fandom_grammar | Writing Tips: American for Brits

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Writing Tips: American for Brits

Most writers are aware of major differences between British and American English, and British writers are usually good about changing arse to ass and git to idiot when writing in American-based fandoms. Still, there are a few British quirks that seem to sneak through, even occasionally by writers experienced in the American idiom.

Some of these quirks seem minor, or even sound so "right" to a British ear that the American alternative just sounds weird, but they really do stand out to American readers. The absolute best way to catch Britishisms is to ask an American to beta. Another tip is to keep a list of the phrases or expressions your characters use in canon, and stick to those rather than phrases that come naturally to you.

Here are a few common Britishisms in fanfic that you can watch out for, with examples from Stargate SG-1 and Torchwood.

Grammatical constructions

"preposition + hospital" versus "preposition + the hospital"

Americans always use "the" here, and wonder what happened to the article if they don't see it. Yes, even if you're not talking about a specific hospital.

"General Hammond's in the hospital?" Daniel was immediately alarmed.

"Just a minor procedure, nothing to worry about," promised Jack.

(Also, "casualty" in Britain is "the emergency room" in America. "Casualty" is only ever used to refer to losses due to war or accident.)

"have done/would do" versus "have/would"

Americans understand that the "do" is understood in action verbs, as it's used in the negative and interrogative forms. We also use it when responding to a negative or interrogative construction without restating a verb.

"I think we have some Jaffa over the ridge there. Do you see the smoke?"

"Yeah, I do."

We do not, however, repeat it with compound verb forms:

Sam barely glanced up. "I'm just going to stay here all night to finish running the simulation."

Jack rolled his eyes. "Yeah, you would. Have fun with that."

versus

Toshiko barely glanced up. "I'm just going to stay here all night to finish running the simulation."

Owen rolled his eyes. "Yeah, you would do. Have fun with that."

collective nouns

A noun which refers to a group of individuals, particularly an institution, is nearly always treated as a singular by Americans, and they find it jarring to see a collective noun followed by a plural verb form.

"The SGC is doing everything in its power to help," Sam assured.

"Right," retorted the distraught mother. "The government is responsible for screwing everything up in the first place."

versus

"Torchwood are doing everything in their power to help," Gwen assured.

"Right," retorted the distraught mother. "The government are responsible for bollocksing everything up in the first place."

Punctuation

apostrophes in truncated words

Any word truncation that has been in use for over 50 years (or even five years, in our rapidly changing world!) will not be given an apostrophe to indicate the missing letters by Americans. I hear that the British don't often use 'phone or 'flu any more, either, but sometimes I still see the apostrophes in Brit-written fic.

periods in abbreviated titles

Americans still spell Mr., Mrs., Dr., Sgt., etc. with a period.

quotation marks

The placement of commas, periods and semicolons with a closing quotation mark will undoubtedly be the subject of a future entry. In short, for now, American correct usage is to always place them inside. Always. Really. Yes, I know it's weird. Also, see the entry on single quotation marks for more on the American usage of double quotation marks for speech.

Word choices

See the English-to-American Dictionary, listed below, for many more examples. These are some that I see frequently in fanfic.

"whilst" versus "while"
Americans never, ever, ever use "whilst."

"trolley" versus "shopping cart" (or "cart")
To Americans, a trolley is a tram.

"holiday" versus "vacation"
To Americans, "holiday" is a recognized day or two free from work or school, like Memorial Day or Thanksgiving Day. "Vacation" is used to refer to extended days off--such as summers off from school or multiple weeks around Christmas and New Year's--or to traveling for fun.

"rubbish" versus "trash"
When Americans want to take out the trash, we empty the wastebasket into the garbage can and put it out on the curb. In a big city, we might put our garbage bags into a big dumpster in the alley. The garbage truck will then take the garbage to the dump. We don't empty the bins, leave it out on the kerb or in the skip, and wait for the rubbish to be hauled to the tip.

