NATIONAL ECONOMICS UNIVERSITY

FACULTY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES

DEAPRTMENT OF BUSINESS ENGLISH

LEXICOLOGY
THE SIGNIFICANCE OF DISTINGUISHING BETWEEN
AMERICAN ENGLISH AND BRITISH ENGLISH AMONG
BUSINESS ENGLISH STUDENTS

Group members: Tô Hương Anh

Nguyễn Thị Hà Thu
Nguyễn Thị Thúy
Đoàn Thị Nhung
ĐàoThị Lành

Ha Noi

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TABLE OF FIGURES

Figure 1. BE students’ confidence of communicating in English…………………………………..6, 9

Figure 2. BE student’s preferred variant………………………………………………………………………7
Figure 3. Linguistic education system of BE students……………………………………………………8
Figure 4. Trouble-encountering due to misusing………………………..………………………………..8
Figure 5. Self-evaluation to differentiate…………………………………..…………………………………10
Figure 6. The biggest difference between AmE and BrE according to BE students..……………….11, 19
Figure 7. Answers for the mini-test1…………………………………………………………………………….12
Figure 8. Students’ answers to three idioms…………………………………………………………………13
Figure 9. Students’ answers to two pieces of news……………………………………………….........14

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

TABLE OF FIGURES .....................................................................................................................................................i

TABLE OF CONTENTS .................................................................................................................................................ii

I. INTRODUCTION ..................................................................................................................................................... 1

I.1. Background ........................................................................................................................................................... 1

I.2. Rational ................................................................................................................................................................ 1

I.3. Research questions ............................................................................................................................................... 2

I.4. Research method .................................................................................................................................................. 2

I.5. Scope of research .................................................................................................................................................. 3

I.6. Structure of research ............................................................................................................................................ 3

II. THEORETICAL REVIEW ............................................................................................................................................ 4

II.1. Definition, origin and development of American English and British English........................................................ 4

II.2. The extent necessary and the difficulties in distinguishing between .................................................................... 4

American English and British English .......................................................................................................................... 4

III. MAJOR FINDINGS .................................................................................................................................................. 6

III.1. The usage of American English among Business English students ....................................................................... 6

III.2. Whether or not the BE students can perceive the importance of ...................................................................... 9

distinguishing between American English and British English .......................................................................... 9

III.2.1. BE students’ assessing themselves at distinguishing between................................................................................9

American English and British English ......................................................................................................................9
III.2.2. BE students’ real ability of differentiate American and British English ...................................................................10
III.2.2.1. In listening skill .....................................................................................................................................................10
II.2.2.2. In writing skill .........................................................................................................................................................11
III.3. The significance of distinguishing between American and British English ........................................................... 13
III.3.1. In study ....................................................................................................................................................................13
III.3.2. In real life .................................................................................................................................................................17
IV. RECOMMENDATION .............................................................................................................................................. 20
V. CONCLUSION .......................................................................................................................................................... 22
APPENDIX .......................................................................................................................................................................iii
Questionnaire ............................................................................................................................................................. iii
Figures ........................................................................................................................................................................ v
REFERENCES

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I. INTRODUCTION
I.1. Background

As we know, English has become an international language and been spoken by billions
of people all over the world. English obviously hales from England and was first used in the
early medieval England. However, nowadays many other countries and parts of the globe
consider it as their second language, or even the mother tongue.

The British colonization is the root of the use of English in the United States, forming a
variant named American English. During the 17th, 18th and 19th century in the US, English was
utilized, influenced and changed little by little by the languages of the native population and
immigrants from West Africa, German, Spanish. As a consequence, current American English is
unlike British English at several points, but comparing with British English, American English is
absolutely not a dialect nor a dependent linguistic system. Therefore, English learners sometimes
encounter troubles in distinguishing between them, though in fact, it is so critical to do so.

Indeed, to Business English students, the matter of differentiating between American and
British English is even more vital. In the future, most of these students will work in the business
environment which requires them to speak English to communicate, negotiate, and widen
network. They might meet partners, clients or customers from the US and in this case, using right
variant of English is one of the keys to success. Besides, the other may pursue the translation or
interpretation career, then they need to be master the American English’s idioms, dialects, word-
use and so on to handle dissimilar situations professionally.

For those reasons, perceiving the differences between American English and British
English is definitely important to the Business English students. However, we have not been sure
whether the BE students are aware of this matter or not, and if they can confidently tell the two
variants apart, so we do this research to help them recognize the circumstance and propose some
ideas and tactics to improve the ability of distinguish between American and British English as
well.

