HOME WEB NEWS IMAGES CLASSIFIEDS YELLOW PAGESPOLLS - SURVEYS WIKI COUNTRIES PHOTOS US UK INDIA
Cities Stocks Weather Movies Coupons Travel Blogs Health Horoscope Maps ASIA EUROPE Classifieds Yellow Pages
 1
|
"Spelling differences" redirects here. For other uses, see Category:Language comparison.
| American and British English differences |
|---|
 British English (BrE)
|
| Vocabulary |
| Pronunciation |
|
Orthography |
|
| Computing |
|
Fiction |
| edit box |
American and British English spelling differences are one aspect of American and British English differences.
In the early 18th century, English spelling was not standardised. Differences became noticeable after the publishing of influential dictionaries. Current British English spellings follow, for the most part, those of Samuel Johnson\'s Dictionary of the English Language (1755). Many of the now characteristic American English spellings were introduced, although often not created, by Noah Webster in his An American Dictionary of the English Language of 1828.
Webster was a strong proponent of spelling reform for reasons both philological and nationalistic. Many spelling changes proposed in the US by Webster himself, and in the early 20th century by the Simplified Spelling Board, never caught on. Among the advocates of spelling reform in England, the influences of those who preferred the Norman (or Anglo-French) spellings of certain words proved decisive. Subsequent spelling adjustments in the UK had little effect on present-day US spelling, and vice versa. While in many cases American English deviated in the 19th century from mainstream British spelling, on the other hand it has also often retained older forms.
The spelling systems of Commonwealth countries closely resemble the British system. In Canada, while most spelling is "British", many "American" spellings are also used. Additional information on Canadian and Australian spelling is provided throughout the article.
Contents |
In a few cases, essentially the same word has a different spelling which reflects a different pronunciation.
As well as the miscellaneous cases listed in the following table, the past tenses of some irregular verbs differ in both spelling and pronunciation, as with smelt (only UK) versus smelled (mainly US): see American and British English differences: Verb morphology.
| UK | US | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| aeroplane | airplane | Aeroplane with three syllables is standard in the UK and was first coined in 1866 [shorter oxford English dictionary], referring both to the vehicle and the wings\' function. The prefix \'aero\' is also preferred for related terms such as aerodrome, aeronautics. Airplane, with two syllables was first coined in 1906[shorter oxford English dictionary] is the primary US spelling, used very rarely in the UK but is understood. Airplane is used most commonly in Canada, however aeroplane is not unknown, especially in parts of French Canada (aeroplane was originally a French loanword; the current French term is however avion - aéroplane designating in French the plane ancestor). |
| aluminium | aluminum | Aluminium is the international standard in the sciences (IUPAC). The American spelling is nonetheless used by many American scientists. Davy, the element\'s discoverer, proposed both "alumium", and later "aluminum". The name "aluminium" was finally adopted to conform with the -ium ending of many elements.History & Etymology of Aluminium Canada as US, Australia as UK. |
| arse | ass | In vulgar senses "buttocks" ("anus"/"wretch"); unrelated sense "donkey"/"idiot" is ass in both. Both forms are found in Canada. |
| barmy | balmy | In sense "slightly insane", "crazy", "foolish",Peters, p. 63. which has limited currency in American English. Both forms originated in 19th century England from other senses: barmy meant "frothing [as of beer]"; balmy means "warm and soft [as of weather]". |
| behove | behoove | Canada has both. |
| bogeyman | boogeyman | The spoken form is bogeyman in the UK so that the US form boogeyman is reminiscent of 1970 disco dancing to the UK ear. |
| carburettor | carburetor | British pronunciation IPA: /ˌkɑːbəˈɹɛtə(ɹ)/; US IPA: /ˈkɑɹbəˌɹeɪtɚ/. Canada spelling and pronunciation as US |
| charivari | shivaree, charivari | In the US, where both terms are mainly regional,The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. [1] charivari is however pronounced usually as shivaree, which is also found in Canada and Cornwall,OED, shivaree and is a corruption of the French word. |
| coupé | coupe | for a 2-door car; the horse-drawn carriage is coupé in both; unrelated "cup"/"bowl" is always coupe. In the US, the E is accented when used as a foreign word. |
| eyrie | aerie | Rhyme with weary and hairy respectively. Both spellings and pronunciations occur in the US. |
| fillet | fillet, filet | Meat or fish. Pronounced the French way in the US even if the word is spelled fillet. Canada as US. Australia as UK. |
| furore | furor | Furore is a late 18th-century Italian loan that replaced the Latinate form in the UK in the following century,Oxford English Dictionary, furore. and is usually pronounced with a voiced e. Canada as US. Australia has both. |
