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English language prevalence in the United States. Darker shades of blue indicate higher concentrations of native English speakers in the corresponding states
American English (AmE, AE, AmEng, USEng, en-US), sometimes called United States English or U.S. English, is the set of
native to the .
English is the most widely spoken language in the United States and is the common language used by the federal government, considered the
language of the country because of its widespread use. English has been given official status by 32 of the 50 state governments. As an example, while both Spanish and English have equivalent status in the local courts of , under federal law, English is the official language for any matters being referred to the
for the territory.
The use of English in the United States is a result of . The first wave of English-speaking settlers arrived in
during the 17th century, followed by further migrations in the 18th and 19th centuries. Since then, American English has developed into new dialects, in some cases under the influence of
and , , , , , and other languages of successive waves of immigrants to the United States.
Any American or even
perceived as free of noticeably local, ethnic, or cultural markers is popularly called "", described by
as "a fairly uniform broadcast standard in the mass media". Otherwise, however, historical and present linguistic evidence does not support the notion of there being a mainstream
of the United States. According to Labov, with the major exception of , regional accents throughout the country are not yielding to this broadcast standard. On the contrary, the sound of American English continues to evolve, with some local accents disappearing, but several larger regional accents emerging.
While written American English is (in general) standardized across the country, there are several recognizable variations in the spoken language, both in pronunciation and in vernacular vocabulary. The regional sounds of present-day American English are reportedly engaged in a complex phenomenon of "both convergence and divergence": some accents are homogenizing and , while others are diversifying and deviating further away from one another. In 2010,
summarized the current state of regional American accents as follows:
Some regional American English has undergone "vigorous new sound changes" since the mid-nineteenth century onwards, spawning relatively recent
(centered on
(centered on ),
(centered on , , and the ),
(centered on , , and ) and , all of which "are now more different from each other than they were fifty or a hundred years ago." Meanwhile, the unique features of the
(centered on ) and
appear to be stable. "On the other hand, dialects of many smaller cities have receded in favor of the new regional patterns"; for example, the traditional accents of
have given way to the general Midland accent, and of
now approaches the sounds of an Inland Northern or Midland accent. At the same time, the , despite its huge geographic coverage, "is on the whole slowly receding due to cultural stigma: younger speakers everywhere in the South are shifting away from the
features of Southern speech." Finally, the
shows the paradox of receding among younger speakers in North Carolina's
islands, yet strengthening in the islands of the .
Major regional dialects of American English
The map above shows the major regional dialects of American English (in ) plus smaller and more local dialects, as demarcated primarily by Labov et al.'s , as well as the related Telsur Project's . Any region may also contain speakers of a "" accent that resists the marked features of their region. Furthermore, this map does not account for speakers of ethnic or cultural varieties (such as , , , etc.). All regional American English, unless specifically stated otherwise, can be assumed to be , with the , , and .
Below, eleven major American English accents are defined by their particular combinations of certain characteristics:
Accent name
Most populous urban center
Philadelphia
Indianapolis
New York City
Minneapolis
San Antonio
Los Angeles
Pittsburgh
New England speech is mostly associated with eastern New England, centering on Boston and Providence, and traditionally includes some notable degree of
(or non-rhoticity), as well as the
vowel (to [u]) and the
vowel (to [ɑ?~??]). In and north of Boston, the
sound is famously centralized or even fronted. Boston shows a , while Providence keeps the same two vowels sharply distinct.
, which prevails in a relatively small but nationally recognizable dialect region in and around
(including
and northeastern ). Its features include some notable degree of
and a locally unique . New York City English otherwise broadly follows Northern patterns, except that the
vowel is fronted. The
is markedly resisted around New York City, as depicted in popular stereotypes like tawwk and cawwfee, with this thought vowel being typically tensed and diphthongal.
along the Eastern seaboard was non-rhotic, though, today, all local Southern dialects are strongly rhotic, defined most recognizably by the
vowel losing its
and approaching [a:~?:], the initiating event for the Southern Vowel Shift, which includes the famous "" that makes short
Since the mid-twentieth century, a distinctive new Northern speech pattern has developed near the Canadian border of the United States, centered on the central and eastern
region (but only on the American side). Linguists call this region the "", as defined by its local —occurring in the same region whose "standard Midwestern" speech was the basis for
in the mid-20th century (though prior to this recent vowel shift). Those not from this area frequently confuse it with the North Midland dialect treated below, referring to both, plus areas to the immediate west of the Great Lakes region, all collectively as "": a common but vaguely delineated term for what is now the central or north-central United States. The
dialect is also prevalent in the , and is characterized by influences from the German and Scandinavian settlers of the region (like "yah" for yes, pronounced similarly to "ja" in German, Norwegian and Swedish). In parts of
and , another dialect known as
is also spoken.
