the difference between british and american english

关于英美语音的不同

Differences on Pronunciation of Common Words

Between American & British English

Now, both America and Britain people are use English, but as we know, the English they use is different from each other in pronunciation, spelling and any other aspects. So we separate the English into American English and British English. American English and British English are the same in many aspects, but they also have many differences in details. It is a hard work to distinguish all the differences between them. In this essay, I want to distinguish the differences on pronunciation of common words between American English and British English.

As students we are, we always use British English as the common one, and we always think that we use the native British pronunciation in speaking English in our daily communication. But, I want to say that, as American English and British English have many similarities and also have many fine distinctions, we always can t distinguish them exactly. So, we can see some examples that students say both American English and British English in a sentence but they don t realize. The mixture of American pronunciation and British pronunciation is commonly seen in our daily communication and that makes the pronunciation not be native. So in my opinion, distinguish the differences on pronunciation of common words between American and British English clearly is very important. Through recognize their own characters of pronunciation, we can know them better and use them better and more exactly.

Now, let us start to make a distinction between their different pronunciations. As for the phoneme, there are two questions between American English and British English s pronunciations. One is that the same phoneme has differences in allophonic transcription between American English and British English; the other is that American English and British English use different phoneme in the same word, i.e. the differences on pronunciation.

1. British people always pronounce with clear articulation and a mellow and full tune, but American people s mouths are often wide open and their pronunciation is a little flatter and leaning forward. That is one of the most common differences between American English and British English. For example, [ɑ], [ɑ:] and [æ], these three phonetic symbols have different use in the same word between American English and British English. British people pronounce [ɑ] or [ɑ:] in a word, but American people pronounce [æ]. As for the simple word ask, in British English, its phonetic symbol is [ɑ:sk], but in American English, the phonetic symbol become [æsk]. When British people pronounce this word, their pronunciation is leaning backward, but American people s pronunciation is leaning forward, that is the different. There are also many examples that can explain this difference. Under are other examples of different pronunciation between American English and British English:

Words with a followed by [f] [θ] [s] [nt] [ns] [nt ] [nd] [mp] (laugh, path, grass, plant, dance, branch, demand, sample) have [æ] in American and [ɑ:] in southern British; i.e.

British English American English

laugh [lɑ:f] [læf]

path [pɑ:θ] [pæθ]

grass [ɡrɑ:s] [ɡræs]

plant [plɑ:nt] [plænt]

dance [dɑ:ns] [dæns]

branch [brɑ:nt ] [brænt ]

demand [di'mɑ:nd] [di'mænd]

关于英美语音的不同

sample ['sɑ:mpl] ['sæmpl]

2. Sometimes we usually soften or don t read the vowel (especially the [ ] or [i]) in the unstressed syllable out in British English, while we should read all vowels out in the American English. So it has been saying that British people often have the “eat vowel” phenomenon and that American people speak English more slowly than British people (if the word s suffix is tory or tary, British English often pronounce [tri], while American English pronounce [t ri]). For example,

British English American English

factory ['fæktri] ['fækt ri]

secretary ['sekr tri] ['sekr t ri]

dormitory ['d :mitri] ['d :mit ri]

history ['histri] ['hist ri]

medicine ['medsin] ['medisin]

interest ['intrist] ['int rist]

victory ['viktri] ['vikt ri]

3. There is another very important difference between British English and American English, and this difference is obvious. When American people speak English, you can hear clearly that they put r in some words; we called that retroflex. Because British English sound pronunciation strength is small, it has little retroflex. For example, in American English, we should pronounce the letter r in every circumstance, but we don t say so unless it is before the vowel, e.g.

British English American English

modern ['m d n] ['m d rn]

popular ['p pjul ] ['p pjul r]

floor [fl :] [fl :r]

occur [ 'k :] [ 'k :r]

In many other places, American people will pronounce the letter r . For example, the word clerk, British people pronounce [klɑ:k], but American people pronounce [kl :rk]; another example, the word squirrel, British English pronunciation is ['skwirl], but American English pronunciation is

['skw :r l].

4. Between American English and British English, [ɑ] and [ ] are also different. When the vowel letter o comes after a stressed closed syllable in a plosive, we usually pronounce it [ ] in the standard British English, while [ɑ] in American E …… 此处隐藏：6878字，全部文档内容请下载后查看。喜欢就下载吧 ……