| grotty | grody | clippings of grotesque |
| haulier | hauler | Haulage contractor; haulier is the older spelling.Peters, p. 242 In Canada, hauler prevails. |
| moustache | mustache | In the US, according to the Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary and the American Heritage Dictionary, the British spelling is an also-ran, but the second-syllable stress pronunciation is a common variant. Both versions are known almost equally in Canada, with the British version being used slightly more often. |
| mum(my) | mom(my) | Mother. Mom is sporadically regionally found in the UK (West Midlands English); some British dialects have mam,Oxford English Dictionary, mom and mam and this is often used in Irish and Welsh English. In the US region of New England, especially in the case of the Boston accent, the British pronunciation of mum is often retained, while it is still spelt mom. Canada has mom and mum; in Australia, mum is the word. |
| naivety | naiveté, naïveté | The American forms are from French, ending [-\'eɪ]; the British form is nativised, ending [-i]. |
| pernickety | persnickety | Persnickety is a late 19th-century North American alteration of the Scottish word pernickety.Oxford English Dictionary, persnickety |
| quin | quint | Abbreviations of quintuplet. |
| scallywag | scalawag | In the US (where the word originated, as scalawag)Peters, p. 487 scallywag is not unknown.In Webster\'s New World College Dictionary, scalawag is lemmatized without alternative, while scallawag and scallywag are defined by cross-reference to it; all of them are marked as originally American. |
| snigger | snicker | According to major dictionaries, both forms can occur in both dialects, although snigger can cause offense in the US due to the similarity to nigger. In Canada snigger can have malicious connotations; in Australia snigger prevails, as in the UK.Peters, p. 505 |
| speciality | specialty | In British English the standard usage is speciality, but specialty occurs in the field of medicine,See, for example, the November 2006 BMA document entitled Selection for Specialty Training and also as a legal term for a contract under seal. In Canada, specialty prevails; in Australia both are current.Peters, p. 510. |
| titbit | tidbit | Canada as US. |
Most words ending in unstressed -our in the United Kingdom (e.g., colour, flavour, honour, armour) end in -or in the United States (i.e., color, flavor, honor, armor). Where the vowel is unreduced, this does not occur: contour, paramour, troubadour, are spelled thus everywhere. Most words of this category derive from Latin non-agent nouns having nominative -or; the first such borrowings into English were from early Old French and the ending was -or or -ur.Webster\'s Third, p. 24a. After the Norman Conquest, the termination became -our in Anglo-French in an attempt to represent the Old French pronunciation of words ending in -or.Oxford English Dictionary, colour, color. The -our ending was not only retained in English borrowings from Anglo-French, but also applied to earlier French borrowings.Webster\'s Third, p. 24a. After the Renaissance, some such borrowings from Latin were taken up with their original -or termination; many words once ending in -our (for example, chancellour and governour) now end in -or everywhere. Many words of the -our/-or group do not have a Latin counterpart; for example, armo(u)r, behavio(u)r, harbo(u)r, neighbo(u)r; also arbo(u)r meaning "shelter", though senses "tree" and "tool" are always arbor, a false cognate of the other word. Some 16th and early 17th century British scholars indeed insisted that -or be used for words of Latin origin and -our for French loans; but in many cases the etymology was not completely clear, and therefore some scholars advocated -or only and others -our only.Peters, p. 397.
Webster\'s 1828 dictionary featured only -or and is generally given much of the credit for the adoption of this form in the US. By contrast, Dr Johnson\'s 1755 dictionary used the -our spelling for all words still so spelled in Britain, as well as for emperour, errour, governour, horrour, tenour, terrour, and tremour, where the u has since been dropped. Johnson, unlike Webster, was not an advocate of spelling reform and for the most part simply recorded what he found. For example, documents [2] from the Old Bailey, the foremost court in London, support the view of the OED that by the 17th century "colour" was the settled spelling. Those English speakers who began to move across the Atlantic would have taken these habits with them and H L Mencken makes the point that, "honor appears in the Declaration of Independence, but it seems to have got there rather by accident than by design. In Jefferson’s original draft it is spelled honour. " [3] Examples such as color, flavor, behavior, harbor, or neighbor scarcely appear in the Old Bailey\'s court records from the 17th and 18th century, whereas examples of their -our counterparts are generally numbered in hundreds. One notable exception is honor: honor and honour were equally frequent down to the 17th century,Oxford English Dictionary, honour, honor. Honor still is, in the UK, the normal spelling as a person\'s name.