I.2. Rational

Those who learn a foreign language always complain about the difficulties in learning
German, but they do not know how lucky they are. Although German in different regions differs
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greatly, they still have Hochdeutsch (German standard). Therefore, people in the regions using
German such as Austria or Switzerland can easily understand what people from other areas say.
However, the difficulty of learning English is that English has no standard. Ignoring the effects
of integrating to use and the formation of a multi-culture, American English and British English
differ in many ways. To be consistent in using English, speakers need to know that those words
have different meanings and pronunciations, depending on whether they are used by a British or
an American and it is necessary not only for the sake of communication, but also for avoiding
embarrassment. For example, if a London talking with a resident of New York assumes that she
had left her child in the stroller and diaper of it in the boot, she will only be greeted with a
confusing look. If the New York then tells the woman that she has nice pants, he can also wonder
why she does not seem to have your comment as a compliment. Thus, telling American English
and British English apart is indeed critical and basic for perfectly speaking and understanding the
language that we are learning, especially to the BE students. This research aims at pointing out
the differences between American and British English, clarifying the difficulties in
distinguishing them, giving some suggestions for speakers to use it correctly.

I.3. Research questions

1. Can BE students perceive the importance of distinguishing between American English and
British English?

2. What is the significance of distinguishing between American and British English?

I.4. Research method

The data used to develop this research are involed two types: primary data and secondary
data… Primary data includes data collected from survey we have conducted. About 51 Business
English (BE) student took part in the survey by answering a questionnaire including 10
questions designed to find out the fact of their distinguish American English and British English
and the significance of this distinguish. Moreover, the data from the books, journals, internet and
other researches related to the topic was used as secondary data for the research. The collected
survey result was carefully processed and analyzed thanks to the help of Survey Monkey.

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I.5. Scope of research

Our research concentrates on clarifying 50 BE students’ ability in telling American

English and British English apart. Two reasons for this choice are: firstly, so we can realistically
and strongly identify their ability during studying process in class. We are familiar to the way
they approach foreign languages, so we have more accurate view of the research. Moreover, BE
students have intensively learned foreign language, so they practice it daily, especially which
they will utilize in the future work. Hence, spotting and having ability to differentiate American
English and British English are absolutely necessary. Moreover, it is important to prepare for
future career.

I.6. Structure of research

The structure of the research includes four main parts: theoretical review, major findings,
recommendations, conclusion. First, the theorical review presents clearly and briefly the
background knowledge of American English and British English. Also, it reviews the results
from some previous studies related to this topic. The second part is major findings playing the
most important role in the report. Major findings focus on the results of the survey and the
analysis to answers to two research questions: the distinguish American English and British
English of BE students intake 53 and the significance of this distinguish. The third part of the
report in which a number of recommendations for students to make better distinguish between
American English and British English are proposed and they refer to some possible explanations
for the difficulties of students’ awareness of the differences between American English and
British English, also the recommendations for further researches. Finally, the conclusion gives
brief statements on figures and analysis found. In addition, the references and appendix are
attached in order to make the report more reliable and clear-to-follow.

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II. THEORETICAL REVIEW
II.1. Definition, origin and development of American English and British English
Most people around the world who learn English as a second language learn either
American English or British English. The worldwide use of English began when Britain created
a worldwide empire. Today, most people who learn English as a foreign language still learn
British English. This happens because Britain has had a longstanding interest in teaching English
and has publishers and institutions in place to promote it. American English is taught more and
more, however, due to the USA's dominance of cinema, television, popular music, trade and
technology (including the Internet). This success also leads speakers of British English–even in
England–to adopt many Americanisms.
The divergence between American English and British English has provided
opportunities for humorous comment, e.g. George Bernard Shaw said that the United States and
United Kingdom are "two countries divided by a common language" and Oscar Wilde wrote
"We have really everything in common with America nowadays, except, of course, the
language".
Recognizing differences between American and British English, Kerry Maxwell and
Lindsay Clandfield said that the two varieties of English most widely found in print and taught
around the world are British and American. It is therefore important for teachers to be aware of
the major differences between the two. We recognize that distinguishing between American
English and British English is not useful for teachers but also for students who often take exams
and essay writing in English. For this reason, we would like to focus clarifying significance of
this distinction to students rather than only analyzing differences between American English and
British English. Only when students are aware of the importance of distinguishing between
American English and British English, do they find out the most effective way to learn English.
The main beneficiary of our research is BE students who approach foreign language every day so
that we can assess their awareness of learning English.
II.2. The extent necessary and the difficulties in distinguishing between American English
and British English

The available literature generally supports the idea that there are enough differences
between BrE and AmE to cause hilarious situations or misunderstandings or even a complete

4
failure of communication. The possible reasons for these differences are also given in an
extensive way.

