# American vs. British English: brainstorm **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [June 24, 2003, 9:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-vs-british-english-brainstorm/183985 "2003-06-24T09:55:13Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![dwc1970](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a183cd/32.png) [@dwc1970](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dwc1970)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2003, 12:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-vs-british-english-brainstorm/183985/21 "2003-06-24T12:21:42Z")
One of the first ones I thought of was “telly”, British for “television.” Not only are there variations in words, but in how some phrases are spoken. I recently learned (here on the SDMB, in fact) that in America we say, “he’s in the hospital.” In British they say, “he’s in hospital.” While the words “college” and “university” are generally interchangeable here in the U.S. we usually say, “he’s going to college.” In Britain they would say, “he’s going to university.” ---
**Author:** ![Hari\_Seldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hari_seldon/32/5173_2.png) [@Hari\_Seldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hari_Seldon)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2003, 12:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-vs-british-english-brainstorm/183985/22 "2003-06-24T12:42:25Z")
A few of the Britishisms are also in Canada. The reason college and university are not interchangeable is that college means, at best, junior college if not simply residential high school. When I tell people in Canada that my daughter graduated from Williams College, they think she went to some finishing school. Any 4 year degree granting institution here, no matter how humble, is called a university. On the other hand, the name of the 26th letter is definitely changing (Sesame Street?). ---
**Author:** ![mallocks](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f4b2a3/32.png) [@mallocks](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mallocks)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2003, 1:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-vs-british-english-brainstorm/183985/23 "2003-06-24T13:00:30Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by kferr \* > \*\*And for car/bike parts and motoring > American / British > bicycle / push bike \*\* 😕 I’ve never used the phrase push bike. Ever. So what’s a bicycle in America? ---
**Author:** ![CCYMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/87869e/32.png) [@CCYMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CCYMan)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2003, 1:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-vs-british-english-brainstorm/183985/24 "2003-06-24T13:06:14Z")
Cool! I was going to start this thread recently when I noticed English-to-English confusion in several threads (sorry, too lazy and sympathetic toward the hamsters to do a proper search): English muffins vs. crumpets Public/Private school vs. Public/Private school Something about flapjacks/pancakes Anyway, a British family lives two doors down from us, and through them I’ve picked up the following: garbage = rubbish garbage cans = bins jelly = jam Jell-O = jelly stroller = pram ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2003, 1:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-vs-british-english-brainstorm/183985/25 "2003-06-24T13:10:30Z")
Here’s a confusing one for you international business types: in the US, to “table” something is to take it off the agenda or to postpone discussion of it; in the UK, it means to put something _on_ the agenda or to bring it up for immediate discussion. Very confusing. ---
**Author:** ![CCYMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/87869e/32.png) [@CCYMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CCYMan)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2003, 1:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-vs-british-english-brainstorm/183985/26 "2003-06-24T13:18:05Z")
And while I’m at it, let me hijack this slightly. It took me years to learn this, so let me know if this is right: England, Scotland, Wales = Great Britain England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland = United Kingdom Here’s my question. It seems that the term “UK” would be at least somewhat politically charged, but from what I can tell, it isn’t. Do you use “Britain” and UK interchangeably? ---
**Author:** ![mhendo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mhendo/32/3159_2.png) [@mhendo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mhendo)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2003, 1:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-vs-british-english-brainstorm/183985/27 "2003-06-24T13:19:29Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by mallocks \* > \*\*😕 I’ve never used the phrase push bike. Ever. So what’s a bicycle in America? \*\* It’s just a bicycle. I grew up in Australia, and recently when i used the term “push bike” (to distinguish it from a motor bike) my American girlfriend asked me what the hell i was talking about, and quite correctly pointed out that you don’t push it, you ride on it. Like **CCYMan** ’s neighbours (neighbors?), i put my rubbish (not my trash) in the rubbish bin, not the garbage can. I should point out that, in Australia at least, we do use the term “stroller,” but we distinguish it from a pram. A pram is one of those things a baby lies down in; a stroller is one of those things in which a toddler sits up, facing forward. When i moved to the US, i was pretty confident that i could quite easily make the switch to writing for Americans (colour/color; centre/center, etc.). However, one of the first corrections my professor made to my written word was to change my use of “whilst” to “while.” She called the former an archaism. The usage is quite common in British and Australian English, but not in American English. ---
**Author:** ![mhendo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mhendo/32/3159_2.png) [@mhendo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mhendo)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2003, 1:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-vs-british-english-brainstorm/183985/28 "2003-06-24T13:20:44Z")
Oh, and i almost forgot: British=arse American=ass ---