Derivatives and inflected forms. In derivatives and inflected forms of the -our/or words, in British usage the u is kept before English suffixes that are freely attachable to English words (neighbourhood, humourless, savoury) and suffixes of Greek or Latin origin that have been naturalized (favourite, honourable, behaviourism); before Latin suffixes that are not freely attachable to English words, the u can be dropped (honorific, honorist, vigorous, humorous, laborious, invigorate), can be either dropped or retained (colo(u)ration, colo(u)rize), or can be retained (colourist).Webster\'s Third, p. 24a. In American usage, derivatives and inflected forms are built by simply adding the suffix in all environments (favorite, savory, etc.) since the u is absent to begin with.
Exceptions. American usage in most cases retains the u in the word glamour, which comes from Scots, not Latin or French; saviour is a common variant of savior in the US. The British spelling is very common for "honour" (and "favour") on wedding invitations in the United States.Baldrige, Letitia (1990). Letitia Baldrige\'s Complete Guide to the New Manners for the \'90s: A Complete Guide to Etiquette. Rawson, p.214. ISBN 0-892-56320-6. The Space Shuttle Endeavour has a u as it is named after Captain Cook\'s ship, HMS Endeavour.
The name of the herb savory is thus spelled everywhere, although the probably related adjective savo(u)ry, like savour, has a u in the UK. Honor (the name) and arbor (the tool) have -or in Britain, as mentioned above. As a general noun, rigour (IPA: /ˈrɪgə(ɹ)/) has a u in the UK; the medical term rigor (often IPA: /ˈraɪgɔː(ɹ)/) does not.
Commonwealth usage. Commonwealth countries normally follow British usage. In Canada -or endings are not uncommon, particularly in the Prairie Provinces, though they are rarer in Eastern Canada.Peters, p. 397. In Australia, -or terminations enjoyed some use in the 19th century, and now are sporadically found in some regions,Peters, p. 397. usually in local and regional newspapers, though -our is almost universal. The name of the Australian Labor Party, founded in 1891, is a remnant of this trend.
In British usage, some words of French, Latin, or Greek origin end with a consonant followed by -re, with the -re unstressed and pronounced /ə(ɹ)/. Most of these words have the ending -er in the US. The difference is most common for words ending -bre or -tre: British spellings theatre, goitre, litre, lustre, mitre, nitre, reconnoitre, saltpetre, spectre, centre, titre; calibre, fibre, sabre, and sombre all have -er in American spelling. The ending -cre, as in acre, lucre, massacre, mediocre, is preserved in American English, to indicate the c is pronounced /k/ rather than /s/. After other consonants, there are not many -re endings even in British English: louvre, manoeuvre after -v-; meagre, ogre after -g-; euchre, ochre, sepulchre after -ch-. In the US, ogre and euchre are standard; manoeuvre and sepulchre are usually maneuver and sepulcher; and the other -re forms listed are variants of the equivalent -er form.
The e preceding the r is retained in US derived forms of nouns and verbs, for example, fibers, reconnoitered, centering, which are, naturally, fibres, reconnoitred and centring respectively in British usage. It is dropped for other inflections, for example, central, fibrous, spectral. However such dropping cannot be regarded as proof of an -re British spelling: for example, entry derives from enter, which has not been spelled entre for centuries.
The difference relates only to root words; -er rather than -re is universal as a suffix for agentive (reader, winner) and comparative (louder, nicer) forms. One consequence is the British distinction of meter for a measuring instrument from metre for the unit of measurement. However, while poetic metre is often -re, pentameter, hexameter, etc. are always -er.
Exceptions. Many other words have -er in British English. These include Germanic words like anger, mother, timber, water,Although acre was spelled æcer in Old English and aker in Middle English, the acre spelling of Middle French was introduced in the 15th Century. Similarly, loover was respelled in the 17th Century by influence of the unrelated Louvre. (see OED, s.v. acre and louvre), and Romance words like danger, quarter, river. Some -er words, like many -re words, have a cognate in Modern French spelled with -re: among these are chapter, December, diameter, disaster, enter, letter, member, minister, monster, number, oyster, powder, proper, sober, tender.