According to W. William Labov, S. Ash, C. Boberg, the considerable variations between

British and American English in terms of economy, history, environment and social organization
is the fundamental ground for the variations prevailing in English language in two above
countries. Considering the fact that, the two countries have lived separate lives for more than 200
years, it is natural that their languages differ to some extent even thought they have the same
origin. Along with these main reasons for the differences between BrE and AmE, Peter Avery,
Susan Ehrlich suggest that youth also plays a main role for language evolution as they
experiment with language by producing slang, idioms, expressions and some of them become
standards.

Various studies and researches have been conducted to define the necessity of making
clear and exhaustive distinction between BrE and AmE by pointing out misunderstandings or
confusions caused by misusing these two main types of English. Besides many hilarious
situations or funny cases provoking by false friends such as pants, suspenders, and buns, the
literature on this topic has reached its way to many other lexical items that might bring about
serious problems. Winston Churchill indicated his research by an example, which is a case of
misunderstanding during Second World War, when a simple word “to table” caused a long and
serious argument between the American and the British. The former wanted to express the
meaning “to suggest formally in a meeting an issue for everyone to discuss about”, while for the
latter, the exact opposite meaning is interpreted, that is, “to postpone dealing with an issue such
as a proposal until a future time”. H. J. Giegerich, Zansvoort, R. W., and many other linguists
have listed out some of the most common English words that are more likely to cause serious
blunders. A clear illustration is the word “fag” – a colloquial term in the UK for cigarette, while
in the US it is considered as an offensive word for a homosexual. Thus, for example, the
sentences “Rick asks if he can bum a fag here or If you are stressed, grap a fag” could bring
about misinterpretations or serious blunders especially when used in America. In the US, the
sentences suggest to make use of homosexuals either to satisfy sexual needs or to avoid being
stressed. Therefore, these misunderstandings either in a small scale or large extent indicate the
need to distinguish American English and British English. Naturally, awareness of lexical

5
differences is also needed since globalization has increased the possibility of interaction between
speakers of the two varieties and embedded the increasing demand of the market (Moss,
Norman, 2001).

By showing these examples, most of researches studying on this topic conclude that it is
crucial to bear in mind these semantic differences. English learners as well as the teachers must
know there are particular items which have different meanings or expressions in American
English and British English system, as well as being aware of how to use them in accordance
with specific context of situations.

III. MAJOR FINDINGS

In the major findings of the research, we will present and analyze the results of our study.
The concept of this part includes two following points. First, we mention the usage of American
English among Business English students, showing how much they like American English and
how familiar they are with it. After that, basing on the survey outcome, we answer the two
research questions, which is also the main section of our research.

III.1. The usage of American English among Business English students

Figure 1. BE students’ confidence of communicating in English

The chart above shows the confident level of BE students in their English
communication. 55% of them think that on the ascending scale of goodness from 1 to 5, they are

6
at 3, which means Average. The second higher number of students, accounting for 27%, believes
that they are fairly good and only 8% of them are certain that they can speak English fluently and
comfortably. Notably, there is still one student who feels completely interior of his or her
English speaking. Actually, at this stage of the way, we expected BE students to be more self-
confident because they have been through three – forth of the university journey and they should
be ready to communicate in English, no matter who the partners are, Vietnamese friends and
teacher or native speakers.
The next finding that we have got is about the students’ preference of either American
English of British English.

Figure 2. BE student’s preferred variant

It can be seen that BE students prefer American English to British English. 75% of them would
like to study and use American English, whereas only 25% would rather use British English. One
reason for this phenomenon might be American English is easier to use in some cases because of
many simplified rules in grammar or word – spelling. Another reason is shown clearly by the
result of the next question about the variant they are following in their education system.

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Figure 3. Linguistic education system of BE students
Most of BE students say that they are being taught American English, so that they are more
familiar and willing to use it to communicate is absolutely reasonable. However, the questions
are whether they accurately made up their mind which kind of English they are using, how they
can do so and is there any chance that they are unconsciously using both?

To find out whether students have had troubles for misusing between AmE and BrE, we
asked them to answer a multi-choice question. The result is presented in the following figure.

Figure 4. Trouble-encountering due to misusing AmE and/or BrE

The majority of students (more than 71 percent) have had problems because they misused
words in AmE and BrE system. This raises the concern about how to speak English correctly in
accordance with one specific English system as lack of practices and knowledge in
differentiating BrE and AmE is the main cause for the possible troubles or blunders.
Furthermore, the object of this study is students whose English is somehow within the scale of

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campus. With the primary level of English, they have to face problems of using properly English
variations. As their command of English requires to be enhanced concerning their future job, the
likelihood of them dealing with circumstances or problems in reference with the differences
between AmE and BrE is raising.

III.2. Whether or not the BE students can perceive the importance of distinguishing
between American English and British English
III.2.1. BE students’ assessing themselves at distinguishing between American English and
British English

On the first question, we asked BE students how they rank their command of English,
and the result presented on the figure below.