**Author:** ![Space\_Vampire](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e0b2c6/32.png) [@Space\_Vampire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Space_Vampire)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2003, 1:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-vs-british-english-brainstorm/183985/29 "2003-06-24T13:25:09Z")
Oh shit, I told somebody “whilst” was archaic too. Ah well. Isn’t there a different word for a shopping cart? I’m curious what the British think of the American equivalents. I presume the feeling is some variety of “what the hell is that,” but in what way? Personally I think the British equivalents tend to sound sort of… eh… fruity. So does our American English sound vulgar and brutish? ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2003, 1:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-vs-british-english-brainstorm/183985/30 "2003-06-24T13:26:53Z")
In the UK, the “post” is delivered by the Royal Mail. In the US, the “mail” is delivered by the US Postal Service. Go figure. ---
**Author:** ![gouda](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/c77e96/32.png) [@gouda](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gouda)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2003, 1:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-vs-british-english-brainstorm/183985/31 "2003-06-24T13:27:36Z")
From reading this thread, it seems we in India use a lot of american as well as british words… and it’s not always a case of either/or. We use hood as well as bonnet, garbage can as well as bin, pants as well as trousers… and so on… ---
**Author:** ![everton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ecb155/32.png) [@everton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/everton)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2003, 1:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-vs-british-english-brainstorm/183985/32 "2003-06-24T13:27:41Z")
**mhendo** : what you’ve described as a stroller would be called a buggy here. Sometimes even when the same phrases are used the emphasis on syllables gives away the speaker’s origin. For example, we both say “ice cream”, but Americans put an emphasis on the word “ice” which the British do not. That even seems to carry through to some names (which sounds very odd to my ears). ROBIN Hood? Why emphasise his first name? You don’t call yourself JOHN Smith do you? There’s always a risk that there will be differences between the use of Englsih here and in Hong Kong. Everybody here would know what a refrigerator was and would commonly abbreviate it to 'fridge as you’ve heard. Nobody would say “icebox”, and “freezer” means something to keep frozen food in, not your beer and everyday chilled food. ---
**Author:** ![everton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ecb155/32.png) [@everton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/everton)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2003, 1:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-vs-british-english-brainstorm/183985/33 "2003-06-24T13:30:37Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Space Vampire \* > Isn’t there a different word for a shopping cart? Yes – shopping trolley. > [@](#): > > I’m curious what the British think of the American equivalents. I presume the feeling is some variety of “what the hell is that,” but in what way? Personally I think the British equivalents tend to sound sort of… eh… fruity. So does our American English sound vulgar and brutish? It sounds American ;). ---
**Author:** ![mallocks](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f4b2a3/32.png) [@mallocks](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mallocks)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2003, 1:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-vs-british-english-brainstorm/183985/34 "2003-06-24T13:31:31Z")
so is push-bike British English? If so I don’t think it’s in very common use, as far as I know we just call them bikes or bicycles 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2003, 1:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-vs-british-english-brainstorm/183985/35 "2003-06-24T13:33:37Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Space Vampire \* > **Oh shit, I told somebody “whilst” was archaic too. Ah well.** It isn’t, but you have to have a British accent (and the right kind of British accent, too) to get away with using “whilst”. \*\* > [@](#): > > Isn’t there a different word for a shopping cart?\*\* Shopping trolley. The kind of trolley you ride in is a tram. And a baby stroller is a “pushchair” in the UK; pram = baby carriage/baby buggy. Except I don’t think I’ve seen a baby carriage in years; everyone uses strollers/pushchairs now (or harnesses for really young infants). On another point, I think the American billion (1,000,000,000) has now completely replaced the UK billion (1,000,000,000,000) in common usage in the UK. Which is how it should be, really. ---