Between the traditional American dialect areas of the "North" and "South" is what linguists have long called the "Midland". This geographically overlaps with some states situated in the lower Midwest. West of the
begins the broad zone of modern-day
. Its vocabulary has been divided into two discrete subdivisions, the "North Midland" that begins north of the
valley area, and the "South Midland" speech, which to the American ear has a slight trace of the "" (especially due to some degree of
glide weakening). The South Midland dialect follows the
in a generally southwesterly direction, moves across
west of the , and peters out in . Modern Midland speech is transitional regarding a presence or absence of the . Historically, Pennsylvania was a home of the Midland dialect, however, this state of early English-speaking settlers has now largely split off into new dialect regions, with distinct
documented since the latter half of the twentieth century.
A generalized Midland speech continues westward until becoming a somewhat internally diverse
that unites the entire western half of the country. This Western dialect is mostly unified by a firm
backed pronunciation of the long oh sound in goat, toe, show, etc., but a fronted pronunciation of the long oo sound in goose, lose, tune, etc. Western speech itself contains such advanced sub-types as
and , with the
accent also being a sub-type primarily of the Western accent. In the immediate
area, some older speakers do not have the normal Western cot–caught merger. The island state of , though primarily English-speaking, is also home to a
known commonly as , and some native Hawaiians may even speak English with a Pidgin accent.
Although no longer region-specific, , which remains prevalent particularly among working- and middle-class , has a close relationship to Southern dialects and has greatly influenced everyday speech of many Americans, including . The same aforementioned socioeconomic groups, but among , have also developed native-speaker varieties of English. The best-studied Latino Englishes are , spoken in the West and Midwest, and , spoken in the . Additionally, ethnic varieties such as
and "" are spoken by some , and
in southern Louisiana.
Pure vowels in General American English ()
GenAm phonemes
GenAm realization
Example words
[] ( )
bath, trap, yak
ban, tram, yeah
ah, father, spa
bother, lot, wasp ()
boss, cloth, dog, off ()
all, bought, flaunt
[] ( )
dress, met, bread
[] ( )
about, syrup, arena
[] ( )
kit, pink, tip
[??~?~?] ( )
private, muffin, wasted ( of /?/)
[] ( )
beam, chic, fleece
[] ( )
happy, money, parties ( of /i/)
[??~?] ( )
bus, flood, what
[] ( )
book, put, should
[u?~?u~?u~?u] ( )
goose, new, true
Compared with , North American English is more homogeneous, and any North American accent that exhibits a majority of the most common phonological features is known as "." This section mostly refers to such widespread or mainstream pronunciation features that characterize American English.
Studies on historical usage of English in both the United States and the United Kingdom suggest that spoken American English did not simply deviate away from period British English, but retained certain now-archaic features contemporary
has since lost. One of these is the rhoticity common in most American accents, because in the 17th century, when English was brought to the Americas, most English in England was also rhotic. The preservation of rhoticity has been further supported by the influences of ,
and . In most varieties of North American English, the sound corresponding to the letter ?r? is a
[?] rather than a trill or tap (as often heard, for example, in the English accents of Scotland or India). A unique "bunched tongue" variant of the approximant r sound is also associated with the United States, and seems particularly noticeable in the Midwest and South.
The red dots show every U.S. metropolitan area where over 50% non-rhotic speech has been documented among some of that area's local white speakers. Non-rhotic speech may be heard from
throughout the whole country.
Traditionally, the "East Coast" comprises three or four major linguistically distinct regions, each of which possesses English varieties both distinct from each other as well as quite internally diverse: , the , the
(centering on Philadelphia and Baltimore), and the . The only
(or non-rhotic) regional accents of American English are all spoken along the East Coast, except the Mid-Atlantic region, because these areas were in close historical contact with
and imitated prestigious varieties of English at a time when these wer in particular, the London prestige of
(or dropping the ?r? sound, except before vowels) from the 17th century onwards, which is now widespread throughout most of England. Today, non-rhoticity is confined in the United States to the accents of , the , , and
(though the vowel-consonant cluster found in "bird", "work", "hurt", "learn", etc. usually retains its r pronunciation today, even in these non-rhotic accents). Other than these varieties, American accents are , pronouncing every instance of the ?r? sound.
