British/American asymmetries

[Lynne Murphy]

Back in the discussion of 'busking' it was asked whether there are many
cases of the British having two words for something the Americans have
one for, and vice-versa.  A few occurred to me last night:

American          British
corn              sweetcorn /  maize
sweater           jumper / cardigan
bus               bus / coach
nipple            nipple / teat (on a baby's bottle)


Of course, US has the words 'coach' and 'cardigan', but my point here is
that in British English, you're forced to make the distinction, but in
American English, you're not (a jumper is not a cardigan, but a sweater
is both).

In the other direction:

British          American
biscuit          cookie / cracker
university       college / university*
torch            flashlight / torch
jam              jam / jelly  (jelly = Jello in UK)
toilet           toilet / bathroom
tights           pantyhose / tights
c.v.             resume / c.v.

* I'm not actually sure if there are any UK universities that don't
offer graduate degrees, but the distinction doesn't seem to be made
anyhow--a college is a part of a university (or occasionally a prep
school).  You get your B.A. at university, not at college.  I suppose
another one I could have put here is BE 'university', AE 'college' /
'grad school', since the term 'grad school' is not used here.

The fact that there are more examples here that demonstrate Americans
having more words is probably the result of an American having written
this list.

Lynne

Dr M Lynne Murphy
Lecturer in Linguistics
School of Cognitive and Computing Sciences
University of Sussex
Brighton BN1 9QH
UK

phone +44-(0)1273-678844
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