American English

American English refers to the changes to written or spoken English initiated when British speakers settled in the American colonies. The dialects of American English developed from colonists’ geographical isolation, their exposure to other immigrant and indigenous languages, and from colonists’ own spoken dialects of English. Britons noticed Americans’ new ways of speaking English within one generation in America, although changes likely occurred earlier. Accent differences as well as vocabulary, word stress, and grammar differences were noticed; these language features constitute a dialect. American English is not a singular dialect but a family of different regional dialects. Cultural exchanges among the United States, Great Britain, and the world have continued American English’s evolution and change; this has also allowed American English to influence British English and world English varieties, while also being influenced by them in return.

Brief History

After U.S. independence Britons objected to American English’s differences, where more favorable options had existed previously. American English retained British English pronunciations that Britain abandoned. For example, into the eighteenth century, American English retained the long e-sound (for example, in words like heard) and retained consonant sounds that were dropped in British English (for example, the l sound in words like would). American English pronunciation initially diverged from England with pronounced r-sounds in words like far and a so-called flat-a sound in words like stamp. Yet as New York and Boston had more contact with England, they adopted the r-less (non-rhotic) pronunciation of upper-class Londoners.

Early British travelers to the colonies were critical of American English vocabulary. In 1735 American English adopted the Dutch adjective bluff to name a broad, flat, and steep riverbank and British English later followed suit. Similarly the American English term caucus from 1750s Boston became a popular 1880s British English political word that later appeared in British English dictionaries. American English is still today criticized for diverging from British English, yet British English itself diverged from its original Old English under the influence of various linguistic influences, including Celtic, Latin, Norman, and Germanic.

Early Americans policed any perceived English-language abuses, such as slang. In seventeenth century Massachusetts calling magistrates poopes (dolts), or people dogs, rogues, and queens (prostitutes) was prosecuted. Nineteenth-century critics frowned on Philadelphian pronunciations like disconary (dictionary) and agin (again), and New Yorker pronunciations like sich (such) and guv (give). Southern Europeans and African Americans were believed to have mutually influenced each other’s language while shaping today’s southern American and African American dialects, although these dialects of spoken American English have been criticized as non-standard dialects. Starting in the 1940s Chicagoans argued that Midwestern American English was the mainstream or Standard American English, and that is how many Americans still perceive the dialect today.

Experts cite Noah Webster’s early nineteenth century An American Dictionary of the English Language, preceded by his earlier dictionaries and famous eighteenth century Blue-Backed Speller, as definitive in American English’s history for documenting new words and Americanizing spellings respectively. Webster noted new American English vocabulary like skunk, hickory, and chowder and Americanized spellings; Webster chose s over c (as in defense), er over re (as in center and theater) and dropped the u in words like colour and favour. Webster unsuccessfully advocated changing tongue to tung, and women to wimmen.

By the early 1900s books published in the United States and Britain compromised on American and British vocabulary, while London journalists feared their city was being overtaken by Yankee slang. American English and British English still mutually influence each other today (Britons use Black Friday to describe holiday shopping sales after the American Thanksgiving), while retaining many of their own unique linguistic features.

American English Today

Britons’ concerns about American English are somewhat mirrored in America’s concerns over what counts as Standard American English. American English is the language of the United States, though it has not been given official federal status. Yet voters in states such as California and Arizona have passed ballot initiatives requiring public education to be conducted in American English, effectively ending bilingual education. Critics argue that the English-only approach to education comes from some Americans’ fears that the growing prominence of immigrants’ native languages, for example, the growing influence of the Spanish language in U.S. culture, will eventually displace American English as the national language.

In response to the cultural preference shown to Standard American English, some American educators have advocated teaching African American students in dialects of African American English, also called Ebonics or African American Vernacular English, alongside Standard American English. Advocates argue that teaching students non-standard English encourages cultural pride, and teaches students how to successfully translate among, and understand, the dialects they will encounter in future life. Critics have argued that teaching lessons this way is racist, will marginalize already marginalized student populations, and will limit their future potential in a society in which Standard American English is the preferred norm.

The U.S. Department of Education has classified African American English as a dialect and thus not a distinct language from American English; this makes African American English ineligible for bilingual education funds. Many U.S. schools, particularly in the northern region, have treated African American English as a substandard form of language, requiring remediation. African American English may be perceived less problematically among Standard American English speakers due to the similarities and origins the two dialects share. Linguists assert that such dialects, though considered non-standard, are legitimate rule-based varietals of American English with features (for example, use-conventions, exceptions, etc.) much like Standard American English.

Non-standard dialects do lack the language prestige of the standard language, but do also continually contribute to the evolution and updating of the standard language. African American expressions such as right on, rip-off, chill out, and dis have been incorporated into American English—as have other words from other ethnic groups, such as the Hawaiian Creole word aloha.

Today most Americans are exposed to different varieties of American English through film and television. The global spread of U.S. popular culture has helped spread the influence of American English worldwide. Resolving questions over the use and inclusion of new words in American English often falls to professional organizations such as the Modern Language Association and the American Dialect Society, and to the panels of professional usage experts employed when American English dictionaries are revised and updated. These experts and organizations, in turn, study speakers’ changing uses of American English when making their decisions.

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