Variants and dialects of the English language English

Variants and dialects of the English language English is the national language of the UK, the USA, Australia, New Zeeland and some provinces of Canada. used to be a state language in the former colonies of the British Empire: in Asia, Africa, or in countries which fell under US domination in Central and South America.

Standard English, variants, dialects Standard English is the official language of Great Britain taught at schools and universities, used by the press, the radio and the television and spoken by educated people. Local dialects are varieties of the English Language peculiar to some districts and having no normalized literary form. Regional varieties possessing a literary form are called variants.

Variants in GB : Scottish English and Irish English, five main groups of dialects: Nothern, Midland, Eastern, Western and Southern.

American English: dialect? has a literary normalized form called Standard American

Regional varieties Canadian, Australian and Indian English

The differences between BE and AmE In the vocabulary, grammar, pronunciation and spelling. Americanisms : historical Americanisms, proper Americanisms and borrowings.

Americanisms historical Americanisms : fall (autumn), to guess (in the meaning “to think”), sick (in the meaning “ill, unwell”). Proper Americanisms (specifically American): Congress, House of Representatives, District Attorney, forty-niner (золотоискатель 1949 года), prairie scooner (фургон переселенцев), jump a claim (захватить чужой участок), drugstore, blue-grass, catbird (американский пересмешник), bullfrog, etc. names of objects which are different in BrE and AmE : store – shop, baggage – luggage, subway – underground, railroad – railway, gasoline – petrol, department – faculty, etc.

Specifically American borrowings reflect the historical contacts of the Americans with other nations on the American continent Spanish borrowings (ranch, sombrero, canyon, tornado) Afro-American borrowings (banjo) German borrowings (lager beer and black beer, frankfurter) Indian borrowings (wigwam, canoe, mocassin, tomahauk, racoon, skunk, names of places, rivers, lakes and states: Mississippi, Ohio, Michigan, Tennessee, Illinois, Kentucky.

Main differences Canadian and BrE: intonation Australian and BrE: phonetics nasal twang (is nasalized), indistinct pronunciation of the consonants p,b,w, n (the so-called American lip-laziness) Indian English and BrE: pronunciation (take – [tek], young – [o], etc.) vocabulary: curry, bandana, khaki, sari, sahib, bundgalow, etc.