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American and British English spelling differences are one aspect of American and British English differences.
In the early 18th century, English spelling was not standardized. Different standards became noticeable after the publishing of influential dictionaries. Current British English spellings follow, for the most part, those of Samuel Johnson's Dictionary of the English Language (1755). Many of the now characteristic American English spellings were introduced, although often not created, by Noah Webster in his An American Dictionary of the English Language of 1828.
Webster was a strong proponent of spelling reform for reasons both philological and nationalistic. Many spelling changes proposed in the U.S. were by Webster himself, and, in the early 20th century, uninfluentially by the Simplified Spelling Board. Among the advocates of spelling reform in England, the influences of those who preferred the Norman (or Anglo-French) spellings of certain words proved decisive. Subsequent spelling adjustments in the UK had little effect on present-day U.S. spelling, and vice versa. While in many cases American English deviated in the 19th century from mainstream British spelling, on the other hand it has also often retained older forms.
The spelling systems of Commonwealth countries closely resemble the British system. In Canada, while most spelling is "British," many "American" spellings are also used. Detailed information on Canadian and Australian spelling is provided throughout the article.
Most words ending in unstressed -our in the United Kingdom (e.g. colour, flavour, honour) end in -or in the U.S. (e.g. color, flavor, honor). Most words of this category derive from Latin non-agent nouns having nominative -or; the first such borrowings into English were from early Old French and the ending was -or or -ur.[1] After the Norman Conquest, the termination became -our in Anglo-French in an attempt to represent the Old French pronunciation of words ending in -or.[2] The -our ending was not only retained in English borrowings from Anglo-French, but also applied to earlier French borrowings.[3] After the Renaissance, some such borrowings from Latin were taken up with their original -or termination; many words once ending in -our (for example, chancellour and governour) now end in -or everywhere. Many words of the -our/-or group do not have a Latin counterpart; for example, armo(u)r, behavio(u)r, harbo(u)r, neighbo(u)r; also arbo(u)r in sense "shelter"; senses "tree" and "tool" are always arbor, a false cognate of the other word. Some 16th and early 17th century British scholars indeed insisted that -or be used for words of Latin origin and -our for French loans; but in many cases the etymology was not completely clear, and therefore some scholars advocated -or only and others -our only.[4]
As early as 1755 Dr Johnson settled on -our, while Webster's 1828 dictionary featured only -or and is generally given much of the credit for the adoption of this form in the U.S. By contrast, Johnson, unlike Webster, was not an advocate of spelling reform and for the most part simply recorded what he found. For example, documents [1] from the Old Bailey, the foremost court in London, support the view of the OED that by the 17th century "colour" was the settled spelling. Those English speakers who began to move across the Atlantic would have taken these habits with them and H L Mencken makes the point that, "honor appears in the Declaration of Independence, but it seems to have got there rather by accident than by design. In Jefferson’s original draft it is spelled honour. " [2] Examples such as color, flavor, behavior, harbor, or neighbor scarcely appear in the Old Bailey's court records from the 17th and 18th century, whereas examples of their -our counterparts are generally numbered in hundreds. One notable exception is honor: honor and honour were equally frequent down to the 17th century,[5] and Honor still is, in the UK, the normal spelling for a person's name.
Derivatives and inflected forms. In derivatives and inflected forms of the -our/or words, in British usage the u is kept before English suffixes that are freely attachable to English words (neighbourhood, humourless, savoury) and suffixes of Greek or Latin origin that have been naturalised (favourite, honourable, behaviourism); before Latin suffixes that are not freely attachable to English words, the u can be dropped (honorific, honorist, vigorous, humorous, laborious, invigorate), can be either dropped or retained (colo(u)ration, colo(u)rise), or can be retained (colourist).[6] In American usage, derivatives and inflected forms are built by simply adding the suffix in all environments (favorite, savory, etc.) since the u is absent to begin with.
Exceptions. American usage most often retains the u in the word glamour, which comes from Scots, not Latin or French; saviour is a common variant of savior in the U.S.; the name of the herb savory is thus spelled everywhere (although the probably related adjective savo(u)ry does have a u in the UK).
