Things I've Learned About English

During my time in Vietnam I've learned a lot about the differences between American English (AE) and British English (BE). For example,

• Americans drive down the street and make a right (or left) turn. Brit's make a right (or left) turning.
• You leave your car in "a car park" in England but in "a parking lot" in America.
• AE calls the place where you're supposed to walk across the road "a crosswalk." Because of the wide lines painted parallel to the sidewalk, BE calls it "a zebra crossing."
• A dot at the end of a sentence is called "a period" in AE. In BE, they call it "a full stop."
• BE prefers to say, "I haven't got ". Americans are much more likely to say, "I don't have ." (That topic was my most confusing class ever because it was hard to avoid switching back and forth between the two.)
• You may have noticed in the previous example that BE ends a quote with " and then a full stop. AE places the quotation mark after the period.
• AE hates the passive voice; BE seems to love it.
• "Sneakers" (AE) are "trainers" (BE) and "lorries" (BE) are "trucks" (AE).
• AE's "crazy" is "mad" in BE, but "mad" in AE means "angry."
• Americans do things "on the weekend" and don't like going "to the hospital." Brits do things "at the weekend" and don't like going "to hospital."
• England uses an IPA phonology chart which includes vowel sounds that most Americans never use. This is why some people don't understand me when I talk about my job until I pronounce it like Job (the name of the guy in the Bible.)
• In standard British English, /r/ is only pronounced if it comes before a vowel. My theory is that the colonists stole all the r's and took them to America. Whatever the reason, it accounts for the different pronunciations of words like war and turn.
• Word stress varies between the two types of English. For example, CONtroversy (AE) is pronounced conTROversy in BE.

There are differences in other languages too, like Spanish Spanish and Puerto Rican Spanish, French French and Canadian French, and northern, central and southern Vietnamese. It's part of the challenge of learning and teaching language.

Got any examples that make you crazy/mad?

Pronunciation Website

Last week in the K37 speaking class, we spent some time on /ʤ/, a sound that's hard to make and even harder to explain how to make. I mentioned a website that gives more information about it. The University of Iowa in America put together a demonstration. Click here to go to the website and then click on the American flag.

Collocations 01

This afternoon we talked about collocations in class. Here is some more information. The slides advance after 5 seconds but, if they go too fast, just pause them. Slide 8 has a few exercises. The answers are on slide 10.

Thee or Thuh?

This afternoon a student asked me, "When do you pronounce "the" /ði/ and when do you say /ðə/?" My  quick answer was something about a vowel sound but then when I started to give examples, it got confusing.

If you look around the internet, you'll find conflicting answers depending on the dialect of English being spoken. Dictionary.com says that it's /ði/ before a vowel sound and /ðə/ before a consonant sound.

The part that can be confusing is that it's before a vowel sound, not a vowel. EnglishClub.com explains that part. For example, "university" begins with a vowel but it's actually the sound of the consonant, /y/ (also written as /j/).

Grammar Practice Website

If you have trouble writing grammatically correct sentences, here is a web site of online exercises that can help you practice. http://cc.ysu.edu/~tacopela/Writing/Grammar.htm. It's from Youngstown State University (USA).

The site begins with some basic grammar. For example, if you sometimes use the wrong form of a verb, this exercise may be useful to you: Forming Verbs: Choosing the Right Form.

If your writing is already pretty good, look further down the page and you'll find exercises to improve it even more. This is especially important if you're considering studying in the West because you'll have a lot of writing assignments. The exercises can also help with grammar for speaking.

Suggestion: If you want to use those exercises, practice every few days (or every day). It won't help you much if you only do it once.