Concept
British English
Overview
British English is the set of varieties of the English language native to the United Kingdom, especially Great Britain. More narrowly, it can refer specifically to the English language in England, or, more broadly, to the collective dialects of English throughout the United Kingdom taken as a single umbrella variety, for instance additionally incorporating Scottish English, Welsh English, and Northern Irish English. Tom McArthur in the Oxford Guide to World English acknowledges that British English shares "all the ambiguities and tensions [with] the word 'British' and as a result can be used and interpreted in two ways, more broadly or more narrowly, within a range of blurring and ambiguity".
Variations exist in formal (both written and spoken) English in the United Kingdom. For example, the adjective wee is almost exclusively used in parts of Scotland, north-east England, Northern Ireland, Ireland, and occasionally Yorkshire, whereas the adjective little is predominant elsewhere. Nevertheless, there is a meaningful degree of uniformity in written English within the United Kingdom, and this could be described by the term British English. The forms of spoken English, however, vary considerably more than in most other areas of the world where English is spoken and so a uniform concept of British English is more difficult to apply to the spoken language.
Globally, countries that are former British colonies or members of the Commonwealth tend to follow British English, as is the case for English used by European Union institutions. The United Nations also uses British English with Oxford spelling. In China, both British English and American English are taught. The UK government actively teaches and promotes English around the world and operates in more than 100 countries.
Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).
Possible passages
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Of the four quadrants of the earth, thus agreeing in number with the four triplicities, one is situated in the north-west of the entire earth, and contains Celto-galatia; or, as it is commonly called, Europe. Opposed to this quadrant lies that of the south-east, towards Eastern Æthiopia; it is called the southern part of Asia Magna. Another quadrant of the entire earth is in the north-east, about Scythia, and is…
Ptolemy, Ptolemy's Tetrabiblos
States what British English is.
But in the majority of inferior languages, the process of “agglutination,” as it is called, has gone far enough to produce considerable stability in the compound words: there is a manifest integration. How small is the degree of this integration, however, when compared with that reached in well-developed languages is shown both by the great length of the compound words used for things and acts of constant…
Herbert Spencer, First Principles
States what British English is.
This tendency is world-wide, but naturally it has advanced in America. In a more or less authoritative book published by the Children’s Foundation,[1] I find some remarks on the teaching of English which seem to exemplify the tendency I deplore. For example: “Twenty-five years ago pupils learnt from ten to fifteen thousand words, but as a result of investigations carried on during the past two decades, it has been…
Bertrand Russell, Education and the good life
States what British English is.
Related ideas
- The Independent
- French language
- Anglo-Norman language
- Great Britain
- Neologism
- Latin
- London
- American English
- British people
- The Guardian
- BBC
- Oxford English Dictionary
- Old English
- Scandinavia
- Southeast Asia
- United Kingdom
- United Nations
- University of Oxford
- Welsh language
- The Times
- British Empire
- Oxford University Press
- Multiculturalism
- Loanword
Opposing perspectives
Place in the tradition
Part of Skepticism.