Theater is the prevailing American spelling and is used by America\'s national theater as well as major American newspapers such as the New York Times (theater section) to refer to both the dramatic arts as well as to buildings where performances take place; yet theatre is also current, witness Broadway and The New Yorker. Some places in the United States have "Centre" in their names (i.e. Rockville Centre, New York), named both before and after spelling reform, and there are very occasional uses of "Center" in England [4]). For British accoutre(ment), US practice varies: Merriam-Webster favours the -re spelling,MWNCD accoutre American Heritage the -er spelling.AHD, accouter
More recent French loanwords retain an -re spelling in American English. These are not exceptions when a French-style pronunciation is used (/ɹ(ə)/ rather than /ɚ/), as with double-entendre, genre, or oeuvre. However, the unstressed /ɚ/ pronunciation of an -er ending is used more or less frequently with some words, including cadre, macabre, maître d\', Notre Dame, piastre, and timbre.
Commonwealth usage.Peters, p. 461. The -re endings are standard throughout the Commonwealth. The -er spellings are recognized, as minor variants, only in Canada.
Nouns ending in -ce with -se verb forms: American English and British English both retain the noun/verb distinction in advice / advise and device / devise, but American English has abandoned the distinction with licence / license and practice / practise (where the two words in each pair are homophones) that British spelling retains. American English uses practice and license for both meanings.
Also, American English has kept the Anglo-French spelling for defense and offense, which are usually defence and offence in British English; similarly there are the American pretense and British pretence; but derivatives such as defensive, offensive, and pretension are always thus spelled in both systems.
Commonwealth usage. Canadian English generally follows British usage for defence and offence and mostly for licence/license as well, although licence is sometimes used for the verb[citation needed]; both pretence[citation needed] and pretense are found, as are practice and practise for both noun and verb[citation needed]. Rest of the Commonwealth as UK.
The spellings connexion, inflexion, deflexion, reflexion, genuflexion are now somewhat rare in everyday British usage, but are not used at all in the US: the more common connection, inflection, deflection, reflection, genuflection have almost become the standard internationally. According to the Oxford English Dictionary the older spellings are more etymologically conservative, since these four words actually derive from the Latin root -xio. The US usage derives from Webster who discarded -xion in favour of -ction for analogy with such verbs as connect.1989 Oxford English Dictionary:connexion, connection.
Connexion has found preference again amongst recent British government initiatives such as Connexions (the national careers and training scheme for school early leavers). Until the early 1980s, The Times of London also used connexion as part of its house style.Howard, Philip (1984). The State of the Language—English Observed. London: Hamish Hamilton. It is still used in legal texts and British Methodism retains the eighteenth century spelling connexion to describe its national organization, for historical reasons.
In both forms, complexion (which comes from the stem complex) is standard and complection is not.The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language:complection, New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2000, <http://www.bartleby.com/cgi-bin/texis/webinator/sitesearch?FILTER=col61&query=complection&x=0&y=0>. Retrieved on 12 May 2007 However, the adjective complected (as in "dark complected"), although sometimes objected to, can be used as an alternative to complexioned in the US,The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language:complected, New York: Houghton Mifflin, 2000, <http://www.bartleby.com/61/86/C0528600.html>. Retrieved on 12 May 2007 but is quite unknown in this sense in the UK, although there is an extremely rare usage to mean complicated (OED). Note, however, that crucifiction is an error in either form of English; crucifixion is the correct spelling.
American spelling accepts only -ize endings in most cases, such as organize, recognize, and realize. British usage accepts both -ize and the more French-looking -ise (organise, recognise, realise). However, the -ize spelling is now rarely used in the UK in the mass media and newspapers, and is hence often incorrectly regarded as an Americanism,Are spellings like \'privatize\' and \'organize\' Americanisms?. AskOxford.com (2006). despite being preferred by some authoritative British sources, including Fowler\'s Modern English Usage and the Oxford English Dictionary, which until recently did not list the -ise form of many individual words, even as an alternative. Indeed, it firmly deprecates this usage, stating, "[T]he suffix…, whatever the element to which it is added, is in its origin the Gr[eek] -ιζειν, L[atin] -izāre; and, as the pronunciation is also with z, there is no reason why in English the special French spelling in -iser should be followed, in opposition to that which is at once etymological and phonetic."Oxford English Dictionary, -ize. Noah Webster rejected -ise for the same reasons.Hargraves, p. 22.
