On the Lexical Differences between American English and British English 英语专业毕业论文.doc

毕业设计（论文）题 目 on the lexical differences between american english and british english学 生 指导教师 专 业 商务旅游英语 班 级 系 别 外语系 contentabstractiiintroduction1chapter 1 the history of british english and american english21.1 the history of british english21.2 development of american english5chapter 2 the differences between british english and american english on lexical level72.1 lexical differences72.2 semantic differences112.3 functional differences152.4 other forms of american english17chapter 3 causes of the differences between british english and american english193.1 differences in regions193.2 differences in national history203.3 differences in politics and economy213.4 differences in social life223.5 differences in features of cultures23conclusion24acknowledgments26references27iabstractunder the condition of the economic globalization, english, as a universal language, plays an important role in daily life, whether it is used in the people-to-people contact or the official communication. english has become the most principal language in the world after a long time. there are two main varieties of english around the world，american english and british english. even though american english and british english are both english and similar in many ways, yet there still are lots of differences between american english and british english in lexicology because of different regions, the ways of peoples thinking, and social development, etc. based on this, this paper discusses the differences in lexicology between british english and american english.first, this paper begins with the history of british english and american english to illustrate the background of the development of the two languages and aims to find out the differences between british english and american english in origin; and then continues to explain the differences in lexicology especially from pronunciation, spelling, semantic and grammars in two languages. after then, the writer analyzes the causes that led to the difference between two languages from aspects of regional culture, national history, political economy, social life and so on. at last, this paper points out the developing tendency of english and thinks that the english learners can have a better understanding of either of the two languages and appropriately express the abundant knowledge contained in english through knowing the differences between american english and british english in lexicology. only in this way can we avoid the embarrassment in communication and strengthen the foundation of knowledge.key words：british english; american english; differences; causesii introductionnowadays in the 21st centuries，the world is getting smaller as the rapid development of science and technology，and becoming a global village made up of different countries in the world. people from different races having different colors of skin and different languages all live in this large village. english has been developing into a global language and is only one language that can be acknowledged to be a universal official language among the thousands of different languages in the world. it is estimated that there are about 500 to 700 million nonnative speakers and 300 million native speakers, of whom some 200 million live in the united states and some 50 million in the united kingdom, using english. the total number of the english speaker possesses nearly one-forth of the worlds population. there are many varieties of english all over the world, including american english, british english, canadian english, australian english, new zealand english, south african english, indian english and caribbean english, and so on. as a message carrier, english fully reflects the unique cultures possessed by the british and american countries. american english derives from british english, and carries on the basic essential factors british english has. however, american english has developed into a unique way because of america itself and the distinctive society and social life. there do exist differences between the two. american english came to be different from british english in lexicology. today, american english is particularly influential. this paper will focus on how american english came to be different from british english in lexicology.chapter 1 the history of british english and american english1.1 the history of british englishthe history of english is conventionally, if perhaps too neatly, divided into three periods: usually called old english (or anglo-saxon), middle english, and modern english. the history of the english language can be dated from the arrival of three germanic tribes to britain during the 5th century ad. angles, saxons and jutes crossed the north sea from what are called denmark and northern germany at the present day. the inhabitants of britain previously spoke a celtic language. however, it was quickly displaced by the language brought with the invaders. most of the celtic speakers were pushed into wales, cornwall and scotland. one group migrated to the brittany coast of france where their descendants still speak the celtic language of breton today. the angles were named from engle, their land of origin. after experiencing constant development, immigrates language had changed into the current english. up to now, it has more than one thousand five hundred years, which some scholars divided into several stages in order to illustrate the history of english. however, they did not divide it in the same way. “here quotes the way of american professor kennedy who divided historical process of period into such three stages” 1.1.1.1 the period of old englishthe period from 450 to 1100 is known as the old english. the earliest period begins with