Figure 1. BE students’ confidence of communicating in English

The majority choose level 3 for this question, which equals the moderate level command of
English. The level 4 ranks the second highest percentage of chosen people with 27 percent out of
total. It can be clearly seen that BE students are quite confident with their command of English
since the majority fall to the high levels (3, 4, 5). However, there is still 10 percent of the total
number of interviewees who chose level 1 and 2, indicating they are not self-confident with their
English. This question is conducted as a base and does not reveal much about how student assess
their ability in differentiating BrE and AmE.

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 In order to find out if BE students can tell AmE and BrE apart, we ask them to evaluate
the ability themselves.

Do you think you can

differentiate between AmE and
BrE?
6% Yes, I can
8%
20% No, I can't

I can only for some

66%
situations
Can't decide

Figure 5. Self-evaluation to differentiate between AmE and BrE

As the result indicated, the large number of interviewees answered only for some typical phrases
or in some of the contexts that they could be used in interactions either with the American or the
British. Besides, 20 percent of interviewees answered that they hardly know how to distinguish
these two types of English or which situations or contexts are appropriate to use specific terms –
terms that are easily to be mistaken. There is only 6 percent of answerers are sure which terms
are appropriate to use. Overall, BE students in NEU still lack of knowledge and practices about
distinguishing AmE and BrE that can be vital for their future study or future job.

Besides investigating on how students perceive their skills and practices in distinguishing
between BrE and AmE, we questioned them to make the distinctions between these two
variations of English language.

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Figure 6. The biggest difference between American and British English according to BE students

Nearly a half of the participants believe that the differences in AmE and BrE
pronunciation are the most obvious and important ones. The answer that got the second highest
number of chosen people is “vocabulary” with 20 percent out of total. It might be true that
differences in the way words are pronounced in standard AmE and BrE are the most noticeable;
and to recognize which variation speakers are talking through their intonation and pronunciation
might be the most effective way. However, differences in lexical items of these two above
variations of English are more likely to cause hilarious situations or serious blunders for
speakers. Overall, BE students in NEU are aware of these differences and could tell which ones
are more significant than others.

III.2.2. BE students’ real capability of distinguishing between American English and British
English
III.2.2.1. In listening skill
After being asked to self-evaluate, BE students continued to do some small exercises in
our questionnaire, which helps us to know exactly whether they can set apart American English
from British English and in fact, the result turned out to be quite astonishing.
First of all, BE students are really in trouble with differentiating these two types of
English in terms of listening skill. The charts below show their answers when required to listen
to two recording tapes and decide which one is British English or American English.

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Figure 7. Answers for the mini test 1
Clearly, the students were confused of about the accents that they heard. After listening to the
first audio, 51% of them thought the story was told by an American, and the rest thought it was a
British’s voice. Actually, the first tape was recorded by a British, so the number of students who
gave the correct answer is smaller by one, 25 to 26. A similar situation happened with the second
tape, only 22 students, equivalent to 43%, had the right answer as an American voice.
Observing the result of this test, we come up with two conclusions. The first one is that
the BE students are still weak at recognizing American English accent because more than half of
them answered wrongly. Actually, the tapes, in our point of view, are not so difficult to listen to
and really typical for each accent. Thus, secondly, the same percentage of alternatives as 51% -
49% and 43% - 57% shows that students, though learn American English and prefer to use it
frequently, seemed to be puzzled and could not determine and distinguish.
II.2.2.2. In writing skill
To examine BE students’ abilities to distinguish American and British English in writing
skill, we asked them to do a mini-test, which includes disorder idioms and pieces of news.

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Figure 8. Students’ answers to three idioms

Three idioms that we chose are “Beating a dead horse”, “A home from home” and “A new lease
of life”. The first idiom means to waste your effort by trying to do something that is no longer
possible. This one belongs to American English, the equivalent idiom of it is “Flogging a dead
horse” and in fact, it was derived from British English. The second idiom is a British idiom and
means a place where you feel relaxed and comfortable as if you were in your own home and
there is an idiom in British English having the same concept – “A home away from home”. The
last idiom is also British, which means the chance to live or last longer, or with a better quality of
life, and the same meaning one in American English has an only small difference of the
preposition, “of” is replaced into “on”.

A glance at the Figure 5 reveals that BE students are still unsure about English idioms,
especially their origins and usage as a result. More students answered the first and second
questions correctly, while the third one did put them on the spot. This matter actually relates a
tad to the unusual idioms-using habit of BE students, causing the lack of sensitiveness in
distinguishing and utilizing idioms.

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 However, the survey upshot also pointed out that BE students are not more familiar to
passages written in English, not to mention in which specific variant.

