Posts Tagged ‘American English’
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Posted by Orin Hargraves on January 30, 2012
Humans never outgrow a fascination with new playthings, but after a certain age it is unseemly and unrealistic to expect a steady stream of surprise gifts from doting parents, aunts, uncles, and grandparents. One consolation for this loss is new words: clever coinages come along all the time to supply our craving for novelty. A [...]
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Posted by Orin Hargraves on January 17, 2012
The run-up to a general election in the United States provides an opportunity for observers of English to see it stretched beyond ordinary limits. The winnowing process that will reduce the various Republican contenders in the race to one has begun and as we plod steadily toward the November election, the rhetoric heats up and [...]
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Posted by Robert Lane Greene on December 06, 2011
Discussion of class and English continues for one final week. In this guest post, journalist, author and blogger Robert Lane Greene looks at class and language, specifically pronunciation, in American English. ___________ In my last post I wrote about the messy variety that characterizes American English, saying it was far too often treated as a [...]
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Posted by Ben Trawick-Smith on November 14, 2011
Class English month continues with the pronunciation theme: guest blogger Ben Trawick-Smith, from Dialect Blog, takes a look at (non-)rhoticity in American English. Ben has worked as an actor, playwright, director, critic and dialect coach. His other passions include linguistics, urban development, philosophy and film. Ben lives with his wife in Seattle, Washington, in the [...]
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Posted by Orin Hargraves on November 01, 2011
Moving on from theatre and acting to music, subcultural English month brings you a guest post by Orin Hargraves, an independent American lexicographer and author of books about English, including Slang Rules!, a lesson book for English learners about American slang. _____________ The music that we call rap today can be heard in nearly every [...]
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Posted by Stan Carey on July 25, 2011
Of the countless varieties of English, American English (AmE) and British English (BrE) are the most significant. This is why you can set Macmillan Dictionary’s default setting to either, and switch back and forth throughout. American English regularly comes under fire from some BrE speakers who perhaps feel a bit possessive or protective about their [...]
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Posted by Sharon Creese on December 02, 2010
The other day, an American friend of mine told me he’d got a kitten, but then completely stumped me by saying she was a ‘brindle’. Was that a special breed, I wondered, or did she need medical treatment? It turns out, ‘brindle’ is what we in the UK would call tortoiseshell, and it got me [...]
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Posted by Dawn Nell on November 17, 2010
Today we (re)introduce Dawn Nell, the second in a series of guest bloggers who are contributing to this blog over a two-week period. The first of their posts is on the subject of ‘Global English’, and the second will look at the ways that you (users) search Macmillan Dictionary. Dawn, who has written for this [...]
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Posted by Kieran McGovern on November 01, 2010
Tomorrow, on 2nd November, the US are holding mid-term elections which will determine who – Republicans or Democrats – will control Congress for the next two years (for predictions, see here). As the 2000 Presidential Election spectacularly proved, the American electorate is divided into two camps. On one side are the Democrat-voting blue states, located [...]
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Posted by Robert Lane Greene on July 29, 2010
Our American English month is shortly coming to its end. Perhaps this is a good point to stop and ask this question again: What is American English? This time the answer comes from Robert Lane Greene, journalist, blogger and author of a soon to be published (and now thoroughly copy-edited) book, You Are What You [...]
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