First, “It’s me” is quite good grammar… “me” being the disjunctive nominative of informal speech. The reason “It’s me” is sometimes considered poor grammar is that in formal discourse, the verb “to be” always takes the subject-form nominative as complement, without contraction, giving “It is I.”
The correct form to use depends on the style. A story set in a lower-middle-class setting in the 1950s where all the characters spoke formal English would be as great a solecism as any informality in the text of a doctoral dissertation would.
In precise English on either side of the Pond, a collective noun governs a singular or plural verb according to whether the noun represents the group as a whole or its individual members. “The committee unanimously recommends passage of this measure,” but “The committee are evenly divided on how to implement the plan.” First case, decision made as a group; second, the views of the individual members. Technically, “the jury is hung” does not mean they were unable to reach a verdict but either they were as a group taken to the gallows and executed for failing to do so, or they are not only twelve good men and true but ithyphallic as well.
And “than I” or “than me” can be correct; informal English either regards “than” as a preposition governing “me” or “me” as a disjunctive nominative, as noted above; “than I” is the more formal usage with “am” or “do” understood. Proper usage would be “He gets laid more often than me” or “He engages in coitus more often than I” – the verb forms cluing you in to the level of discourse intended.
The furor over prescriptive vs. descriptive grammar has always seemed to me to be a tempest in a teapot: Like any other social science, grammar attempts to describe a social condition, in this case how language is used. As such, it should include the levels of usage. And the idea that there is a correct grammar stems from the fact that while we learn informal usage from daily conversation in childhood, formal usage is something that comes later in life with the preparation of formal reports and such. There are standards to informal usage also; everyone has heard or been a parent correcting a toddler’s “me want cookie” to “I want a cookie.” So the teaching of “proper” (formal) English is not incorrect, just not properly identified as “the usage appropriate to formal presentations rather than daily conversation and familiar letters.”
There are very few differences in the grammar rules between US English and UK English. The use of plural/singular for collective nouns (“The committee meets today” – US “The committee meet today” – UK) is probably the most obvious grammar difference. The British also used to be very concerned about the difference between the use of “will” and “shall.” Americans almost always use “will” (unless you’re Douglas Macarthur).
Most other differences are either style (double or single quotation marks, period before or after quote marks), usage (corn (US) = maize (UK) corn (UK) = grain (US)), pronunciation (you say “to-may-to” and I say “to-mah-to”), or idiom (“Don’t let’s do that” – UK “Let’s not do that” – US).
Good call, TomH. The past participle gotten, with a venerable existence going back centuries in England, is now extinct in Britain but lives on in America.
One of the many ways that American English is more conservative than British. We need to compile plenty of examples of this to refute the frequent, but mistaken, assumption of ESL people that British English is somehow more “authentic” or “correct” than American because it is more “conservative.” In fact, students of linguistic history know that the trend often goes the opposite way: more innovation in the core Ursprache zone than in areas of outward migration which hold on to conservative features longer.
American English makes a useful distinction between the participles got, implying simple possession, and gotten, implying acquisition. Thus
“I’ve got a new car.” – just means I have a car that happens to be a new one. I might have had it for the past several months, but it’s still relatively new (late-model, right from the factory, not pre-owned).
“I’ve gotten a new car.” – this means I just bought it, within the past few days or so.
And the man in the suit has just bought a new car
From the profit he’s made on your dreams
–Stevie Winwood
Sorry, ish. “Than” is not a preposition. It’s a conjunction, joining two sentences. There’s an implied second verb, “He is bigger than I [am].” Although it’s acceptable to use “me” in informal situations, you certainly can’t say that “I” would be wrong.
Chuck, though you are undoubtedly the most scholarly science fiction author whom I know personally (not to mention the only one, other than Ian Strock), I have to differ on your MacArthur aside (though the rest of your post was quite on target).
Old Douglas was in some ways quite the pedant. And he chose carefully what he wanted to say. It’s one of fate’s ironies that it got totally twisted by the loss of the shall/will distinction over the last 60 years.