The -ise form is used often[citation needed], but seemingly not always[citation needed] by the British government and is more prevalent in common usage within the UK today; the ratio between -ise and -ize stands at 3:2 in the British National Corpus.Peters, p. 298 The OED spelling (which can be indicated by the registered IANA language tag en-GB-oed), and thus -ize, is used in many British-based academic publications, such as Nature, the Biochemical Journal and The Times Literary Supplement. In Australia and New Zealand -ise spellings strongly prevail; the Australian Macquarie Dictionary, among other sources, gives the -ise spelling first. The -ise form is preferred in Australian English at a ratio of about 3:1 according to the Macquarie Dictionary. Conversely, Canadian usage is essentially like American,Peters, p. 298. although -ise is occasionally found in Canada.[citation needed] Worldwide, -ize endings prevail in scientific writing and are commonly used by many international organisations.
The same pattern applies to derivatives and inflections such as colonisation/colonization.
Some verbs ending in -ize or -ise do not derive from Greek -ιζειν, and their endings are therefore not interchangeable; some verbs take the -z- form exclusively, for instance capsize, seize (except in the legal phrase to be seised of/to stand seised to), size and prize (only in the "appraise" sense), whereas others take only -s-: advertise, advise, apprise, arise, chastise, circumcise, incise, excise, comprise, compromise, demise, despise, devise, disguise, exercise, franchise, improvise, merchandise, revise, supervise, surmise, surprise, and televise. Finally, the verb prise (meaning to force or lever) is spelt prize in the US“prize.” Webster’s Third New International Dictionary, Unabridged. Merriam-Webster, 2002. Also, “prize.” Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, Eleventh Ed. and prise everywhere else,According to Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, Eleventh Ed.: prise is “chiefly Brit var of PRIZE”. including Canada,Peters, p. 441 although in North American English pry (a back-formation from or alteration of prise) is often used in its place.Peters, p. 446.
The distribution of -yse and -yze endings, as in analyse / analyze, is different: the former is British, the latter American. Thus, UK analyse, catalyse, hydrolyse, paralyse; US analyze, catalyze, hydrolyze, paralyze. However, analyse was commonly spelled analyze from the first — a spelling also accepted by Samuel Johnson; the word, which came probably from French analyser, on Greek analogy would have been analysize, from French analysiser, from which analyser was formed by haplology.Oxford English Dictionary, analyse, analyze In Canada, -yze prevails; in Australia, -yse stands alone. Unlike -ise/-ize, neither of the endings has any resemblance to the Greek original ending. The Greek verb from which the word λύσις (lysis) (and thus all its compound words) derives, is λύειν (lyein).
Some words of Greek origin, a few of which derive from Greek λόγος, can end either in -ogue or in -og: analog(ue), catalog(ue), dialog(ue), demagog(ue), pedagog(ue), monolog(ue), homolog(ue), etc. In the UK (and generally in the Commonwealth), the -ogue endings are the standard. In the US, catalog has a slight edge over catalogueBoth the Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary and American Heritage Dictionary have catalog as the main headword and catalogue as an equal variant. (note the inflected forms, cataloged and cataloging vs. catalogued and cataloguing); analog is standard for the adjective, but both analogue and analog are current for the noun; in all other cases the -gue endings strongly prevail,Peters, p. 236. except for such expressions as dialog box in computing, which are also used in the UK. Finally, in Canada and Australia as well as the US analog has currency as a technical termPeters, p. 36. (e.g. in electronics, as in "analog computer" and many video game consoles might have an analog stick).
Many words are written with ae or oe in British English, but a single e in American English. The sound in question is /i/ or /ɛ/ (or unstressed /ə/). Examples (with non-American letter in bold): anaemia, anaesthesia, caesium, diarrhoea, gynaecology, haemophilia, leukaemia, oesophagus, oestrogen, orthopaedic, paediatric. Words where British usage varies include encyclopaedia, foetus (though the British medical community deems this variant unacceptable for the purposes of journal articles and the like, since the Latin spelling is actually fetus), homoeopathy, mediaeval. In American usage, aesthetics and archaeology prevail over esthetics and archeology,Peters, p. 20. while oenology is a minor variant of enology.
The Ancient Greek diphthongs <αι> and <οι> were transliterated into Latin as
Commonwealth usage. In Canada, e is usually preferred over oe and often over ae as well; in Australia and elsewhere, the spellings with just e are increasingly used.Peters, p. 20, p. 389. Manoeuvre is the only spelling in Australia and the most common one in Canada, where maneuver and manoeuver are also sometimes found.Peters, p. 338.