Many British accents have evolved in other ways compared to which
has remained relatively more , for example, regarding the typical southern British features of a , fronting of , and . The innovation of , which does occur before a consonant (including a syllabic
, like in the words button or satin) and word-finally in General American, additionally occurs variably between vowels in British English. On the other hand, General American is more innovative than the dialects of England, or English elsewhere in the world, in a number of its own ways:
The , making father and bother rhyme. This change, known as the father–bother merger is in a transitional or completed stage nearly universally in North American English. Exceptions are in northeastern , such as the , , , [], and many , such as the .[]
About half of all Americans merge of the vowels /ɑ/ and /?/. This is the so-called , where words like cot and caught are . This change has occurred most firmly in eastern New England (Boston area), , and the whole western half of the country.
For speakers who do not merge caught and cot, the
has taken hold. This change took place prior to the unrounding of the cot. It is the result of the lengthening and raising of the cot vowel, merging with the caught vowel in many cases before
(as in cloth, off), which is also found in some varieties of British English, as well as before /?/ (as in strong, long), usually in gone, often in on, and irregularly before /ɡ/ (log, hog, dog, fog).
The strut vowel, rather than the lot or thought vowel, is used in the function words was, of, from, what, everybody, nobody, somebody, anybody, and, for some speakers, because and want, when stressed.
before intervocalic /?/: The , , and
mergers are found in most American English dialects. However, exceptions exist primarily along the east coast.
Americans vary slightly in their pronunciations of —such as those in /???/ and /???/—sometimes monophthongizing towards [??] and [??] or
towards [e??] and [i(?)?] respectively, causing pronunciations like [p?e??] for pair/pear and [p?i??] for peer/pier. Also, /j??r/ is often reduced to [j?], so that cure, pure, and mature may all end with the sound [?], thus rhyming with blur and sir. The word sure is also part of this rhyming set as it is commonly pronounced [??].
is much more extensive than in most of England. In most North American accents, /j/ is dropped after all
and interdental consonants (i.e. everywhere except after /p/, /b/, /f/, /h/, /k/, and /m/) so that new, duke, Tuesday, presume are pronounced [nu], [duk], ['t?uzde?], [p???'zum].
in environments that vary widely from accent to accent. With most American speakers, for whom the phoneme /ae/ operates under a somewhat continuous system, /ae/ has both a tense and a lax
(with a kind of "continuum" of possible sounds between those two extremes, rather than a definitive split). In these accents, /ae/ is overall realized before
as more tense (approximately [e??]), while other environments are more lax (approximately the standard [ae]); for example, note the vowel sound in [maes] for mass, but [me??n] for man). In some American accents, though, specifically those from , , and , [ae] and [e??] are entirely separate (or "split") phonemes, for example, in planet [p??aen??t?] vs. plan it [p??e?n??t?]. This is often called the Mid-Atlantic
system. Note that these vowels move in the opposite direction in the mouth compared to the backed British ""; this phenomenon has been noted as related to the increasingly rare phenomenon of older speakers of the eastern New England (Boston) area for whom /ae/ changes to /ɑ/ before /f/, /s/, /θ/, /?/, /z/, /v/ alone or when preceded by a
Environment
Consonant after /ae/
Example words
[?(j)?~e?]
[ae~?(j)?]
/b/, /d/, /d?/, /?/, /v/, /z/, /?/
/f/, /s/, /θ/
All other consonants
of intervocalic /t/ and /d/ to
[?] before unstressed vowels (as in butter ['b????], party ['p?ɑ??i]) and syllabic /l/ (bottle ['bɑ???]), as well as at the end of a word or morpheme before any vowel (what else [w?'???s], whatever [w?'??v??]). Thus, for most speakers, pairs such as ladder/latter, metal/medal, and coating/coding are pronounced the same, except with the stressed /a?/ (see below).
of /a?/: many speakers split the sound /a?/ based on its presence before either a voiceless or voiced consonant, so that in writer it is pronounced [??] but in rider it is pronounced [??] (because [t] is a voiceless consonant while [d] is voiced). This is a form of
but, unlike more extreme forms of that process, does not affect /a?/. In many areas and idiolects, a distinction between what elsewhere become homophones through this process is maintained by vowel lengthening in the vowel preceding the formerly voiced consonant, e.g., ['?????] for "writer" as opposed to ['?????] for "rider".