"tea" (or "supper") versus "dinner"
The morning meal is breakfast; the midday meal is lunch; and the evening meal is dinner. In some parts of the US, the evening meal might be supper--follow what your canon characters say. If someone is invited for tea, it's literally just for a cup of tea, and maybe cookies. ("Biscuits" are a type of flour roll served with butter or gravy.)

"university" versus "college"
The correct name for a post-secondary education institution exploring a single subject or specific trade is "college," while the name for one comprised of several colleges, or exploring several subjects is a "university." Nevertheless, for some reason Americans refer to their university experience as "college," and both the college and university experience as "school." Even when it would be technically correct, Americans don't "go to university."

Sam gave her teammates a pleading look. "If Cassie doesn't straighten out her grades, she'll never get into college, and I know she's set on Stanford University ... at least she was before Janet died."

Jack glowered at the report card. "With grades like these, she'd be lucky to get into school at Colorado Springs Beauty College."

Daniel wasn't too worried. "It's just one bad semester. I had one of those, and it didn't hurt me getting into school."

"Yeah, well," Jack retorted, "you already had five universities trying to recruit you by the time you were fourteen."

"Where did you go to college, Uncle Daniel?" interrupted Cassie, from the doorway where she'd been hovering.

"I went to UCLA," he replied, holding out an arm to pull her into a hug.

While we're on the subject, Americans go to elementary school (kindergarten through sixth grade), then middle school or junior high (grades 6-8 or 7-8 or 7-9, varying), then high school through grade 12. Public schools are paid for by the government, while private schools charge fees to students' parents. Before ten years ago, there was no test required to get a high school diploma--just finishing four years with passing grades. Now some districts or states do have required testing. All students planning to attend college (university, not trade schools) take the SAT test for verbal and math skills. Some also take ACT tests in particular subjects, if the university of their choice requires it.

So that's a quick roundup of Britishisms I see in American canon fanfic. One of my favorite sites for translating the common language that divides us is The English-to-American Dictionary: http://english2american.com/. Even without a fic project at hand, it's a fun read for its own sake.

Canadians, Australians and New Zealanders, please chime in on your English usage, as well!

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Canadians are tricky! I love the site Canadian English (http://www.cornerstoneword.com/misc/cdneng/cdneng.htm).

Spelling is part of culture for me, so I get a bit of dissonance when it doesn't match the setting. But then I'm a grammarian. ;-)

*glomps your dorkitude* One of the many things I love about you!

*clings defiantly to punctuation outside of quotation marks*

Hehe, I can adjust every other aspect of my writing to Americanisms (even dropping my cherished 'u's) but I'm a diehard holdout when it comes to that one.

:D

It just looks wrong the other way around!

Hee! I suppose there are some people who find it wrong in an American-based fic, but for me I can give that a pass more easily than spelling, grammar or word choice. (Heck, most American writers don't get it right. ;-)

I always enjoy getting beta comments that are peppered with suggestions on how to use American idioms or a particular turn of phrase. Especially those tricky things, like getting brand names for household goods right, or making sure I'm using the slang properly and not accidentally making a General sound 'gangsta'. :P

I file them all away, and it really helps when I'm trying to get the 'voice' of a character who tends to slip into say a more regionalised speech pattern.

I'll even pester people over AIM - just last night I was fishing around for the right phrase to describe what I would call 'the lounge' - the room where you watch TV - and I had a big conversation on 'living room' versus 'den' or 'rec room'.

Hehehe - 'den' I just love that word! It makes me think of bears ina cave though!

I love those, too! One of my best LJ friends was my first Brit-picker beta, and we bonded over her wonderfully detailed descriptions of Manchester-area expressions and cultural insights.

Those big discussions are great! ("Den" reminds me of my grandpa--he had one!)

Compromise is good. :-) Jim (or Ray) should never say 'lift' when they mean 'elevator'. But I cling to the privilege of writing that 'blue is a good colour on Blair and red is a good colour on Fraser'. Or I would if I wrote DS.

