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American and British English spelling differences

Privacy Level: Public (Green)
Date: 28 Sep 2022 [unknown]
Location: Englandmap
Profile manager: Kathy Nava private message [send private message]
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Please do not comment about the title of this FSP or the content. I named it using the same name as what is on WikiPedia. [1]

There are many countries that speak English around the globe. When creating an English profile we should use the British spelling of the words used in the biography and not the American spelling. Here are some of the common spelling differences. [1]

Latin-derived spellings (often through Romance)

-our, -or
Most words ending in an unstressed -our in British English (e.g., behaviour, colour, flavour, harbour, honour, humour, labour, neighbour, rumour, splendour) end in -or in American English (behavior, color, flavor, harbor, honor, humor, labor, neighbor, rumor, splendor). Wherever the vowel is unreduced in pronunciation (e.g., contour, paramour, troubadour, and velour), the spelling is uniform everywhere
-re, -er
The difference is most common for words ending -bre or -tre: British spellings calibre, centre, fibre, goitre, litre, lustre, manoeuvre, meagre, metre, mitre, nitre, ochre, reconnoitre, sabre, saltpetre, sepulchre, sombre, spectre, theatre (see exceptions) and titre all have -er in American spelling.
-ce, -se
advice/advise and device/devise and licence/license or practice/practise
Please note that depending on if the word is used as a noun or a verb depends on which spelling is used even in England as both spellings are used

Greek-derived and Latin-derived spellings

ae and oe
Many words, especially medical words, that are written with ae/æ or oe/œ in British English are written with just an e in American English. The sounds in question are /iː/ or /ɛ/ (or, unstressed, /i/, /ɪ/ or /ə/). Examples (with non-American letter in bold): aeon, anaemia, anaesthesia, caecum, caesium, coeliac, diarrhoea, encyclopaedia, faeces, foetal, gynaecology, haemoglobin, haemophilia, leukaemia, oesophagus, oestrogen, orthopaedic, palaeontology, paediatric, paedophile


Greek-derived spellings (often through Latin and Romance)

-ise, -ize (-isation, -ization)
organise, realise, recognise
-ogue, -og
analog(ue), catalog(ue), dialog(ue), homolog(ue), monolog(ue)

For all other spelling diferences please see [1]


Sources

  1. 1.0 1.1 1.2 American and British English spelling differences website




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Comments: 8

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Superb general reminder of the spelling differences Kathy - a big thank you for an excellent help page.

Malc

England Project - Profile Improvement Team Coordinator.

posted by Malc Rowlands
edited by Malc Rowlands
People who live in the United Kingdom who speak English do not recognise the term British English itself . Your comments however apply to folk from Canada, Australia, New Zealand, much of the Caribbean , South Africa , England, Wales , Scotland and the island of Ireland. Other ex-colonies such as India still have a widespread use of English with the same spelling.
posted by Neil Hartwell
Hi Kathy,

Most interesting, I once tried to persuade Wikitree admin via G2G that the phrase "Honor Code" was not really a very familiar concept outside the USA and could be replaced by "Code of Conduct". Wikipedia shows it pretty easy to avoid variant spellings in site terminology but alas I got a bloody nose for my pains. "In regard to the spellings used, we are based in America, though we welcome and desire people worldwide to the use site. As such, though, American spellings are what are used out of consistency with our geographical basis." https://www.wikitree.com/g2g/1215475/possible-rename-variant-spelling-provide-guidance-practice?show=1215475#q1215475

posted by Anne Rees
British English !!!!! OMG and you are a leader in the English Project!!!!!!! Unfortunately this is a major problem of Wikitree claims to be world wide but very USA dominated.

FYI British English could be taken offensively by a good number of British people. It is used poorly traveled or those not educated in USA,s ivy universities . Educated Americans , American's that have worked in multinational organizations' or well travelled Americans know better and do not use USA colloquialisms in international situations. personally I do not care but would think this person using such terms is lack of .........

posted by Paul Harrison
Hi Paul,

Thank you for pointing out that this page was accidentally set to open instead of being for my eyes only.

Yes, I am a Project Coordinator with the England Project but I live in the US. This is a reminder to me that I need to use the British English spelling of a word when writing the biographies for English profiles.

Kathy

posted by Kathy (Urbach) Nava
Same for advise, advice and for devise, device.
posted by Brad Cunningham U.E.
This is well structured. Ÿou may need to tweak licence/license because both spellings exist in British English: licence is the noun and license is the verb - you need a driving licence to drive a car, and you need to be licensed to run a pub. Same goes for practice and practise - there was a church choir practice yesterday, and they practised singing the 23rd Psalm set to the tune of Crimond.
posted by Richard Swetenham
Thank you for pointing that out. I just took it off the website. I will make those changes.
posted by Kathy (Urbach) Nava