Many speakers in the , , and
dialect areas raise /a?/ before voiced consonants in certain words as well, particularly [d], [g] and [n]. Hence, words like tiny, spider, cider, tiger, dinosaur, cyber-, beside, idle (but sometimes not idol), and fire may contain a raised nucleus. The use of [??] rather than [a?] in such words is unpredictable from phonetic environment alone, though it may have to do with their acoustic similarity to other words that do contain [??] before a voiceless consonant, per the traditional Canadian-raising system. Hence, some researchers have argued that there has been
the distribution of the two sounds is becoming more unpredictable among younger speakers.
is common when /t/ is in the final position of a syllable or word (get, fretful: [ɡ??], ['f???f??]), though this is always superseded by the aforementioned rules of flapping
L-velarization: England's typical distinction between a "clear L" (i.e. ) and a "dark L" (i.e.
or sometimes even ) is much less noticeable in nearly all dialects of American E it may even be altogether absent. Instead, most U.S. speakers pronounce all "L" sounds with a tendency to be "dark", meaning with some degree of . The only notable exceptions to this are in some Spanish-influenced U.S. English varieties (such as , which typically shows a clear "L" in ); in , where the /l/ is clear in
and in older,
of the U.S., where "L" is clear in an
environment between .
Both intervocalic /nt/ and /n/ may commonly be realized as [??] or simply [n], making winter and winner homophones in fast or non-careful speech.
The vowel /?/ in unstressed syllables generally merges with /?/ (), so roses is pronounced like Rosa's.
Some mergers found in most varieties of both American and British English include:
, making the vowels /?/ and /o/ before 'r' homophones, with homophonous pairs like horse/hoarse, corps/core, for/four, morning/mourning, war/wore, etc. .
, making pairs like wine/whine, wet/whet, Wales/whales, wear/where, etc. , in most cases eliminating /?/, the . Many older varieties of southern and western American English still keep these distinct, but the merger appears to be spreading.
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North America has given the English
many thousands of words, meanings, and phrases. Several thousand are now used in English as spoken internationally.
The process of coining new lexical items started as soon as the colonists began borrowing names for unfamiliar flora, fauna, and topography from the . Examples of such names are , ,
(from ). Other Native American loanwords, such as
or , describe articles in common use among Native Americans. The languages of the other colonizing nations also added to the A for instance, , , , and pit (of a fruit) , ,
from , , portage ("carrying of boats or goods") and (probably)
[ – ], , and
Among the earliest and most notable regular "English" 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 A for instance, run, branch, fork, , , , neck (of the woods), barrens, , notch, knob, riffle, , watergap, cutoff, ,
and .[] Already existing words such as , ,
and (in later use)
received new meanings that were unknown in England.[]
Other noteworthy American
are f for example, ,
( via Louisiana French);
(Canadian French, but used also in Louisiana with a different meaning); , ,
(Spanish); vlei, skate,
(Dutch, ).
The word , used in England to refer to wheat (or any cereal), came to denote the plant , the most important crop in the U.S., originally named
by t wheat, rye, barley, oats, etc. came to be collectively referred to as . Other notable farm related vocabulary additions were the new meanings assumed by
(not only a building for hay and grain storage, but also for housing livestock) and team (not just the horses, but also the vehicle along with them), as well as, in various periods, the terms , , , ,
, later applied to a , most Spanish contributions came after the , with the opening of the West. Among these are, other than toponyms,
(from chaparreras), , , , , ; examples of "English" additions from the
era are bad man,[] maverick, chuck ("food") and ; from the
came such idioms as hit pay dirt or strike it rich. The word blizzard probably originated in the West. A couple of notable late 18th century additions are the verb belittle and the noun bid, both first used in writing by .[]
With the new continent developed new forms of dwelling, and hence a large inventory of words designating real estate concepts (land office, , outlands, waterfront, the verbs locate and relocate, betterment, addition, subdivision), types of property (,
in the 18 , , tenement house, ,
in the 19 project, , , , , multi-family in the 20th century), and parts thereof (, breezeway, , , , trim, ; stoop (from Dutch), family room, and, in recent years, , , walkout basement).[]
Ever since the , a great number of terms connected with the U.S. political institutions have
examples are run (i.e, for office), gubernatorial, ,
(after the ), repeater,
term used originally in Banking) and . Some of these are internationally used (for example, , , , ).