Internationally, the American spelling is closer to the way most languages spell such words; for instance, almost all Romance languages (which tend to have more phonemic spelling) lack the ae and oe spellings (a notable exception is French), as do Swedish, Polish, and others, while Dutch uses them ("ae" is rare and "oe" is the normal representation of the sound IPA: [u], while written "u" represents either the sound y or ʏ in IPA). Danish and Norwegian retain the original ligatures. German, through umlauts, retains its equivalent of the ligature, for when written without the umlaut, words resemble the British usage (i.e. ä becomes ae and ö becomes oe). Similarly, Hungarian uses "é" as a replacement for "ae" (although it becomes "e" sometimes), and the special character "ő" (sometimes "ö") for "oe".
| This short section requires expansion. |
British English often prefers hyphenated compounds, such as counter-attack, whereas American English discourages the use of hyphens in compounds where there is no compelling reason, so counterattack is much more common. Many dictionaries do not point out such differences. Canadian and Australian usage is mixed, although Commonwealth writers generally hyphenate compounds of the form noun plus phrase (such as editor-in-chief).Peters, p. 258
The final consonant of an English word is sometimes doubled when adding a suffix beginning with a vowel. Generally this occurs only when the word\'s final syllable ends with a single vowel followed by a single consonant, and the syllable is stressed; but in British English, a final -l is often doubled even when the final syllable is unstressed.Peters, p. 309. This exception is no longer usual in American English, apparently because of Noah Webster.Cf. Oxford English Dictionary, traveller, traveler. The -ll- spellings are nonetheless still regarded as acceptable variants by both Merriam-Webster Collegiate and American Heritage dictionaries.
Among consonants other than l, practice varies for some words, such as where the final syllable has secondary stress or an unreduced vowel. In the US, the spellings kidnaped and worshiped, introduced by the Chicago Tribune in the 1920s,Zorn, Eric (June 8 1997). ERRANT SPELLING: Moves for simplification turn Inglish into another langwaj Section 3A page 14. Chicago Tribune. Retrieved on 2007-03-17. are common alongside kidnapped and worshipped, the only standard British spellings.
Miscellaneous:
Conversely, there are words where British writers prefer a single l and Americans usually use a double l. These include wil(l)ful, skil(l)ful, thral(l)dom, appal(l), fulfil(l), fulfil(l)ment, enrol(l)ment, instal(l)ment. In the UK ll is used occasionally in distil(l), instil(l), enrol(l) and enthral(l)ment, and often in enthral(l). Former spellings instal, fulness, and dulness are now rare.Peters, p. 283 The Scottish tolbooth is cognate with toll booth, but has a specific distinct sense.
The preceding words have monosyllabic cognates always written with -ll: will, skill, thrall, pall, fill, roll, stall, still. Comparable cases where a single l occurs in American English include full→useful, handful; all→almighty, altogether; null→annul, annulment; till→until; well→welfare, welcome; chill→chilblain; and others where the connection is less transparent. Note that British fulfil and American fulfill are never fullfill or fullfil.
Dr Johnson wavered on this issue; his dictionary of 1755 lemmatizes distil and instill, downhil and uphill.Peters, p. 501.
British English sometimes keeps silent e when adding suffixes where American English does not.
Compare also meter/metre, for which an older English written distinction between etymologically related forms with different meanings once existed, but was obviated in the regularization of American spellings.
Proper names formed as proper acronyms are often rendered in title case by Commonwealth writers, but usually as upper case by Americans: for example, Nasa / NASA or Unicef / UNICEF.Marsh, David (July 14 2004). The Guardian Stylebook. Atlantic Books. ISBN 1843549913. Retrieved on 2007-04-09. “acronyms: take initial cap: Aids, Isa, Mori, Nato” This does not apply to most initialisms, such as USA or HTML; though it is occasionally done for some, such as PC (Police Constable).See for example Pc bitten on face in Tube attack. BBC (31 March 2007). Retrieved on 2007-04-09.