the immigration of certain germanic tribes from the continent to britain in the fifth century a. d., though no records of their language survive from before the seventh century, and it continues to the end of the eleventh century or maybe a bit later. as having been seen that english language did not simply spring into existence; it was brought from the continent by germanic tribes who had no form of writing and hence left no records. philologists know that they must have spoken a dialect of a language that can be called west germanic. by that time latin, old norse (the language of the viking invaders), and especially the anglo-norman french of the dominant class after the norman conquest in 1066 had begun to have a substantial impact on the lexicon. a few of these words will be recognized as identical in spelling with their modern equivalents: he, of, him, for, and, on etc., and some of words are familiar to modern words, which can be easily guessed, such as were to were, was to was, of which only these who have made special study of old english can understand what their meanings are. 1.1.2 the period of middle englishthe period of middle english extends roughly from the twelfth to the fifteenth century. this period was marked by important and significant changes in the english language, especially in the vocabulary. the norman conquest was the cause of these changes. the change of this period had a great effect on vocabulary. in this period many old english words were lost, but thousands of words borrowed from french and latin appeared in the english vocabulary. because the normans who conquered britain were government administrators or lords, meat was their most main dishes. such words as beef, mutton, veal, and calf, etc. came into english vocabulary. that is to say, the influence of french upon the english lexicon continued throughout this period. english had also strong influence from latin (mostly through the church and scholars) and the norman invasion of england brought about significant changes in the language.1.1.3 the period of modern englishmodern english period extends from fifteenth century to the present day. modern english is developed by the efforts of literary and political writings. from 1500 to 1700 is the early modern english. during this time, the chief influence of this time was great humanistic movement of the renaissance. since the 16th century, because of the contact that the british had with many peoples from around the world, and the renaissance of classical learning, many words have entered the language either directly or indirectly. new words were created at an increasing rate. shakespeare coined over 1600 words. the nineteenth and twentieth centuries are a period of rapid expansion for the english vocabulary in the history of the english language. other important developments at this period include the stabilizing effect on spelling of the printing press and the beginning of the direct influence of latin, greek on the lexicon. later, as english came into contact with other cultures around the world and distinctive dialects of english developed in the many areas which britain had colonized, other numerous languages made small but interesting contributions to the language vocabulary. lexical improvement in this process has grown rapidly. therefore, the vocabulary of english is the largest of any language.“the historical aspect of english really encompasses more than three stages of development above mentioned”2. english has what might be called a prehistory as well. english is just one relatively young member of an ancient family of languages whose descendants cover a fair portion of the globe. during the english development, there are numerous words borrowed from abroad. borrowed words include names of animals, clothing, food, scientific and mathematical terms, drinks, religious terms, sports, vehicles, music and art, weapons, political and military terms, and astronomical names.languages that have contributed words to english include latin, greek, french, german, arabic, hindi (from india), italian, malay, dutch, farsi (from iran and afghanistan), sanskrit (from ancient india), portuguese, spanish, and ewe (from africa). even with all these borrowings the core of the language remains the anglo-saxon of old english. only about 5000 words from this period have remained unchanged but they include the basic building blocks of the language: household words, parts of the body, common animals, natural elements, most pronouns, prepositions, conjunctions and auxiliary verbs.1.2 development of american english 1.2.1 the history of american englishthe history of american english can also be divided into three periods: the colonial (1607-1776), the national (1776-1898), and the international (1898-present) periods. during nearly four hundred years of use in north america, the english language changed.american english began in elizabeth i, namely it derived from england in the seventeenth century. at the beginning of the 17th century the english language was brought to north american by colonists from england. they used the language spoken in england. george p. krapp, a professor in columbia university of american, “indicated in his book that the british people had brought the shakespeare and miltons english into american”3. that is, elizabethan english, the language used by shakespeare, milton and banyan. at first the language stayed the same as the language used in britain, but slowly the language began to change. sometimes, the english spoken in american changed but sometimes the language spoken in the place stayed the same, while the language in england changed. the development of the english language in america can be separated into three periods: the first period extends from the settlement of jamestown in 1607 to