Figure 9. Students’ answers to two pieces of news

The first paragraph was extracted from the CNN and the other was taken from the BBC – two
famous and reliable websites of online news. Therefore, apparently, the first one was written in
American English style and analog to the second. If truth be told, in the Figure 6, the gaps
between the percentage of 51% and 49% for the question one and 19% to 16% for the question
two are not a great deal and even though students had chance to read the text and think
thoroughly, they kept wondering and could even put a tick irrationally. Sadly, once again in both
questions, the major of students were false.
All in all, after studying the outcome of the survey, we found out that BE students have
not been able to differentiate American and British English. This fact is slightly disappointing
and worrying because that is what they need to do. Sometimes, people evaluating and thinking
about themselves are mistaken and this case is similar to that, BE students are so confident of
their aptitude, but has not been good enough.

III.3. The significance of distinguishing between American and British English

III.3.1. In study

According to students, the hardest thing when they approach lesson is finding out the best
suitable way to make that lesson come into their mind. This method must be the simplest, easiest
and most flexible to help them find the interesting side of lesson. Only if they are impressed by

14
this lesson and are excited with it, they can digest and keep it in their mind. Studying with
mother language is such a difficult one, learning foreign language is double in difficulty. Thus,
students must get deep and stabilized basis at the start of studying. Especially, according to
students who had and have learned English, distinguishing American English and British English
is very important. Under the limitation of our research, we will point out some senses of this to
implement for our result in this topic.

The first thing we would like to confirm that distinguish two different types of English is
British English and American English are very good for perfecting the skills of English learners.
(We do not mention some types of English because of the popularity of American English and
British English all over the world today). Not only improving the skills of listening, speaking,
reading and writing; distinguish British and American English also help students gain a strong
foundation in language with an understanding of the structure of words, pronunciation,
semantically consistent with the culture of each type of language they learned and used.

In our research, among 51 students in intake 53, 34 students (approximately 67%) said
that it is very necessary to have correctly knowledge about American English and British
English. That means BE students have raised their awareness of studying English accurately.
Moreover, they also awared that English needs to be understood from its roof, starting with the
history and the original of which one they have learned. Distinguishing American and British
English brings some benefits to students, in term of study, that are:

 Improving English skills including pronunciation, vocabulary, grammar and spelling:

American and British English differs each other mainly from pronunciation, vocabulary,
grammar and spelling. Unluckily, that are main parts learners should improve before get a high
mark in any English skill such as listening, reading, speaking or writing. In the process of
listening skill training, students can listen and guess the contents through the words that they
know, but in some cases, the pronunciation of speaker makesthey feel bewildered by wondering
whether it is familiar with them or not, and this main reason will disturbed and make they miss
the opportunity to hear all their lesson. Understanding the pronunciation of each speaker will
help students catch some key words in their lesson which are valuable to guess the meaning of
the text. For example, American English and British English isdifferent from putting stress in
syllables such as:
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ballet - BE ballet - AE

address - BE address * - AE

garage - BE garage - AE

advertisement - BE advertisement – AE

In addition, the differences in pronunciation of the other words exist in the vowel sounds,
not in differently-stressed syllables. They are therefore more difficult to illustrate in writing
without recourse to phonetic script, which few people know. Their pronunciations are illustrated
therefore by reference to common words with the same sound:

vase: vars as in cars (BE) : vace as in face (AE)

route: root as in shoot (BE) : rout * as in shout (AE)

buoy: boy as in toy (BE) : booey as in the French name Louis (AE) (esl.fis.edu, n.d).

Learning American and British English also help students keep in their mind more new
words. Some are familiar with studying course, some are not. That words are very useful for
them in writing, especially in making their essay more interesting and colorful.

Danh thiếp: Calling card (A) – Visiting card (B)

Kẹo: Candy (A) – Sweets (B)

Cửa hàng kẹo: Candy store (A) – Sweet shop (B)

Toa xe lửa: car (A) – coach, carriage (B)

Ngô: Corn (A) – Maize, Indian corn (B)

Lúa mì: grain, wheat (A) – corn (B)

Bánh quy: Cracker (A) – Biscuit (B)(celi.edu.vn, n.d).

Another thing should be taken as the most advantage is grammar of each type. Writing
and reading are two main types which strongly need correct form of word. Understanding and
applying exactly form of word is a key to achieve a good result in this subjects. For example in

16
AmE the past tense of fit is fit; in BrE it is fitted. Americans say “I've gotten to know her well”;
Britons say “I've got to know her well”. In BrE the present perfect tense is used for situations in
which AmE would typically use the past simple. For example using the words just or already,
Britons would be more likely to say: “I've just seen him or I've already done it” whereas in AmE
it would be common to hear “I just saw him or I already did it”.