Contractions, where the final letter is present, are often written in British English without stops/periods (Mr, Mrs, Dr, St). Abbreviations where the final letter is not present generally do take stops/periods (such as vol., etc., ed.); British English shares this convention with French: Mlle, Mme, Dr, Ste, but M. for Monsieur. In American English, abbreviations like St., Mr., Mrs., and Dr. always require stops/periods.
| UK | US | Remarks |
|---|---|---|
| adze | adze, adz | |
| annexe | annex | To annex is the verb in both Commonwealth and American usage; however, when speaking of an annex(e) –the noun referring to an extension of a main building, not military conquest, which would be annexation–, it is usually spelled with an -e at the end in the Commonwealth (except Canada), but in the US it is not. |
| any more | anymore | In sense "any longer", the single-word form is usual in North America and Australia but unusual in the UK, at least in formal writing.Peters, p. 41. Other senses always have the two-word form; thus Americans distinguish "I couldn\'t love you anymore [so I left you]" from "I couldn\'t love you any more [than I already do]". |
| axe | ax, axe | Both noun and verb. The two-letter form is more etymologically conservative (the word comes from Old English æx). |
| camomile, chamomile | chamomile, camomile | In the UK, according to the OED, "the spelling cha- is chiefly in pharmacy, after Latin; that with ca- is literary and popular". In the US chamomile dominates in all senses. In Canada chamomile seems to prevail. |
| cheque | check | In banking. Hence pay cheque and paycheck. Accordingly, the North American term for what is elsewhere known as a current account or cheque account is spelled chequing account in Canada and checking account in the US. Some US financial institutions, notably American Express, prefer cheque. |
| chequer | checker | As in chequerboard/checkerboard, chequered/checkered flag, etc. Canada as US.Peters, p. 104. |
| cosy | cozy | In all senses (adjective, noun, verb). In Canada, cozy prevails.[citation needed] |
| cipher, cypher | cipher | Both spellings are quite old. |
| doughnut | doughnut, donut | In the US, both are used with donut indicated as a variant of doughnut. Merriam-Webster Online. [Accessed 1 January 2008] In the UK, donut is indicated as a US variant for doughnut.Cambridge Advanced Learner’s Dictionary. [Accessed 1 January 2008] |
| draught | draft | The UK usually uses draft for all senses as a verb;
"draught", Concise OED. for a preliminary version of a document; for an order of payment (bank draft), and for military conscription (although this last meaning is not as common as in American English). It uses draught for drink from a cask (draught beer); for animals used for pulling heavy loads (draught horse); for a current of air; for a ship\'s minimum depth of water to float; and for the game draughts, known as checkers in the US. It uses either draught or draft for a plan or sketch (but almost always draughtsman in this sense; a draftsman drafts legal documents). The US uses draft in all these cases (although in regard to drinks, draught is sometimes found). Canada uses both systems; in Australia, draft is used for technical drawings, is accepted for the "current of air" meaning, and is preferred by professionals in the nautical sense.Peters, p. 165. The pronunciation is always the same for all meanings within a dialect (RP /drɑ:ft/, General American /dræft/). The spelling draught is older; draft appeared first in the late 16th century.Oxford English Dictionary, draught. |
| gauntlet | gauntlet, gantlet | When meaning "ordeal", in the phrase running the ga(u)ntlet, some American style guides favor gantlet.
Garner, Bryan A. (1998). A Dictionary of Modern American Usage. New York: OUP, p.313. ISBN 0195078535. This spelling is unused in Britain "gauntlet2", Concise OED. and less usual in America than gauntlet. The word is an alteration of earlier gantlope by folk etymology with gauntlet ("armored glove"), always spelled thus. |
| glycerine | glycerin, glycerine | Scientists use the term glycerol. |
| jail, gaol | jail | Jail prevails everywhere, although gaol is still an official spelling in Australia; in the UK, gaol and gaoler are used, apart from literary usage, chiefly to describe a mediaeval building and guard. |
| grey | gray | Grey became the established British spelling in the 20th century, pace Dr. Johnson and others,Peters, p. 235 and is but a minor variant in American English, according to dictionaries. Canadians tend to prefer grey. Non-cognate greyhound is never grayhound. |
| kerb | curb | For the noun designating the edge of a roadway (or the edge of a [UK] pavement/[US] sidewalk/[Australia] footpath). Curb is the older spelling, and in the UK as in the US is still the proper spelling for the verb meaning restrain.tiscali.reference. Retrieved on 2007-03-10. Canada as US. |
