# Words originating in BrE in AmE, CaE, AuE after 1600s



## theagx

> watershed (n.)
> 
> 
> "line separating waters flowing into different rivers," 1803, from water (n.1) + _shed_ "ridge of high ground between two valleys or lower ground, a divide" in the topographical sense, perhaps from shed (v.) in its extended noun sense of "the part of the hair of the head" (14c.). A loan-translation of German _Wasser-scheide_. Figurative sense is attested from 1878. Meaning "ground of a river system" is from 1878.



I am amazed at how evenly English (as well as Spanish, but that's offtopic here) "settled" or how "unified" it became in the Americas and Australia. In most writings, you have to read for a while before coming across a spelling or sentence construction that indicates the origin of the text - be it from the UK, USA, Canada or Australia/NZ. And those differences are ever so slight. It seems almost surreal, given that English speakers first settled in the Americas around 1600?

The word above, watershed, was loan-translated from GERMAN, presumably into British English -- Britain being nearby. That itself seems a remarkable feat. To borrow a word in a time where international contact wasn't as easy as it is now, then have the word come into common use around the whole country (UK) with very limited media, travel and telecommunications. And then the most remarkable - have that word filter through into US, Ca and Au English? 

Travel between the UK and US/Ca/Au must have been more extensive than I thought, right? When I see non American English words first coined after the 1600s that are used across the Anglosphere, I have to wonder how the word was "transported" around the Anglosphere.

Even if "watershed" is actually originally AmE, then does that mean that no BrE word made it to the shores of North America and Australia after the 1600s?

Obviously, it's easier to understand how AmE words make it into BrE, CanE and AuE, particularly since the 20c. Also, AuE obviously has more BrE words as Brits didn't take over Australia (i.e. from the aborigines) til much later, hence why Aussies sound more British than Americans do.


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## merquiades

I have noticed in the last few years a couple of British expressions taking root in American English.  Unless I lived in a bubble just a few years ago they would not have been understood in the US.

_Cheers!_ with the meaning of _thanks_, not when making a toast.

_My bad!_  meaning "that's my fault!"

There are certainly many more.  I'll post them as I come across them. I don't know how they were transmitted.  Internet forums?  I suppose it is also possible they existed in some other variety of American English (for example, I don't know much about western dialects) and for some reason they finally made it to my "circle".


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## Stoggler

merquiades said:


> _My bad!_  meaning "that's my fault!"



I thought that was American English in origin.  The first times I ever heard or read it was on US television programmes or from US participants on forums like this one.  I've since heard it in Britain but my feeling is that it's American English.

Always happy to be told otherwise though 

The BBC had a couple of articles on Britishisms adopted in the US - here are the links: here and here


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## Stoggler

Here's something on the origin of "my bad":

http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/my-bad.html

Older than one might think, and appears in the film Clueless (1995 - God, is that really 19 years old?).  Seemingly US in origin (the modern usage anyway)


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## berndf

theagx said:


> Travel between the UK and US/Ca/Au must have been more extensive than I thought, right? When I see non American English words first coined after the 1600s that are used across the Anglosphere, I have to wonder how the word was "transported" around the Anglosphere.


Before the US civil war and probably in the two or three decades that followed, people in the salons of Boston, New York, Richmond and Charleston were very eager to keep up with the latest trends in London which also includes language. This created a dichotomy of very conservative rural dialect (Appalachian dialects are still famous for its archaic phonology) and urban English that kept up with language changes in England. Starting about 1830 there were fresh immigration waves from Europe into the US including substantial immigration from the British Isles (from both, Ireland and Great Britain) which helped to maintain British influence American language.


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## berndf

merquiades said:


> _Cheers!_ with the meaning of _thanks_, not when making a toast.


Saying _Cheers!_ when making a toast is also an early 20th century BrE innovation. The original meaning was a general exclamation of support.


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## Stoggler

berndf said:


> Saying _Cheers!_ when making a toast is also an early 20th century BrE innovation. The original meaning was a general exclamation of support.



Well that's my "you learn something new everyday" moment for today!


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## merquiades

Stoggler said:


> Well that's my "you learn something new everyday" moment for today!



Mine was reading your links.  Most of the expressions that were mentioned in those articles (spot on, ginger hair, cheeky, the long game, gone missing) I have known my whole life or a large part of it.  It never occurred to me they were specifically British, just words belonging to the English language repertoire in general and as such used with more or less frequency and perhaps in competition with other words with similar meaning.