The development of industry and material innovations throughout the 19th and 20th centuries were the source of a massive stock of distinctive new words, phrases and idioms. Typical examples are the vocabulary of
(see further at ) and
terminology, ranging from names of roads (from dirt roads and back roads to
and ) to road infrastructure (, , ), and from automotive terminology to
(for example, in the sentence "riding the subway downtown"); such American introductions as commuter (from commutation ticket), , to board (a vehicle), to park, double-park and parallel park (a car),
or the noun terminal have long been used in all dialects of English.
Trades of various kinds have endowed (American) English with household words describing jobs and occupations (, longshoreman, patrolman, , , bellhop, , , , , boss [from Dutch], , , , ), businesses and workplaces (, , , , , , , , , , hock [also from Dutch]), as well as general concepts and innovations (, , , , reservation [as at hotels], pay envelope, , mileage, , , ).[]
Already existing English words—such as , , dry goods, , —underwe some—such as , student, , the verbs can (as in "canned goods"), ship, fix, carry, enroll (as in school), run (as in "run a business"), release and haul—were given new significations, while others (such as ) have retained meanings that disappeared in England. From the world of business and finance came , , , , , ; from sports terminology came, jargon aside, Monday-morning quarterback, cheap shot, game plan (); in the , out of , off base, hit and run, gamblers coined , , , bottom dollar, raw deal, pass the buck, ace in the hole, freeze-out, miners coined , bonanza, peter out, pan out and the verb prospect and railroadmen are to be credited with make the , sidetrack, head-on, and the verb railroad. A number of Americanisms describing material innovations remained largely confined to North America: , , ; many automotive terms fall in this category, although many do not (, , , , , , , to exhaust).[]
In addition to the above-mentioned loans from French, Spanish, Mexican Spanish, Dutch, and Native American languages, other accretions from foreign languages came with 19th and early 20th notably, from
(, schmooze, tush) and — and culinary terms like frankfurter/franks, liverwurst, sauerkraut, , ; , , ; musical terminology (, , etc.); and apparently , fresh ("impudent") and what gives? Such constructions as Are you coming with? and I like to dance (for "I like dancing") may also be the result of German or Yiddish influence.
Finally, a large number of English colloquialisms from various periods are A some have lost their American flavor (from
and cool to
and ), while others have not (, for sure); many are now distinctly old-fashioned (swell, groovy). Some English words now in general use, such as hijacking, , boost, bulldoze and , originated as American slang. Among the many English idioms of U.S. origin are get the hang of, bark up the wrong tree, keep tabs, run scared, take a backseat, have an edge over, stake a claim, take a shine to, in on the ground floor, bite off more than one can chew, off/on the wagon, stay put, inside track, , bad hair day, , under the weather, jump bail, come clean, come again?, it ain't over till it's over, and what goes around comes around.[]
American English has always shown a marked tendency . Examples of verbed nouns are interview, advocate, vacuum, lobby, pressure, rear-end, transition, feature, profile, spearhead, skyrocket, showcase, service (as a car), corner, torch, exit (as in "exit the lobby"), factor (in mathematics), gun ("shoot"), author (which disappeared in English around 1630 and was revived in the U.S. three centuries later) and, out of American material, proposition, graft (bribery), bad-mouth, , major, , , intern, ticket (traffic violations), hassle, , peer-review, dope and , and, of course verbed as used at the start of this sentence.
coined in the U.S. are for instance , , ,
(in all senses),
(the noun), , , , , , smalltime, , , lowbrow and highbrow, hell-bent, foolproof, nitpick, about-face (later verbed), upfront (in all senses), fixer-upper, no- many of these are phrases used as adverbs or (often) hyphenated attributive adjectives: , , free-for-all, ready-to-wear, catchall, low-down, down-and-out, down and dirty, in-your-face, many compound nouns and adjectives are open: , , , , wheat pit, head start, ; some of these are colorful (, , , , , dust bunny), others are euphemistic ( (physically challenged), , , ).