Last but not least, it can be said that American English has the more economical and
phonetic spelling than British English. We can compare also the AmE words traveling, jewelry
and program with their BrE counterparts travelling, jewellery and programme. Words ending
with “or” in AmE tend to be added “u” after “o” in BrE such as: color-colour, humor-humour,
flavor-flavour. BrE usually double the final consonant, but AmE has not, especially with the
consonant "l":

Travel - traveler - travelling (BrE)

Travel - traveler - traveling (AmE)

 Improving dictionary using skills.

In some dictionaries, authors can simultaneously record both types AmE and BrE. Therefore,
the distinction helps students may choose from a suitable one for their purpose. On the other
hand, this will help to minimize the differences between dictionaries and textbooks in the
transcription and avoid confusing and wondering for learners.

In conclusion, it is important to differentiate American English and British English for

students, especially to K53 of BE students because of its benefits in studying. It is so difficult but
quite simple when each individual applies what we have pointed out in this study perfectly.
Remembering, applying and practicing everyday yourself is the best way to improve your
English skills besides basing on technology advances.

III.3.2. In real life

In term of daily activities, distinguishing between American English and British English
is really vital. It is our carelessness in using words that makes us misunderstood the situation.
This is a really terrible damage. We are foreign learners, but we cannot realize which English we
are speaking all the time. We are really not aware of the significance of distinguishing between

17
the two varieties of English. This has been shown in our research. Most BE students intake 53 do
not realize whether language that they are speaking is American English or British English. As a
result, they find it not unnecessary to distinguishing between these two varieties of English. They
said that whichever English they spoke, British English or American English, other people still
understand and give a timely reaction to what they said. For example, when they said that” We
don’t need to hurry” (often used in America) or “ We needn’t hurry”( often used in England), it
is a bit different in grammar, but the meaning is the same. Probably they have never encountered
the funny situations or stories related to using words, so they don’t see through the significance
of this distinction. An important point to make is that difference doesn’t mean wrong.
According to our research to BE students intake 53, there are many students preferring
American English to British English, 75 percent for American English and 25 percent for British
English. However, comments such as “American English is better than to British English”, or “
American English is inferior than British English” have no solid basis. Students will often have
very firm beliefs on which English they think is better or easier to understand. The truth is that
no language or varieties of language is inherently better or worse than another. They are just
different. While it may be true for that particular individual, there is no evidence to suggest that
one variety is easier to learn or understand than the other. The most important thing is that the
differences between the two varieties of English in lexicology as well as in grammar will easily
cause the serious mistakes in understanding words and its meaning.
We still know that Americans speak English, but each kind of English reflects the cultural
features, as well as life style of each country. Therefore, BE students should be aware of this so
that they can avoid mistakes when communicating with foreign people in daily life and
understand more about their cultural features. While we may not think it at first, there are
numerous cultural differences between the US and the UK that we will likely encounter. There
are differences in customs, attitudes, opinions, and even reactions. As we know, Americans
would rather show their own personality than Britons. Americans are much more open than
Britons. This is shown through words. In our research we have collected, most students said that
the biggest difference between American English and British English is pronunciation, and
vocabulary with 20 percent.

18
Figure 6. The biggest difference between American and British English according to BE students

Besides, there are differences in intonation and spelling. In daily life, distinguishing
pronunciation and lexicology using is really necessary. In term of pronunciation, some words
that are pronounced differently in America and England are Methane, Interpol, controversy,
leisure, schedule. Britons pronounce the word “ schedule” as if began with an” sh” sound, while
Americans pronounce it as if it began with” sk” sound. Vowels and consonants may also have
different pronunciations. British speakers pronounce “ zebra” to rhyme with “ Debra”, while
American speakers make “ zebra” rhyme with” Libra”. In communication, these different
pronunciations are really confusing. If students pronounce wrongly, they will make listeners
confused to understand. Thus, when communicating with Americans or Britons, students should
pronounce correctly according to that country’ pronunciation. Differences in vocabulary are big
ones between America and England. For this, distinguishing them in communicating is really
necessary. While some words may mean something in British English, the same word might be
something else in American English. For example, “Athlete” in British English is one who
participates in track and fields events whereas “Athlete” in American English is one who
participates in sports in general. Another example, “Rubber” in British English is tool to erase
pencil markings, while “ Rubber” in American English is “ condom”. Thus, when speaking to
American students in class, don’t ask “I need rubber”. People will look at you, and this really
makes you embarrassed. You use “battery” for charging in American English, and “ cell ” for
charging in British English. Therefore, in US, they don’t understand if you refer cells. They think
“ cell phone”. Furthermore, both languages have slightly different structure of telling the time.
While the British would say “ quarter past ten” to denote 10: 15, it in not uncommon in America
to say “ quarter after” or ever “ quarter after ten”. Students need to distinguish it in order to
avoid misunderstanding the meaning of words. While lexical differences are the easiest one to

19
notice, the knowledge of grammatical differences are considered. In British English, the present
perfect is used to express an action that has occurred the recent past that has an effect on the
present moment. For example, “ I have misplaced my pen”. I American English, the use of the
past ten is also permissible. For example, “I misplaced my pen”. These differences easily cause
misunderstood.
In daily life as well as in leaning English, BE students need to distinguish the
differences between American English and British English above all aspects to find out the
effective ways to learning English as well as avoid misunderstanding the situation when
communicating.