Rather than an Arnoldian “I’ll be back” (I shall return with no emphasis on the auxiliary verb), which would merely imply his expectation to return at some time or other, or “I will return” (which carries the meaning of intent, determination), he chose to say “I shall return” as a morale-lifter to the Filipinos and Americans there, because the “shall” and the stress together implied simple futurity, not determination, but certitude. Of course, as time passed and the “I shall/you will” faded out, the meaning of “will” as simple future and “shall” as determination took hold, and most people read his statement as “I’m determined to return” not as the “No doubt about it, I’ll return (because the Japanese defeat is certain)” that he meant.
No particular reason for the hijack; it’s just that it’s such a neat piece of effecive grammar by someone who knew how to use it, turned bad by the winds of chance and change, that I just had to share it.
America is also much less accepting of the possessive it’s than Britain is. In America the appearance of this (mis)usage in print is a sign of a bad copy editor; in Britain, well, you just grit your teeth and get used to it.
Regarding the OP, I have some experience looking at the question from the other end, so to speak, in that I’m a Brit (with some ritzy-ditzy English qualifications to boot) who has spent a lot of time over there in the US (and I so wish I lived there too, but that’s a different story).
The answer is, as many have already stated here, that in terms of everyday usage you will find the grammar to be the same (or very easily assimilated) whereas the vocabulary and colloquialisms will take time to absorb (but you will have a lot of fun learning them).
BobT suggested a collective noun such as ‘England’ (as in the English team) take a plural verb in UK English and a singular one US English. I am not sure this is true. Most native English speakers have only the haziest notion of ‘correct’ grammar, and would accept either a singular or plural verb according to the perceived context: is the speaker referring to one thing (a team) or several (the players)?
melchizedek suggested we English use singular quotation marks whereas Americans prefer double. Not so. If we teach grammar in our schools at all, we still teach that written speech is denoted by quotation marks, these being typographically equivalent to double inverted commas. If the speech itself reports a separate quotation, this is placed within single inverted commas.
I disagree with ruadh. It is never acceptable to use it’s to mean its. Yes, many sloppy writers make this mistake, but no, it is not acceptable.
“British English, A to Zed” by Norman W. Schur, is indispensable for Americans working in Britain. There are about four hundred pages of Briticisms, including slang, common phrases, etc.; an appendix that contains differences in syntax, punctuation and style, pronunciation, spoken usage and figures of speech. Another appendix contains glossaries and tables (automotive terms, cricket terms, financial terms).
The book is useful as well as very witty.
“Giving the English language to the Americans is like giving sex to small children; they know it’s important but they don’t know what to do with it.”
Actually, to my ears, the first has an implied “am” at the end. It does sound funny, but i would naturally think the speaker was implying “am”. I’ve heard both, but, “he is bigger than me” sounds more “natural”.
Question (sorry for the thread hijack):
Is a phrase like “Went to the store, bought some eggs.” necesarily wrong, or would it be assumed that “I” is the subject?
Yes, they use British texts in Jamaica and spell things the same way. But they also say “flim” instead of “film” in Jamaica and “cerfiticate” for “certificate” there. Do they use those pronunciations in Britain? Not to mention the Patois, which bears little relationship to American or British English:
“A fi oonu pickney dem?” (Are those (plural)your children?)
“Fi true im na bidnes me.” (He [or she] really doesn’t bother me)
As Jamaica is a member of the Commonwealth, it’s hardly surprising that at some stage of their history they sent exams back to Britain in preference to the US.
But how old is that anecdote peace? I’d be guessing a few decades. At least.
I want to chime in on the “He is bigger than I” vs. “He is bigger than me.” In this case “than I” is correct, but they both convey the
same meaning. The reason that the difference is important is when you use a transitive verb, both are correct, but the meaning is
different.
[li]He loves you more than I.[/li][li]He loves you more than me.[/li]The first says “He loves you more than I love you.”
The second says “He loves you more than he loves me.”