by Ed Bottomley

Created on: June 01, 2007

Today one of my work colleagues was talking about his favourite film Hot Shots Part Deux , or as he pronounced it "Part Dookes", I had to stop myself from going over there to throttle him, but it started me thinking.....
I have lived in the US for over two years and I have never been under any illusions that I am in a foreign country, and as such it has taken me this long to learn their patois (one of the main casualties in my culturally enriching foray to Michigan has been my spelling so I apologise in advance) - the main difficulty is often pronunciation differences ; words such as "basil" (bay-zil) , "vitamin" (vie-ta-min), and even "water" (wad-err) cause many problems. There are also countless different words that can result in many quizzical looks. There are the obvious ones math (maths), cookie (biscuit), trunk (boot), hood (bonnet) , sidewalk (pavement) - and the slightly lesser known ones cleats (football boots), biscuit (a type of bread roll), and the perennially annoying "pissed" (angry). There are also a plethora of words that are spelt and pronounced differently (specialty/speciality, defense/defence, honor/honour) - if you add to this several words and phrases that elicit utter bafflement when announced to Americans such as "gobsmacked", "dodgy", "surname",and "spanner in the works" as well as words which mean utterly different things in the two countries like "mad" (angry/insane), "pissed" (angry/drunk), pants (trousers/underwear), and the always hilarious "fanny"- it is a wonder these two nations have managed to stay (relatively) civil with each other since the American war of Independence/the American Revolution.

The Americans and the British also have in their possession two words that are guaranteed to sound bizarre and antiquated when used on the wrong side of the pond. In America the word "Gotten" ("have you gotten that letter in the mail yet?") is very common , but still sounds wrong to my ears, conversely the word "Whilst" is seen as an archaic Shakespearean word.
It is very common for us Brits to take the high ground in these arguments , after all it is our language, how dare they bastardise it in such a way? There are lots of answers for our differences in pronunciation; one of the main offenders is Noah Webster, who in 1806 published Webster's publication of A Compendious Dictionary of the English Language. In it, he introduced features that would be a hallmark of future editions such as American spellings (center rather than centre,

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