Many compound nouns have the form verb plus preposition: , stopover, lineup, , tryout, spin-off,
("summary"), , holdup, hideout, comeback, cookout, , , , rollback ("decrease"), rip-off, come-on, shoo-in, fix-up, tie-in, tie-up ("stoppage"), stand-in. These ess some prepositional and phrasal verbs are in fact of American origin (spell out, figure out, hold up, brace up, size up, rope in, back up/off/down/out, step down, miss out, kick around, cash in, rain out, check in and check out (in all senses), fill in ("inform"), kick in or throw in ("contribute"), square off, sock in, sock away, factor in/out, come down with, give up on, lay off (from employment), run into and across ("meet"), stop by, pass up, put up (money), set up ("frame"), trade in, pick up on, pick up after, lose out).[]
Noun endings such as -ee (retiree), -ery (bakery), -ster (gangster) and -cian (beautician) are also particularly productive. Some verbs ending in -ize are of U.S. for example, fetishize, prioritize, burglarize, accessorize, itemize, editorialize, customize, notarize, , winterize, ; and so are some
(locate, fine-tune, evolute, curate, donate, emote, upholster, peeve and enthuse). Among syntactical constructions that arose in the U.S. are as of (with dates and times), outside of, headed for, meet up with, back of, convince someone to, not about to and lack for.
Americanisms formed by alteration of some existing words include notably pesky, phony, rambunctious, pry (as in "pry open", from prize), putter (verb), buddy, , skeeter, sashay and kitty-corner. Adjectives that arose in the U.S. are for example, lengthy, bossy,
and cutesy, grounded (of a child), punk (in all senses), sticky (of the weather), through (as in "through train", or meaning "finished"), and many colloquial forms such as peppy or wacky. American
include , guesstimate,
A number of words and meanings that originated in
and that have been in everyday use in the United States dropped out in most varieties of British E some of these have cognates in . Terms such as
("autumn"),
("nappy"),
("sweets"), ,
are often regarded as Americanisms. Fall for example came to denote the season in 16th century England, a contraction of Middle English expressions like "fall of the leaf" and "fall of the year".
During the 17th century,
in North America was at its peak and the new settlers took the English language with them. While the term fall gradually became obsolete in Britain, it became the more common term in North America. Gotten ( of get) is often considered to be an Americanism, although there are some areas of , such as
and , that still continue to use it and sometimes also use putten as the past participle for put (which is not done by most speakers of American English).
Other words and meanings, to various extents, were brought back to Britain, especially in the second half of the 20 these include hire ("to employ"), quit ("to stop", which spawned quitter in the U.S.), I guess (famously criticized by ), , hit (a place), and the adverbs overly and presently ("currently"). Some of these, for example
and , originated in 19th century Britain.
The mandative
(as in "the City Attorney suggested that the case not be closed") is livelier in American English than it is in British English. It appears in some areas as a spoken usage and is considered obligatory in contexts that are more formal. The adjectives mad meaning "angry", smart meaning "intelligent", and sick meaning "ill" are also more frequent in American (these meanings are also frequent in Hiberno-English) than British English.
created a survey, completed in 2003, polling English speakers across the United States about the specific words they would use in everyday speech for various concepts. This 2003 study concluded that:
For a "long sandwich that contains , lettuce, and so on", the most common term found in the survey, throughout the country (preferred by 77% of the participants), was the word sub (an abbreviation for ). The
shows the greatest variety of terms for this idea in one single region, largely counting for the 5% of the survey who preferred the term hero, nearly 7% (which is even more prevalent in the Pittsburgh and Philadelphia metropolitan areas, including southern New Jersey as well as eastern Pennsylvania) who preferred hoagie, and just less than 3% (also notably prevalent throughout New England, except Maine) who prefer grinder.
The U.S. is largely divided about the "generic term for a sweetened carbonated beverage". Nearly 53% of the surveyed sample preferred soda, particularly in the Northeast, , , the far , and some of , with it
in some parts of southeastern . Over 25% preferred pop, particularly around the
(including the ) and the Western regions along the . Over 12% preferred coke (which is also trademarked for a ), particularly scattered throughout the . Urban, coastal California speakers use all three terms, though especially soda. Speakers of the
generally use soda or pop.
The most common word or phrase "to address a group of two or more people" (in the second ) was you guys at almost 43%, particularly throughout the Northeast and Great Lakes region (along with simply you at nearly 13%). Y'all was preferred by 14%, particularly in the South, but reaching somewhat noticeably into the Northern regions as well. Yous(e) was largely confined to the New York and Philadelphia metropolitan areas, at just over 0.5%. The expression "yinz" is a distinctive feature of
The most common term for generic, rubber-soled shoes worn for athletic activities is sneakers as said by 46% of those surveyed throughout the country, but particularly in the Northeast. 41%, particularly outside of the Northeast, said tennis shoes. Several much rarer other terms were also documented in various regions of the country.
Nearly 68% of the participating speakers make no distinction between
and , or simply never use the term supper.