Commonwealth usage. Commonwealth countries normally follow British usage. In Canada -or endings are not uncommon, particularly in the Prairie Provinces, though they are rarer in Eastern Canada.[7] In Australia, -or terminations enjoyed some use in the 19th century, and now are sporadically found in some regions,[8] usually in local and regional newspapers, though -our is almost universal.
In British usage, some words of French, Latin, or Greek origin end with a consonant followed by -re, with the -re unstressed and pronounced . Most of these words have the ending -er in the U.S. This is especially true of endings -bre and -tre: fibre/fiber, sabre/saber, centre/center (though some places in the United States have "Centre" in their names, named both before and after spelling reform, and there are very occasional uses of "Center" in England [3]), specter/spectre .
Theater is the prevailing American spelling and is used by America's national theater as well as major American newspapers such as the New York Times (theater section) to refer to both the dramatic arts as well as to buildings where performances take place; yet theatre is also current, witness Broadway and The New Yorker.
Macabre is an exception, perhaps because in the U.S., the word is regarded as French, and is even pronounced as a French word, if the final syllable is pronounced at all. The ending -cre is retained in the U.S.: acre, massacre, and so on; this prevents the c from losing its hard k sound (however, it should be noted that acre was spelled æcer in Old English and aker in Middle English, compare Icelandic akr, Gothic Aker(s), Old High German Ackar, German Acker, Latin ager.)
There are not many other -re endings, even in British English: louvre, manoeuvre, meagre, ochre, ogre, sepulchre, and euchre. In the U.S., ogre and euchre are standard, manoeuvre and sepulchre are usually maneuver and sepulcher, and the other -re forms listed are variants of the equivalent -er form.
Of course the above relates to root words; -er rather than -re is universal as a suffix for agentive (reader, winner) and comparative (louder, nicer) forms. One consequence is the British distinction of meter for a measuring instrument from metre for the unit of measurement. However, while poetic metre is often -re, pentameter, hexameter, etc. are always -er.
The e preceding the r is retained in U.S. derived forms of nouns and verbs, for example, fibers, reconnoitered, centering, which are, naturally, fibres, reconnoitred and centring respectively in British usage. It is dropped for other inflections, for example, central, fibrous, spectral. However such dropping cannot be regarded as proof of an -re British spelling: for example, entry derives from enter, which is never spelled entre.
Commonwealth usage.[9] The -re endings are standard throughout the Commonwealth. The -er spellings are recognized, as minor variants, only in Canada.
Nouns ending in -ce with -se verb forms: American English and British English both retain the noun/verb distinction in advice / advise and device / devise, but American English has lost the same distinction with licence / license and practice / practise that British spelling retains. American English uses practice and license for both meanings. Also, American English has kept the Anglo-French spelling for defense and offense, which are usually defence and offence in British English; similarly there are the American pretense and British pretence; but derivatives such as defensive, offensive, and pretension are always thus spelled in both systems.
Commonwealth usage. Canadian English generally follows British usage for defence and offence and mostly for licence/license as well, although licence is sometimes used for the verb; both pretence and pretense are found, as are practice and practise for both noun and verb. Rest of the Commonwealth as UK.
The spellings connexion, inflexion, deflexion, reflexion are now somewhat rare in everyday British usage, but are not known at all in the U.S: the more common connection, inflection, deflection, reflection have almost become the standard internationally. According to the Oxford English Dictionary the older spellings are more etymologically conservative, since these four words actually derive from the Latin root -xio. The U.S. usage derives from Webster who discarded -xion in favor of -ction for analogy with such verbs as connect.[10]
Connexion has found preference again amongst recent British government initiatives such as Connexions (the national careers and training scheme for school early leavers). Until the early 1980s, The Times of London also used connexion as part of its house style.[11] It is still used in legal texts and British Methodism retains the eighteenth century spelling connexion to describe its national organisation, for historical reasons.
In both forms, complexion (which comes from the stem complex) is standard and complection is not.[12] However, the adjective complected (as in "dark complected"), although sometimes objected to, can be used as an alternative to complexioned in the U.S.,[13] but is quite unknown in this sense in the UK, although there is an extremely rare usage to mean complicated (OED). Note, however, that crucifiction is simply an error in either form of English; crucifixion is the correct spelling.
