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The Make-up of the English Vocabulary

the hatchet w ithout picturing an American scene. The relationship


between British English and American English becomes significant only
w hen two usages do not match. W e feel uncom fortable w hen the Ameri
can says gotten w here we w ould say got, but the American turns out
to be using a now disused English form. There was dispute among
nineteenth-century English scholars about w hat Shakespeare m eant
w hen, in the fencing scene between Hamlet and Laertes in Hamlet, the
Queen says o f Hamlet that he is fat and scant o f breath. A fat Hamlet
was not w hat readers wanted. One scholar suggested that perhaps Richard
Burbage had put on w eight by the time he came to play the part. The
m atter was cleared up only w hen an English scholar, walking in rural
New England, was told by a farm ers wife from w hom he sought a
drink that he looked fat. Sweaty was w hat she meant. The seemingly
provincial usage had survived among the descendants of im migrants
from Warwickshire.
Thus American usage may be as historically valid as British usage
w here the two differ. Moreover, the American usage may be the m ore
vivid. The Americans say sidewalk w here w e use the Latin w ord pave
m en t. Resistance to American im portations has often been both ignorant
and irrational. There was a time w hen the American fondness for saying
I guess was ridiculed, yet Chaucer was fond o f the interjection. As for
American pronunciation, the American vowel sound in w ords such as
path, bath, and father is said to be closer to Elizabethan pronunciation
than current English pronunciations are. I have heard intelligent people
reacting in mock horror to American use o f the verb to enjoy. The
American waitress puts dow n the dish on the table and says Enjoy! For
us the verb to enjoy is a transitive verb that requires an object. We do
not say I enjoyed but I enjoyed m yself. And my latest dictionary allows
o f no intransitive use. But it w ould be a mistake to criticize the American
usage as incorrect, for the OED cites an archaic intransitive use o f the
verb, meaning to be in a joyous state, to rejoice from the year i 49.
All one can say o f current divergences between British and American
English is that they are interesting rather than culturally significant. We
are amused w hen an American air pilot announces that We shall be
landing at H eathrow m om entarily, for to us it suggests a stay too
brief to allow o f safe escape from the plane. Just as the Americans use
m om entarily to m ean in a few m om ents tim e, so they use presently
to mean at present (Im sorry, Im afraid the manager is presendy away
from the office), w here w e use it to mean very soon.

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