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## swintok

berndf said:


> Before the US civil war and probably in the two or three decades that followed, people in the salons of Boston, New York, Richmond and Charleston were very eager to keep up with the latest trends in London which also includes language. This created a dichotomy of very conservative rural dialect (Appalachian dialects are still famous for its archaic phonology) and urban English that kept up with language changes in England. Starting about 1830 there were fresh immigration waves from Europe into the US including substantial immigration from the British Isles (from both, Ireland and Great Britain) which helped to maintain British influence American language.



I agree completely with the idea that sustained immigration from the British Isles contributed greatly to the dissemination of words and usages in North America and Aus/NZ.  If you look at the stats for Canada, both the absolute numbers of British and Irish immigrants and their relative position in relation to other immigrant groups at least until the 1970s is very significant.  Though nowadays immigration from the British Isles pales in comparison to Asian immigration, Canada still takes in around 7000-10000 British and Irish permanent residents every year and many thousand more temporary workers, students, etc.  

http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/resources/statistics/facts2012/permanent/10.asp


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## fdb

theagx said:


> The word above, watershed, was loan-translated from GERMAN, presumably into British English -- Britain being nearby. That itself seems a remarkable feat. To borrow a word in a time where international contact wasn't as easy as it is now, then have the word come into common use around the whole country (UK) with very limited media, travel and telecommunications. And then the most remarkable - have that word filter through into US, Ca and Au English?



People did use to read books. "Watershed" is, at least originally, a technical term in geological science.


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## merquiades

This quote in the Hebblethwaite article summarizes what I have suspected for a long time and why I've never liked those lists of words with giving the official equivalent in one country or another.



> There is not so much an "on and off switch" between versions of English, says Kretzschmar, but more of a continuum - with the same words in existence in different places, but just used at different frequencies.


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## Ben Jamin

merquiades said:


> This quote in the Hebblethwaite article summarizes what I have suspected for a long time and why I've never liked those lists of words with giving the official equivalent in one country or another.



Is it true that books have been translated from British to American and vice versa?


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## fdb

Not translated, but when American books are republished in Britain they are usually edited for spelling (e.g. center > centre) and usage.


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## Pedro y La Torre

Ben Jamin said:


> Is it true that books have been translated from British to American and vice versa?



The only thing that is changed is the spelling, and even then, this is often not done. I have loads of books written in "American" at home (to be honest, the differences are tiny; there is a bigger difference between Irish as spoken in Galway and Cork).


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## learnerr

Ben Jamin said:


> Is it true that books have been translated from British to American and vice versa?


Anyway, what merquiades said does not suggest that there is no difference between BrE and AmE. Just these differences are more subtle and intricate than wordlisters are trying to declare. That's if I get his thought correctly.


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## merquiades

Ben Jamin said:


> Is it true that books have been translated from British to American and vice versa?



I heard there was a different edition of Harry Potter for BE and AE audiences, but other than that, not really that I know of.  Perhaps it was because they were aiming for the child market??

I'm not saying there is no difference at all between BE and AE vocabulary, just that it is mostly shades of grey, not black and white, cut and dry.  Spelling, of course, is another issue.


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## berndf

Pedro y La Torre said:


> to be honest, the differences are tiny; there is a bigger difference between Irish as spoken in Galway and Cork.


Or between parents and children at the very same place, for that matter. I agree that the whole issue is often hopelessly exaggerated.


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## swintok

merquiades said:


> I heard there was a different edition of Harry Potter for BE and AE audiences, but other than that, not really that I know of. Perhaps it was because they were aiming for the child market??
> 
> I'm not saying there is no difference at all between BE and AE vocabulary, just that it is mostly shades of grey, not black and white, cut and dry. Spelling, of course, is another issue.



The first book in the Harry Potter series is _Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone _in the entire English-speaking world with the exception of the United States, where it is _Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone_.  This has nothing to do with dialectal differences.  It was just for some reason the US publishers thought American kids would not buy a book with the word philosopher in the title.  Changes to titles of books and films are quite common for marketing purposes.  My favourite is the film _The Madness of King George_.  The original book is called _The Madness of King George III_.  The story is that the film marketers did not want people asking why they had never heard of the first two films in the series (i.e., _The Madness of King George I _and _The Madness of King George II_), though I don't know whether this is true.


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## killerbee256

A minor note I'd like to add. In the 19th century German was the language of science the way English is now, so it makes sense that technical words would be adopted or calqued into English during that time.


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## Stoggler

There are a number of lexical differences between the US and British (or rest-of-the-English-speaking-world) editions of the first Harry Potter book, and there are websites that list the differences.  Here's one site, but there are plenty of others.  To be honest some of the changes seem a little unnecessary to my eyes, but others seem reasonable enough.  The first HP book was published before JK Rowling was a huge star and she didn't have quite so much editorial power that she had in the later ones so I think what happened to the first Harry Potter book is what happens to all children's books when they cross the Atlantic, in either direction.


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