**Author:** ![Angua](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/8baadc/32.png) [@Angua](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Angua)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2003, 1:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-vs-british-english-brainstorm/183985/36 "2003-06-24T13:37:27Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by jr8 \* > \*\* > On another point, I think the American billion (1,000,000,000) has now completely replaced the UK billion (1,000,000,000,000) in common usage in the UK. Which is how it should be, really. \*\* No it hasn’t. We still call a million million a billion 😛 ---
**Author:** ![Davebear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bcef8e/32.png) [@Davebear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Davebear)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2003, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-vs-british-english-brainstorm/183985/37 "2003-06-24T13:42:29Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Angua \* > **An icebox tends to be known as a freezer.** Over here, icebox refers to a primitive form of refrigerator, in which the cooling was supplied by a large block of ice placed in the (usually) top compartment. While one _could_ put things “on ice”, there often wasn’t room, and that wasn’t the intent, to begin with. Freezers, _per se_, didn’t come into being until the advent of electric refrigeration, and were never commonly known as iceboxes. Icebox was carried over to refer to refrigerators, though, and will still be used in that sense, occasionally. All of which is a long-winded way of saying I have no idea what you were trying to tell us. Because, in my idiom, you appear to be saying icebox (fridge) = freezer. I know I’m misunderstanding, but I’m not sure where I’m going astray. > [@](#): > > **A fender (on a car) is a bumper.** So, what do you call the horizontal bits on the front and back of a car that are actually _intended_ to absorb bumps? We call those bumpers. > [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by mhendo \* > \*\*Like CCYMan’s neighbours (neighbors?), i put my rubbish (not my trash) in the rubbish bin, not the garbage can. \*\* If you ask an American who’s old enough, like me, he’ll know the difference between trash and garbage. We used to have separate pickup services for the two types of refuse. Garbage was food waste; trash was everything else. The garbage was put into in-ground bins which had a foot operated lid on them, and a pull-out liner. The lids were cast iron, and heavy enough to keep out stray dogs and cats, and all but the most determined raccoons. Trash went into what we now interchangeably call trash cans or garbage cans. I don’t know if this dual system was ever implemented anywhere other than the Northeastern US, but it was pretty universal, here. I don’t know why it started or why it stopped. But, it stopped long enough ago that many of the posters here wouldn’t have been born, yet. I’m thinking roughly around 1970, in our area, but that’s a rough estimate based on an unreliable memory. ---
**Author:** ![Angua](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/8baadc/32.png) [@Angua](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Angua)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2003, 1:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-vs-british-english-brainstorm/183985/38 "2003-06-24T13:45:09Z")
OK. I’m even more confused than you lot 🙂 However, and I hate to break this to my UK friends, you guys are actually closer to the original Greek roots of words which end in -ise by using ize. :runs and hides before any of the UKDopers see this: ---
**Author:** ![Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spectre_of_pithecanthropus/32/12343_2.png) [@Spectre\_of\_Pithecanthropus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spectre_of_Pithecanthropus)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2003, 1:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-vs-british-english-brainstorm/183985/39 "2003-06-24T13:46:53Z")
Don’t forget _got_ vs _gotten_. IIRC only Americans use the latter as the past participle in a normal sentence, e.g. “He’s already gotten the food ready” But it’s used in phrases, like “ill-gotten gains”, on both sides of the Atlantic. Oh I just thought of another one. Don’t they only say _autumn_ in England, while _fall_ is still used in America? ---
**Author:** ![Davebear](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bcef8e/32.png) [@Davebear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Davebear)\ **Post date:** [June 24, 2003, 1:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-vs-british-english-brainstorm/183985/40 "2003-06-24T13:52:11Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by everton \* > \*\*ROBIN Hood? Why emphasise his first name? You don’t call yourself JOHN Smith do you? \*\* That’s due to ‘Murkin iggerance. People think the Robin part is a title, meaning Robbing (robbin’), as opposed to his first name. Had his nickname come down through history in it’s unabbreviated form, “Robin _of the_ Hood”, it might be different. But, that would probably confuse us just as much, since Robin is generally a girl’s name, here. Oh, and we use _both_ Autumn and Fall. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-vs-british-english-brainstorm/183985.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/american-vs-british-english-brainstorm/183985.md?page=3)