British - American English- III

                                                         British - American English- III

Dear readers, in the previous post we learnt about the basic differences such as -er/-re, -ce/-se, -oe/-ae, -e/-ue, -eable/-able between the British and American spelling systems. In continuation with the previous post, let us discuss the remaining facts in this aspect of spelling differences between British and American English.

1.     Regular/Irregular Verb

The past and past participle of the main verbs in English are known as regular and irregular verb. The words which end with “ed” in the past and past participle form is called “regular verb”. For example:

·       play     - played          - played

·       try       - tried             -tried

·       plan    - planned        - planned

Whereas, verb that ends without “ed” in the past and past participle form is called irregular verb.   For example:

·       eat       - ate                - eaten

·       see       - saw               - seen

·       speak  - spoke            - spoken         

In British English both regular and irregular patterns of verbs are used, but in American English mostly regular verbs are used.

2.     Full stops in Abbreviations

In American English full stop or period i.e., “.” is used. For example, “Mr.”, “Mrs.”, “Dr.”, whereas, in British English full stop is usually not used. For example, “Mr”, “Mrs”, “Dr”.    

3.     Quotation Marks

In American English double quotation marks (“…”) are used, whereas, in British English single quotation marks are used (‘…’). When we quote any statement expressed by others or any quotation from any text, it is ethical to use those words inside the quotation marks to differentiate them from a writer’s personal ideas.

For example, Swami Vivekananda says, ‘You are the creator of your own destiny’.

4. Punctuation in Short Forms

When we use short forms namely, ‘i.e.’, ‘e.g.’, ‘viz.’ etc. in British English, they are used as ‘i.e.’ and ‘e.g.’, whereas in American English, ‘i.e.,’ and ‘e.g.,’ are used.

 

Some of the differences in the spellings between British and American spellings are featured below:

Sl. No.	British English	American English
1	Aluminium	Aluminum
2	Anti-clockwise	Counterclockwise
3	At weekends	On weekends
4	Film	Movie
5	Holiday	Vacation
6	Metre	Meter
7	Post	Mail
8	Towards	Toward
9	Yours faithfully	Respectfully yours / Yours truly
10	Transport	Transportation

 

  

 

Author:

K. Nandhakumar

Assistant Professor of English

Sri Ramakrishna Mission Vidyalaya College of Arts and Science (Autonomous)

Coimbatore- 641 020