And if anyone ever writes something set in NZ, let's not forget that only foreigners forget the 'the' when referring to the North Island and the South Island...

This has been helpful, although I think I watch so much American TV/movies that words themselves aren't too difficult. The differences in grammar and punctuation/spelling are probably harder and I tend to change from one story to another sometimes, although I try to be consistent within one story if I can! Thankfully, I mostly stick to the one fandom these days, and my usual beta is American, so hopefully I'm catching any issues before they trip me up completely, but no doubt I fail on occasion.

NZ, as you've had pointed out by someone else, has more British inclinations, as well as plenty of our own unique words/phrases, so sometimes it seems strange (particularly in LOTRips) to see Kiwis say American-style things!

The thing about punctuation outside of quotations confused me a little, do you mean like this:

"Yes, that's exactly what I mean!" John exclaimed.

Would British writers put the exclamation mark outside of the speech marks? I can't say I've seen that. perhaps I need to see examples if this wasn't a good one, cos (see, I'm a Kiwi, there's that 'cos'!) I always put the punctuation marks inside speech marks and have never put them outside - I don't think I learned it that way.

Man, language for world wide consumption is tricky, huh?

Thanks, love! ;-)

Oh, and one of those Americanisms that I don't know whether it's regional or not is the way I've seen 'couple things' (or the word couple meaning a few). Here, we would say 'a couple of things' but some Americans (I'm not sure all) just say 'a couple things'. I'd never leave out the 'of' unless that was right for my characters, as it's just bad English to me. Comments welcome.

PS. We say cupboards, you say closets. But what do you call kitchen cupboards?

Also, I'm boggling at a sudden realisation that most Americans don't have electric kettles. o.O

Wow, I'm feeling incredibly inept. I'm most definitely going to need to find a Brit beta, because the more I read this the more American my non-American characters are sounding.

I have to say, in reading, that I don't find the the writing jarring when the character is only thinking. However, the moment they ask for a 'cuppa' I balk. And I tend to write with that in mind. Thinking American, speaking otherwise. Which, now that I think on it, is even worse. *headdesk*

I'm looking forward to seeing the other post. Thanks as always. You are the Queen!

Oh, and that's another one. You Americans say 'on Thanksgiving'. We Brits would say 'at Thanksgiving'. *g*

Fascinating and very useful study, plus great link. Thank you!

This ties into one of my biggest rants. Off-world alien cultures who have never been exposed to an American using American slang. It just boggles the mind! :)

Anyway, on the subject of holidays, I once read a fic where Jack O'Neill made plans for Boxing Day. I was totally thrown for a loop, because as an American, I had never heard of Boxing Day. I finally got up enough nerve to ask the author about it, and she made a smooth recovery in her fic when she realized that most Americans were clueless on this holiday. Just a thought here, it might be a good idea to find a list of American and/or British holidays when writing about those cultures. :)

"tea" (or "supper") versus "dinner"
The morning meal is breakfast; the midday meal is lunch; and the evening meal is dinner. In some parts of the US, the evening meal might be supper--follow what your canon characters say. If someone is invited for tea, it's literally just for a cup of tea, and maybe cookies. ("Biscuits" are a type of flour roll served with butter or gravy.)

I hope you don't mind me asking for advice, but there are a couple of things that I am forever being confused about and the above paragraph has an example of them both. *hugs you for making it easier for me* Wouldn't the punctuation go "after" the end quotation marks in the first line? You had mentioned earlier that the punctuation mark "always" goes before the end quotation mark, which is true in dialog, but for some reason I keep thinking it should go after when using them for emphasis and titles. Could you clarify it for me, once and for all, please?

The other thing that makes me think every time I use them is parentheses. Someone may have covered this before, and I apologize if I missed it, but in your example, the period came before the end parenthesis. Does it matter if it goes after? Before or after, after or before...

Just curious!