| liquorice | licorice | Licorice prevails in Canada and is common in Australia, but is rarely found in the UK; liquorice, which has a folk etymology cognate with liquor,Ernout, Alfred; Meillet, Antoine (2001). Dictionnaire etymologique de la langue latine. Paris: Klincksieck, p362. ISBN 2252033592. is all but nonexistent in the US. ("chiefly British", according to dictionaries).Peters, p. 321. |
| mollusc | mollusk, mollusc | The related adjective is normally molluscan in both. |
| mould | mold | In all senses of the word. In Canada both have wide currency.Peters, p. 360 . |
| moult | molt | In Canada both have wide currency.[citation needed] |
| neurone, neuron | neuron | Neuron prevails[citation needed] in Canada and Australia; both are common in the UK. |
| omelette | omelet, omelette | |
| pyjamas | pajamas | Pronounced /-\'dʒɑːməz/ in the UK, /-\'dʒɑməz/ or /-\'dʒæməz/ in the US. Canada has both.Peters, p. 449. |
| per cent | percent | |
| plough | plow | Both date back to Middle English; the OED records several dozen variants. In the UK, plough has been the standard spelling for about three centuries.Oxford English Dictionary, plough, plow. Although plow was Webster\'s pick, plough continued to have currency in the US, as the entry in Webster\'s Third (1961) implies; newer dictionaries label plough "chiefly British". Canada has both.Peters, p. 230. |
| sceptic (-al, -ism) | skeptic (-al, -ism) | The American spelling, akin to Greek, preferred by Fowler, and used by many Canadians, is the earlier form.Peters, p. 502. Sceptic also pre-dates the settlement of the US and follows the French sceptique and Latin scepticus. In the mid-18th century Dr Johnson\'s dictionary listed skeptic without comment or alternative but this form has never been popular in the UK;Oxford English Dictionary, sceptic, skeptic. sceptic, an equal variant in Webster\'s Third (1961), has now become "chiefly British". Australians generally follow British usage. All are pronounced with a hard "c", though in French the letter is effectively silent and so confusible with septique. |
| storey | storey, story | Level of a building. Note also the differing plural, storeys vs stories respectively. |
| sulphur | sulphur, sulfur | Sulfur is the international standard in the sciences (IUPAC), and is supported by the UK\'s RSC.Royal Society of Chemistry 1992 policy change Sulphur was preferred by Johnson, is still used by British and Irish scientists and is still actively taught in British and Irish schools, prevails in Canada and Australia, and is also found in some American place names (e.g., Sulphur Springs, Texas and Sulphur, Louisiana). AmE usage guides suggest sulfur for technical usage, and both sulphur and sulfur in common usage.“The spelling sulfur predominates in United States technical usage, while both sulfur and sulphur are common in general usage. British usage tends to favor sulphur for all applications. The same pattern is seen in most of the words derived from sulfur.” Usage Note, Merriam-Webster Online. [Accessed 1 January 2008] The contrasting spellings of the chemical elements Al and S mean that the American spelling aluminum sulfide becomes aluminum sulphide in Canada, and as aluminium sulphide in older UK usage. |
| tyre | tire | The outer lining of a wheel, which contacts the road or rail and may be metal or rubber. Canada as US. Tire is the older spelling, but both were used in the 15th and 16th centuries (for a metal tire); tire became the settled spelling in the 17th century but tyre was revived in the UK in the 19th century for pneumatic tires, possibly because it was used in some patent documents,Peters, p. 553. though many continued to use tire for the iron variety. The Times newspaper was still using tire as late as 1905. |
| vice | vise | The two-jaw tool. Americans (and Canadians) retain a medieval distinction between vise (the tool) and vice (the sin and the Latin prefix meaning "deputy"), both of which are vice in the UK (and Australia).Peters, p. 556. |
| yoghurt, yogurt | yogurt | Yoghurt is an also-ran in the US, as yoghourt is in the UK. Although Oxford Dictionaries have always preferred yogurt, in current British usage yoghurt seems to be preferred. In Canada yogurt prevails, despite the Canadian Oxford preferring yogourt, which has the advantage of being bilingual, English and French.Peters, p. 587. Yogourt is an accepted variant in French of the more normal Standard French yaourt. Australia as the UK. Whatever the spelling, the word has different pronunciations in the UK /jɒ-/ (or /jəʊ-/) and the US. /joʊ-/. Australia as US with regard to pronunciation. The word comes from the Turkish yoğurt.Merriam-Webster Online - Yogurt entry; the letter ğ was traditionally rendered as gh in transliterations of Turkish, which used to be written in a variant of the Arabic alphabet until the introduction of the Latin alphabet in 1928. |