American spelling accepts only -ize endings in most cases, such as organize, recognize, and realize. British usage accepts both -ize and the more French-looking -ise (organise, recognise, realise). However, the -ize spelling is now rarely used in the UK in the mass media and newspapers, and is hence often incorrectly regarded as an Americanism,[14] despite being preferred by some authoritative British sources, including Fowler's Modern English Usage and the Oxford English Dictionary, which until recently did not list the -ise form of many individual words, even as an alternative. Indeed, it firmly deprecates this usage, stating, "[T]he suffix…, whatever the element to which it is added, is in its origin the Gr[eek] -ιζειν, L[atin] -izāre; and, as the pronunciation is also with z, there is no reason why in English the special French spelling in -iser should be followed, in opposition to that which is at once etymological and phonetic."[15] Noah Webster rejected -ise for the same reasons.[16]
But the OED might be fighting a losing battle. The -ise form is used by the British government and is more prevalent in common usage within the UK today; the ratio between -ise and -ize stands at 3:2 in the British National Corpus.[17] The OED spelling (which can be indicated by the registered IANA language tag en-GB-oed), and thus -ize, is used in many British-based academic publications, such as Nature, the Biochemical Journal and The Times Literary Supplement. In Australia and New Zealand -ise spellings strongly prevail; the Australian Macquarie Dictionary, among other sources, gives the -ise spelling first. Conversely, Canadian usage is essentially like American, although -ise is occasionally found in Canada. Worldwide, -ize endings prevail in scientific writing and are commonly used by many international organizations.
The same pattern applies to derivatives and inflections such as colonisation/colonization.
Endings in -yze are now found only in the U.S. and Canada. Thus, Commonwealth (including sometimes Canada) analyse, catalyse, hydrolyse, paralyse; North American analyze, catalyze, hydrolyze, paralyze. It is worth noting, however, that analyse was commonly spelled analyze from the first — a spelling also accepted by Samuel Johnson; the word, which came probably from French analyser, on Greek analogy would have been analysize, from French analysiser, from which analyser was formed by haplology.[18]
Note that not all spellings are interchangeable; some verbs take the -z- form exclusively, for instance capsize, seize (except in the legal phrase to be seised of/to stand seised to), size and prize (only in the "appraise" sense), whereas others take only -s-: advertise, advise, apprise, arise, chastise, circumcise, comprise, compromise, demise, despise, devise, disguise, excise, exercise, franchise, improvise, incise, merchandise, revise, supervise, surmise, surprise, and televise. Finally, the verb prise (meaning to force or lever) is spelled prize in the U.S. and prise everywhere else, including Canada,[19] although in North American English pry (a back-formation from or alteration of prise) is often used in its place.[20]
Some words of Greek origin, a few of which derive from Greek λόγος, can end either in -ogue or in -og: analog(ue), catalog(ue), dialog(ue), demagog(ue), pedagog(ue), monolog(ue), homolog(ue), etc. In the UK (and generally in the Commonwealth), the -ogue endings are the standard. In the U.S., catalog has a slight edge over catalogue[21] (note the inflected forms, cataloged and cataloging vs. catalogued and cataloguing); analog is standard for the adjective, but both analogue and analog are current for the noun; in all other cases the -gue endings strongly prevail,[22] except for such expressions as dialog box in computing, which are also used in the UK. Finally, in Canada and Australia as well as the U.S. analog has currency as a technical term[23] (e.g. in electronics, as in "analog computer" and many video game consoles might have an analog stick).