Thanks for the wonderful insight into American vs. British English. I found myself nodding at everything you wrote!

Edited 2008-04-26 12:10 (UTC)

Nice roundup of some of the more prevalent mistakes. May I also add the construction:

"I know I've not been round much lately" - British

"I know I haven't been around much lately" - North American

Also, in everything except the use of university vs college and not requiring standardized tests for university entrance, Canadians use all the American examples above, not the Brit.

I think one that always jars me is 'trainers' instead of like, sneakers or something.
My majour problem is that I was raised in England and America, so I'm all colours of confused on what is or is not slang for which particular country. *facepalm* Add to that, my dad is american/italian and my mum is northern english, so I have all kinds of weird slang going on.
American slang-specific beta's are the best.

As a writer, the question for me is trying to make the characters as true to themselves as possible. Therefore, if that character is American, I try to make their speech and thoughts conform to American patterns; ditto for Brits and Canadians. And as a reader, I do find it distracting for a New York cop to say, "..., yeah?" at the end of a sentence or a USAF colonel to say "I've not been sleeping well lately," and if that pops me out of the story, even momentarily, it's a flaw in the story. Maybe not a huge flaw, but still.

What a great post. And I'm glad to see it didn't turn into a screeching flamewar, like it did when the topic came up in a specific fandom. As an American, I'm bookmarking it for reference for the next time I write Doctor Who. I look forward to the reverse post.

Bookmarking and thank you! Very useful!

I had one beta tell me that Americans tend to use 'won't' more than 'will' too:

I wrote something like:

"If you're done complaining, pass me the file, will you?"

and she suggested

"If you're done complaining, pass me the file, won't you?"

or

"If you're done complaining, pass me the file, okay?"

And another told me that Americans say 'continue' not 'carry on' as I was writing sentences like:

Blair took a deep breath and carried on bravely. "No, I do want to go on the stakeout."

Thanks for the explanation on the college/university issue. I'm always having problems trying to transfer my German education into American. Once I had to state me degree and I wasn't sure if it was a college or a university degree. I went with the latter one since my school was a university (though there are several degrees of universities here in Germany and the degrees itself vary a lot) and I'm glad to know that I was right in my choice.

I haven't seen a lot of Kiwi-isms in your writing, so I think you're doing a great job! Yes, America's media imperialism "helps."

And punctuation inside or outside of quotation marks refers to periods, commas and semicolons (see previous sentence). Exclamation and question (not query ;-) marks go inside or outside depending on context. I hope to do the big post on that someday.

It's a regionalism; it sounds "wrong" to me, too! Another regionalism is someone saying, "a couple, three things," to refer to "a few things, possibly more than two."

Funny! I find it jarring right down to the descriptive passages, but then I have a "proofreader's brain."

I'm glad you liked! And I know you'll have plenty of volunteers to "Britishise" you're writing when you're ready. *smoosh*

Oh gods, yes! It's bad enough that Stargate has to have all other cultures speak English because of the constraints of an hour-long show, but do they have to throw so many colloquialisms in there? English speakers on the other side of Earth might not understand some, and yet off-worlders do?

Boxing Day, yes! Or Guy Fawkes. Or Canadian versus American Thanksgiving. I just learned that New Zealanders celebrate Easter Monday in a big way--everything's closed.

We'll do the big "punctuation with quotation marks" post, but in short, periods, commas and semicolons always go inside quotation marks in American grammar--even for titles and emphasis words. The parentheses question is a good one, too, that we should do. In the example above, that is a complete sentence inside the parentheses, so the period goes inside. For a parenthetical aside within another sentence, punctuate the sentence itself.

Oh, good one, yes! Thank you. :-)

And thanks for the Canadian input--often a tricky distinction to negotiate.

Oh, yes, "trainers"! That one and "jumpers." A jumper in America is a sleeveless dress that one wears a shirt under--not the image for most male characters!

Bless the betas, for they save us from ourselves. :-)

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Writing Tips: American for Brits

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