the end of colonial times. in this period the population in america numbered about four million people, 90 percent of them came from britain. the second period covers the expansion of the original thirteen colonies. this period may be said to close with the civil war, about 1860. this period was marked by the arrival of the new immigrants from ireland and germany. the third period, since the civil war, is marked by an important change in the place where the european immigrants came. they came from northern and southern europe in large numbers.following american independence, famous persons like thomas jefferson, john adams, and webster began to consider “that the country should have a language of its own”4. english in america has developed a character of its own, reflecting the life and the physical and social environment of the american people. as time went on, the english language gradually changed on both sides of the atlantic. the americans adopted many words from foreign languages and invented large number of new words to meet their various needs.1.2.2 creation of american lexiconnorth america has given the english lexicon many thousands of words. several thousands words are now used in english as spoken internationally; however, several words died within a few years of their creation. all of these vocabularies are not found in british english. the process of coining new lexical items started as soon as the colonists began borrowing names for unfamiliar flora, fauna, and topography from the native american languages. examples of such names are opossum, raccoon, squash, and moose. other american indian loanwords, such as wigwam or moccasin, describe artificial objects in common use among native americans. the languages of the other colonizing nations were also added to the american vocabulary; for instance, cookie, cruller, and pit (of a fruit) from dutch; levee, portage, and gopher from french; barbecue, stevedore from spanish. among the earliest and most notable regular words additions to the american vocabulary, dating from the early days of colonization through the early 19th century, are terms describing the features of the north american landscape; for instance: branch, fork, snag, bluff, gulch, neck (of the woods), barrens, cutoff, trail, and divide etc, which have new meanings that were unknown in england. all of these words had changed their spelling to some degree. with the new continent developing new forms of dwelling, a large number of words designating real estate concepts are such as land office, lot, outlands, waterfront, the verbs locate and relocate, betterment, addition, subdivision, types of property such as log cabin, adobe in the 18th century; frame house, apartment, tenement house, shack, shanty in the 19th century; project, condominium, townhouse, mobile home, multi-family in the 20th century.30chapter 2 the differences between british english and american english on lexical level2.1 lexical differencesalthough british english and american english are from one origin, they become different in pronunciation, spelling and meanings as the different development of these two countries. “english basic word store is “a core of the vocabulary shared by britain and america. there wouldnt be british english or american english without that core” 5.2.1.1 differences in pronunciationthe differences between british english and american english are obvious in pronunciation. there was a joke that an englishman came across an american at railway station. the character of the american was very optimistic and he was good at making friends with others. after having some polite formula, he asked: “whats your job?” “im a clerk”, the englishman answered. the american was very surprised, “clock? your job is to tick all day long? ” the same word, the american pronounced kl:rk. while the englishman read it cla:k.this joke just reflects the differences in pronunciation between british english and american english.the differences in pronunciation between british english and american english mainly appear in the pronunciation of some words, and there is no fixed regular pattern to accord to. the following words different in pronunciation between british english and american english are more often appear than we see:example wordsbritish englishamerican englishateet eitbeenbi:nbinidyllidilaidlmattermatemthothothtturnt:nt:rnzzedzithere are much difference in dealing with the accents of words between two countries. the differences of accents among the words .when a word is composed of two or more than two syllables, one of the syllables must have an accent. there are usually two accents in multi-syllable words. in british english, people are used to putting the main accent of a word on the last several syllables, while in american english; people prefer to put the main accent of a word on the front syllables. in many two-syllable words ending with -ary, -ory and ate, british english put the main accent on the second syllable, while american english put it on the first syllable. for example:british englishamerican englishancillaryancillarylaboratorylaboratorycorollarycorollarydictatedictatemigratemigrategenerally, in british english, the secondary accent appears before the main accent, while in american english, the secondary accent appears behind the main accent, especially when it comes occur in a compound word. for instance:british englishamerican englishfarmhousefarmhouseicecreamicecreamthere do have some differences in pronunciation between british english and american english, but we can still be easy to distinguish them, and it will not bring any difficulties to our study. 2.1.2 differences in spelling british english and american english belong to the same language family, they are both english, but they are two variants of english, there s