64% of the participants said they use "Where are you at?" to mean "How are you coming along?" This also incorporated the 34% who use "Where are you at?" in any context, for example, to even mean "Where are you physically located right now?"
Freshwater "" were identified by 40% of polled speakers as crawfish, 32% as crayfish, and 19% as crawdads within no particular regional boundaries, except that crayfish was especially uncommon in the South. 5% reported having no term for this animal.
The most common nicknames for grandparents were grandpa/grampa and grandma/gramma.
Nearly all American English speakers called the
a firefly or lightning bug, with nearly 40% using the two terms interchangeably.
The use of the word , simply as a synonym for nowadays (e.g. I do only figurative paintings anymore), was reported as sounding acceptable to 5% of participants. However, in example sentences with a clearly disheartened tone or dismissive attitude, the positive use of anymore sounded acceptable to as many as 29% of participants (e.g. Forget your baby wearing nice clothes anymore). This rare use of the word was observed much more around Pennsylvania and going westward into the .
was identified by 77% of participants as a shopping cart and by nearly 14% as a grocery cart. 4% preferred the term buggy: a clearly Southern phenomenon.
American English and
(BrE) often differ at the levels of phonology, phonetics, vocabulary, and, to a much lesser extent, grammar and orthography. The first large American dictionary, An American Dictionary of the English Language, known as , was written by
in 1828, codifying several of these spellings.
Differences in grammar are relatively minor, and do not normally affect mu these include: di formal (rather than notional) different preferences for the past forms of a few verbs (for example, AmE/BrE: learned/learnt, burned/burnt, snuck/sneaked, dove/dived) although the purportedly "British" forms can occasionally be seen in American Eng different prepositions and adverbs in certain contexts (for example, AmE in school, BrE at school); and whether or not a definite article is used, in very few cases (AmE to the hospital, BrE to hospital; contrast, however, AmE actress Elizabeth Taylor, BrE the actress Elizabeth Taylor). Often, these differences are a matter of relative preferences rather and most are not stable, since the two varieties are constantly influencing each other, and American English is not a standardized set of dialects.
Differences in
are also minor. The main differences are that American English usually uses spellings such as flavor for British flavour, fiber for fibre, defense for defence, analyze for analyse, license for licence, catalog for catalogue and traveling for travelling. Noah Webster popularized such spellings in America, but he did not invent most of them. Rather, "he chose already existing options [...] on such grounds as simplicity, analogy or etymology". Other differences are due to the
tastes of the 19th century
Britain (for example they preferred programme for program, manoeuvre for maneuver, cheque for check, etc.). AmE almost always uses -ize in words like realize. BrE prefers -ise, but also uses -ize on occasion (see ).
There are a few differences in punctuation rules. British English is more tolerant of run-on sentences, called "comma splices" in American English, and American English requires that periods and commas be placed inside closing quotation marks even in cases in which British rules would place them outside. American English also favors the double quotation mark over single.
AmE sometimes favors words that are
more complex, whereas BrE uses clipped forms, such as AmE transportation and BrE transport or where the British form is a , such as AmE burglarize and BrE burgle (from burglar). However, while individuals usually use one or the other, both forms will be widely understood and mostly used alongside each other within the two systems.
British English also differs from American English in that "schedule" can be pronounced with either [sk] or [?].
Dialects are considered "" if they pronounce the r sound in all historical environments, without ever "dropping" this sound. The
is the pronunciation of the unrounded
vowel variant (as in cot, lot, bother, etc.) the same as the
vowel (as in spa, haha, Ma), causing words like con and Kahn and like sob and
to , with the vowel usually realized in the back or middle of the mouth as [ɑ~?]. Finally, most of the U.S. participates in a continuous nasal system of the "short a" vowel (in cat, trap, bath, etc.), causing /ae/ to be pronounced with the tongue raised and with a glide quality (typically sounding like [??]) particu thus, mad is [maed], but man is more like [m??n].
(18th ed., 2015)
. Braille Authority of North America (BANA). 2 November .
en-US is the
for U.S. English, as defined by
Plichta, Bartlomiej, and Dennis R. Preston (2005). "The /ay/s Have It: The Perception of /ay/ as a North-South Stereotype in the United States English." Acta Linguistica Hafniensia 37.1: 107-130.
Zentella, A. C. (1982). Spanish and English in contact in the United States: The Puerto Rican experience. Word, 33(1-2), 41.
(1997). English as a Global Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.  .