IV. RECOMMENDATION
It has been shown that most of Business English (BE) students intake 53 feel confident in
English communication. However, majority of students in survey had difficulties in
differentiating American English and British English, so sometimes they encounter troubles due
to misusing these two variants. When studying English, they often do not pay much attention to
the differences between American English and British English. According to the results of
survey, only haft of them found it necessary to tell American English and British English apart,
but some thought it is not important to distinguish. Additionally, both listing differences between
American English and British English in theory and applying it in the life are not easy, which
needs much effort of students. Hence, it is one of the reasons why BE students intake 53 can not
get deep awareness of differences between American English and British English. Moreover,
they tend to prefer and use more American English than British English. Almost all survey
participants said that their linguistic educating system is following American English. It
implicates that they are more familiar with using more American English than British English in
studying. Besides, a possible explanation is the strong influences from American English through
different media seeming to be a reason for this increasing tendency.
Distinguish American English and British English plays an important role in studying
English also application in life. Obviously it is necessary that students be familiar with the usage
of two forms of English in vocabulary, spelling, pronunciation, etc. This is best achieved by
listening, listening and some more listening. While listening programs from CNN, VOA is

20
highly recommended to those expecting to get deeper understanding of American English, BBC
is the best choice when you want to listen to British English more.
The theory and examples of differences between American English and British English is
easily searched on the Internet from numerous websites. There is a variety of sources from
Internet that students can consider as reference to understand thoroughly differences between
American English and British English. As a result, getting knowledge about this difference is no
longer a big problem to them anymore.
Moreover, the dramatic advancement of technology also gives helps to students in being
aware of the differences such as website of Bell Lab. You can type an English sentence then
select whether American English or British English, do careful listening practice, then you can
quickly find out the comparison.
Ginger oxford dictionary is known as one of the most popular dictionaries for English
learners. It is said that UK and US English use different dictionaries. Ginger comes with two
dictionaries that the user can choose either a US or UK dictionary. With a clear explanation and
detailed examples, it not only offers the whole range of words but also shows the exact
differences between American English and British English, and gives students an accurate
guidance to choose the right ones for certain contexts to express themselves.
About.com with “the English as 2nd language” is the useful website for students. The page
with the title “British to America/ America to British” is a tool created to help you look up and
compare some of the most common differences between American English and British English.
You can use drop-down list to find the American English equivalent of these British Expressions
or the British English equivalent of these American English words.
This research consisted of a rather small sample, only 51 students took part in the survey.
Still, many of the findings in the research at hand match the pattern in earlier research, and the
difficulty in distinguishing American English and British English of students and the
significance of the distinguish seem to be confirmed. Furthermore, the survey is only to study the
situation in BE students intake 53. It would be better if further researches are in other
departments, schools so that a general view will be seen not only in a particular one.
This research has given the readers the overview of the fact of distinguishing American
English and British English among BE students intake 53. It will becomes a useful source for BE
students intake 53 recognize their real awareness of the differences between both forms of

21
English. Simultaneously, It is a reference for teachers that can have plans for future teaching
programs about the distinguish American English and British English.

V. CONCLUSION

In conclusion, our research showed that most BE students intake 53 have difficulty in
distinguishing the two varieties of English they are learning in the university. That is because
American English and British English are mostly in agreement, which are quite hard to
distinguish. Sometimes students speak American English, sometimes they speak British English.
It is really confusing for BE students to realize they are learning in American English or British
English. We still keep a common knowledge that Americans speaks English, and there are
numerous similarities between American English and British English.

However, there are also tremendous differences between these two varieties of English.
For foreign learners, especially for BE students in take 53 who are about to graduating, it is
really significant to distinguish the two types of English as well as to realize which language they
prefer. This helps students develop the knowledge of English not only in learning foreign
including written and spoken English, but also in communicating with foreigners. Distinguishing
based on the differences between the two types of English will keep them from misunderstanding
the meaning of words and the situation as well. Especially, in the daily life, misunderstanding the
situation will cause serious damage. Students should avoid this.

