Britain and the US share a common language – but English is spoken and spelled very differently on each side of the Atlantic. James Harbeck finds out why.

Why does American English take such liberties with our common tongue?

On the other hand, why has it not taken more liberties? English speakers first started colonising America more than 400 years ago. Since then, American English has been evolving, influenced by other languages, culture and technology. As the linguist Max Weinreich said, a language is a dialect with an army and a navy; the US has been an independent country for more than two centuries – and boasts the world’s most powerful examples of both. So why is American not a separate language? Or should we view it as one? How did it come to be so different, and how did it not come to be more different? More.

See: BBC

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