the manner of expression. Let’s take a look at grammatical differences. Taking up nouns, it is seen that in the British form collective nouns such as “committee” or “team” can be used with singular or plural verb forms. In American english however, it is almost always a singular verb. But if the collective noun is plural in form, such as “The Beatles”, it is always followed by “are”; that is, the plural form. This may not impact the language to a large extent, but can still cause confusion. Next up are the verbs- Irregular past and past participle forms of verbs such as “learn”, “spoil”, “spell”, etc. (learnt, spoilt, spelt) also have legitimate regular forms (learned, spoiled, spelled). For some of these words, British english has a strong tendency toward the irregular form, whereas American english tends toward the regular form. Then again, there are various exceptions to this also (burnt, leapt and dreamt are common in America); also, there are certain rare cases such as the mixing of the preterit and past participle forms of verbs like “dive-dove” and “sneak-snuck” and adding a third form as in “shrank-shrunk-shrunken”. The confusion in these differences can be cut down by taking the most common usages of the past forms of each of the verbs and sticking with that form. American english, unlike British english, also often replaces present perfect and past perfect forms of verbs with past simple (such as “I have already eaten- I already ate”); but these forms are mostly used while speaking and advertising. Some other rather uncommon cases of verb tenses such as using “would have” in place of “would” and “could have” in place of “could” also exist, but only in spoken language. The use of tenses can be confusing at times, but can be clarified quite easily at one level because a lot of the differences are in the spoken part of the language only. Considering the use of auxiliary verbs, it can be noted that “shall” and “shan’t” are used often by the British, but almost never by Americans, whereas the Americans use “be going to” twice as much as the British. Similarly, there are such differences in articles, prepositions, adverbs, phrasal verbs, etc. but what confuses people the most is usually the differences in spelling. One of the most common confusions in spelling is the “-our” (British) - “-or” (American) dilemma. Examples for this are “labour-labor” and “flavor-flavor”. Another common confusion is with quite a few words such as “centre” and “metre” as spelt in British english are spelt with “-er” in American english (center, meter). Of course, there are many exceptions to this rule (such as “chapter”, “enter”, “December”, etc.). One more common difference in spelling seen between the two versions of english is “-ise” (British) and “-ize” (American). Examples for these are “realise-realize” and “visualize-visualize”. All in all, there are a few more spelling differences but only with some rarely used words. Spelling differences can be a hassle, and hence one should choose to stick with American or British spellings as a rule. American english and British english have quite a variety of differences, but are essentially the same language and are just accepted as two versions of the language. As long as one knows how the two forms of the language works, it will most likely not be a problem.