When students would like to become a translator, the distinction will bring students the
knowledge of the culture as well as life style of each country. In term of studying, distinguishing
between the two varieties of English plays an important role in helping students improve English
skills including pronunciation, vocabulary, grammar, and spelling. There are distinct differences
in vocabulary between American English and British English. For this reason, students should be
careful in using words when writing or speaking, especially when taking the international exams.
Moreover, a good distinction between two types of English will improve students’ dictionary
using skill. Americans have such various vocabularies that they have their own dictionaries.
However, in some dictionaries, authors can simultaneously record both types American English
and British English. Therefore, the distinction helps students choose a suitable one for their

22
purpose. On the other hand, this will help to minimize the differences between dictionaries and
textbooks in the transcription and avoid confusing and wondering for learners. In words, it is
really significant to differentiate American English and British English for students, especially to
BE students intake 53 because of its benefits in studying English as well as communicating with
foreigners.

23
APPENDIX
Questionnaire

The significance of distinguishing between American English

and British English among BE students
We are students from Department of Business English, NEU. At the moment, we are conducting
a survey relating to "The significance of distinguishing between American English and British
English among BE students". We promise to keep all your information confidential and only use
it for researching purpose. Please read and answer all the questions below. Thank you!

*Note: In this questionaire, we use AmE and BrE respectively as the abbreviations of American
English and British English.

*Must-answer question

1. How confident you are in your English communication? *

1 2 3 4 5
Not confident at all Really confident
2. Which one do you prefer, AmE or BrE? *

 AmE
 BrE

3. Your linguistic education system is following which one, AmE or BrE? If you are not sure,
you might guess. *

 AmE
 BrE

4. In your opinion, is it necessary for the BE students to be able to tell the AmE and BrE apart? *

 Yes, of course!
 No, I think it is useless to do so.
 Can't decide.

5. In your opinion, what is the biggest difference between AmE and BrE? *

 Pronunciation
 Grammar
  Vocabulary
 Intonation
 Style
 Other

6. Have you ever encountered any trouble due to misuse AmE and/or BrE? *

 Yes, I have.
 No, I haven't
 Other

7. Please use the links below to open and listen to two audio recordings, then decide
which one is AmE or BrE. *

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=telyPoVtjdI&feature=youtu.be ;
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0KPa2DdJK-A&feature=youtu.be

AmE BrE

Audio
1

Audio
2

8. Please read the idioms, phrases and paragraphs below, then decide which one is AmE or BrE.
*

1.beating a dead horse; 2.a home from home; 3. a new lease of life; 4.These are the questions
preoccupying western governments and Russia's neighbors, after the swift annexation of Crimea
and Russian military maneuvers close to the Ukrainian border. There were some tantalizing clues
in Putin's pugnacious speech to the Duma this week. He described the fall of the Soviet Union as
unfortunate -- because it had separated Russians. "The Russian nation became one of the biggest,
if not the biggest ethnic group in the world to be divided by borders," he said.; 5. A few minutes
after a minor earthquake hit Southern California on Monday morning, the Los Angeles Times
featured an article about the event on its website, with help from a computer algorithm written by
one of the paper's developers. It's not the first time the newspaper has used automated reporting.
And the Times isn't the first media outlet to rely on such systems. Entire companies, such as
Narrative Science (business news) and Automated Insights (sports), have business models built
around the idea of mechanised journalism./.
AmE BrE
1

iv
 AmE BrE
2
3
4
5

Figures

v
Figure 1. BE students’ confidence of communicating in English

Figure 2. BE student’s preferred variant

Figure 3. Linguistic education system of BE students

vi
Figure 4. Trouble-encountering due to misusing

Do you think you can

differentiate between AmE and
BrE?
6% Yes, I can
8%
20% No, I can't

I can only for some

66%
situations
Can't decide

Figure 5. Self-evaluation to differentiate

Figure 6. The biggest difference between American and British English according to BE students

vii
Figure 7. Answers for the mini-test1

Figure 8. Students’ answers to three idioms

viii
Figure 9. Students’ answers to two pieces of news

ix
REFERENCES
Peter Avery, Susan Ehrlich (2004). Teaching American English and British English, Cambridge
University Press, 1 (3), pp. 12-34.

H. J. Giegerich (2000). Analysing Variation in English, The Modern Language Journal, 2 (11),
pp 1-5.

W. William Labov, S. Ash, C. Boberg (2006). The Atlas of North American English: Phonetics,
Phonology and Sound Change, Mouton de Gruyter, 1 (1), pp. 4-7.

Zansvoort, R. W. (1957). A handbook of English Grammar; London: Longmans, Green and Co

Ltd.

Moss, Norman (2001) What’s the Difference-A British / American Dictionary; London:
Hutchinson.

Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_American_and_British_English

https://www.google.com.vn/#q=difference+between+american+english+and+british+english

http://celi.edu.vn/vn/tin-tuc/meo-hoc-tieng-anh/su-khac-nhau-co-ban-giua-tieng-anh-anh-va-anh-
my.html.

http://esl.fis.edu/grammar/easy/aebe.htm#3.