Many words are written with ae or oe in British English, but a single e in American English. The sound in question is or (or unstressed ). Examples (with non-American letter in bold): an'''a'''emia, an'''a'''esthesia, c'''a'''esium, diarrh'''o'''ea, gyn'''a'''ecology, h'''a'''emophilia, leuk'''a'''emia, '''o'''esophagus, '''o'''estrogen, orthop'''a'''edic, p'''a'''ediatric. Words where British usage varies include encyclop'''a'''edia, f'''o'''etus (though the British medical community deems this variant unacceptable for the purposes of journal articles and the like, since the Latin spelling is actually fetus), hom'''o'''eopathy, medi'''a'''eval. In American usage, aesthetics and archaeology prevail over esthetics and archeology,[24] while oenology is a minor variant of enology. In more modern legislative enactments, Subpena is gaining currency over Subpoena.[25]
The Ancient Greek diphthongs <αι> and <οι> were transliterated into Latin as
Commonwealth usage. The spellings with just e are generally preferred in Canada and increasingly used in Australia.[28]
Internationally, the American spelling is closer to the way most languages spell such words; for instance, almost all Romance languages (which tend to have more phonemic spelling) lack the ae and oe spellings (a notable exception is French), as do Swedish, Polish, and others, while Dutch uses them ("ae" is rare and "oe" is the normal representation of the sound (while written "u" represents either the sound y or in IPA)). Danish and Norwegian retain the original ligatures. German, through umlauts, retains its equivalent of the ligature, for when written without the umlaut, words resemble the British usage (i.e. ä becomes ae and ö becomes oe). Similarly, Hungarian uses "é" as a replacement for "ae" (although it becomes "e" sometimes), and the special character "ő" (sometimes "ö") for "oe."
British English often prefers hyphenated compounds, such as counter-attack, whereas American English discourages the use of hyphens in compounds where there is no compelling reason, so counterattack is much more common. Many dictionaries do not point out such differences. Canadian and Australian usage is mixed, although Commonwealth writers generally hyphenate compounds of the form noun plus phrase (such as editor-in-chief).[29]
The final consonant of an English word is sometimes doubled when adding a suffix beginning with a vowel. Generally this occurs only when the word's final syllable ends with a single vowel followed by a single consonant, and the syllable is stressed; but in British English, a final -l is often doubled even when the final syllable is unstressed.[30] This exception is no longer usual in American English, apparently due to Noah Webster.[31] The -ll- spellings are nonetheless still regarded as acceptable variants by both Merriam-Webster Collegiate and American Heritage dictionaries.
Among consonants other than l, practice varies for some words, such as where the final syllable has secondary stress or an unreduced vowel. In the U.S., the spellings kidnaped and worshiped, introduced by the Chicago Tribune in the 1920s,[34] are common alongside kidnapped and worshipped, the only standard British spellings.
Miscellaneous:
Conversely, there are words where British writers prefer a single l and Americans usually use a double l. These include wil(l)ful, skil(l)ful, thral(l)dom, appal(l), fulfil(l), fulfil(l)ment, enrol(l)ment, instal(l)ment. In the UK ll is used occasionally in distil(l), instil(l), enrol(l) and enthral(l)ment, and often in enthral(l). Former spellings instal, fulness, and dulness are now rare.[35] The Scottish tolbooth is cognate with toll booth but has a specific distinct sense.
The preceding words have monosyllabic cognates always written with -ll: will, skill, thrall, pall, fill, roll, stall, still. Comparable cases where a single l occurs in American English include full→useful, handful, etc.; all→almighty, altogether, etc.; null→annul, annulment; till→until; well→welfare, welcome; toll→extol; spell→dispel; chill→chilblain; and others where the connection is less transparent. Note that British fulfil and American fulfill are never fullfill or fullfil.
Dr Johnson wavered on this issue; his dictionary of 1755 lemmatises distil and instill, downhil and uphill.[36]
British English sometimes keeps silent e when adding suffixes where American English does not.
Compare also meter, for which an older English written distinction between etymologically related forms with different meanings once existed, but was obviated in the regularisation of American spellings.
Proper names formed as proper acronyms are often rendered in title case by Commonwealth writers, but usually as upper case by Americans: for example, Nasa / NASA or Unicef / UNICEF.[51] This does not apply to most initialisms, such as USA or HTML; though it is occasionally done for some, such as PC (Police Constable).[52]
Contractions, where the final letter is present, are often written in British English without stops/periods (Mr, Mrs, Dr, St). Abbreviations where the final letter is not present generally do take stops/periods (such as vol., etc., ed.). (British English shares this convention with French: Mlle, Mme, Dr, Ste, but M. for Monsieur.) In American English, abbreviations like St., Mr., Mrs., and Dr. always require stops/periods.
Throughout the following table, Canadian and Australian spelling is the same as British except where noted.
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