Crawford, James (1 February 2012). . languagepolicy.net 2013.
. us-english.org 2016.
. Law.cornell.edu.
Labov, William (2012). Dialect diversity in America: The politics of language change. University of Virginia Press. pp. 1-2.
Kretzchmar, William A. (2004), Kortmann, B Schneider, Edgar W., eds., , Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter, p. 262,  
Labov, William (2010). . The University of Virginia Press. Pre-publication draft. p. 55.
Labov, William. 2012. Dialect diversity in America: the politics of language change. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press.
Labov, William (2010). . The University of Virginia Press. Pre-publication draft. p. 53-4.
, p. 148
:127, 254)
:124, 229)
:137, 141)
Cf. Trudgill, p.42.
:263, 264)
:315, 340)
:263, 264)
:263, 264)
:154, 343, 361)
Heggarty, Paul et al., eds. (2015).
2016. See under "Std US + ‘up-speak’"
(Trudgill, p. 2) is a collective term used for the varieties of the English language that are spoken in both the United States and .
. Wisegeek.org. .
. 20.  . : 2013.
A Handbook of Varieties of English, Bernd Kortmann & Edgar W. Schneider, Walter de Gruyter, 2004, p. 317.
Labov, p. 48.
Trudgill, pp. 46–47.
(1982). Accents of English. : . pp. 136–37, 203–6, 234, 245–47, 339–40, 400, 419, 443, 576.  . 0-521-22919-7 (vol. 1),   (vol. 2),   (vol. 3)
Labov et al. (2006), p. 171.
According to Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary, Eleventh Edition.
. . Archived from
J. C. Wells. . 3. Cambridge University Press. pp. 481–482.
(2006). The Atlas of North American English. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. p. 182.  .
Trager, George L. (1940) One Phonemic Entity Becomes Two: The Case of 'Short A' in American Speech: 3rd ed. Vol. 15: Duke UP. 256. Print.
Freuhwald, Josef T. (November 11, 2007). .
Grzegorz Dogil, Susanne Maria Reiterer, and Walter de Gruyter, eds. (2009). . Walter de Gruyter GmbH. p. 299.
Wells, John C. (April 8, 1982). . Cambridge University Press. p. 515.
A Handbook of Varieties of English, Bernd Kortmann & Edgar W. Schneider, Walter de Gruyter, 2004, p. 319.
. Repository.upenn.edu. .
A few of these are now chiefly found, or have been more productive, outside of the U.S.; for example, jump, "to drive past a traffic signal"; block meaning "building", and center, "central point in a town" or "main area for a particular activity" (cf. Oxford English Dictionary).
(2004). New-Dialect Formation: The Inevitability of Colonial Englishes.
Trudgill, p. 69.
British author
(in English People, 1947, cited in OED s.v. lose) criticized an alleged "American tendency" to "burden every verb with a preposition that adds nothing to its meaning (win out, lose out, face up to, etc.)".
Harper, Douglas. . .
A Handbook of Varieties of English, Bernd Kortmann & Edgar W. Schneider, Walter de Gruyter, 2004, p. 115.
. Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary 2013.
. Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary 2013.
Vaux, Bert and Scott Golder. 2003. . Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Linguistics Department.
Katz, Joshua (2013). ".' North Carolina State University.
Algeo, John (2006). British or American English?. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.  .
Algeo, John. "The Effects of the Revolution on Language", in A Companion to the American Revolution. John Wiley & Sons, 2008. p.599
Peters, Pam (2004). The Cambridge Guide to English Usage. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.  , pp. 34 and 511.
(blog). Style Guide of the American Psychological Association. 2011.
Jones, Daniel (1991). English Pronouncing Dictionary. Cambridge University Press.  .
; Sharon A
(2006). The Atlas of North American English. Berlin: .  .
(2012). Speaking American: A History of English in the United States 20th-21st century usage in different cities
(1848). Dictionary of Americanisms: A Glossary of Words and Phrases Usually Regarded As Peculiar to the United States. New York: Bartlett and Welford.
(2003). Garner's Modern American Usage. New York: Oxford University Press.
(1977) [1921].
(4th ed.). New York: Knopf.
History of American English
Bailey, Richard W. (2004). "American English: Its origins and history". In E. Finegan & J. R. Rickford (Eds.), Language in the USA: Themes for the twenty-first century (pp. 3–17). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Finegan, Edward. (2006). "English in North America". In R. Hogg & D. Denison (Eds.), A history of the English language (pp. 384–419). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
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