century, they encountered certain difficulties peculiar to the English
speech. The dental combinations in our English tongue appear to have
proved a stumbling block to the Irish mode of utterance, and hence
such grotesque pronunciations as _tthrash_ for _thrash_, _stthraitch_
for _stretch_, _Satthirday_ for _Saturday_ and _scoundthrel_ for
_scoundrel_. In his native speech the Celt trilled his _r’s_, and
nothing was more natural then than that he should do the same thing
when he began to speak English. So to the present day the _r_ is
emphatically trilled on Irish lips, although it is decidedly un-English
to trill it. These few examples will serve to indicate the character
of some of the difficulties inherent in the English language which the
Irishman encountered in his effort to speak it. But there were other
difficulties than those of utterance which had to be overcome in
mastering the spoken tongue.
Furthermore, the English speech on Irish soil did not develop and
flourish as it did in its own habitat in England. On the contrary, it
always remained an exotic and it never kept pace in its growth and
development with the language on English soil. If Ireland had been
first depopulated and then settled by the British, the variations in
speech would have been much less conspicuous, even had they existed
at all. But that was not the case. Those conditions came much nearer
being fulfilled here in America when the Puritans and Cavaliers came
over to the New World, bringing with them practically the same English
as that carried into the Emerald Isle. For the first settlements in
America by the English colonists correspond in point of time to those
made in Ulster,--that is, the early seventeenth century. But the
English language in America was not contaminated by contact with the
Indian language and, with the exception of a few geographical names,
our speech shows almost no trace of Indian influence. Consequently
the English speech on American soil has had an entirely different
development from that which it had on Irish soil, although it is a
transplanted language in both instances. The explanation is found
entirely in the difference of environment. However, there are certain
fossilized phrases, provincialisms, vulgarisms, or what not, in
American English, which betray the affinity of the language of the
early settlers of America with that of the early settlers of Ireland.
Witness here the coincidence of our vulgar _chist_ (chest), _ingine_
(engine), _quair_ (queer), _hade_ (head), _afeard_ (afraid), _weepin_
(weapon), _kag_ (keg), _rassel_ (wrestle), _arrant_ (errand), _deef_
(deaf), _baste_ (beast), _sarmin_ (sermon), etc., with the Irish
pronunciation of these words.
There is one marked Hibernicism which has now passed far beyond the
Irish dialect. Probably many of those from whose delicate mouths we
hear it so frequently are not aware of its Irish origin. Let it be
said by way of parenthesis that the writer does not intend this remark
as an impeachment of that charming pronunciation which boasts the
sanction of those arriving at their conclusions by instinct rather than
reason; nor is the remark made in a spirit of stoical indifference to
refined and delicate feelings like that of Balthazar, the infatuated
chemist in Balzac’s Search for the Absolute. When the beautiful eyes
of his devoted wife filled with tears as she pleaded with him not to
sacrifice all his fortune and even herself in his search for diamonds,
he ruthlessly exclaimed: “Tears! I have decomposed them; they contain
a little phosphate of lime, chloride of sodium, mucin and water.” The
Hibernicism in question is the pronunciation of “gyirl,” so wide-spread
and carefully cultivated by delicate mouths in Virginia as to be
regarded a shibboleth of those “to the manner born.” (It is of course
the prerogative of woman to change her mind,--and her name, too, if she
so elects.) Other examples of this Hibernicism are _cyart_, _cyarve_,
_scyar_, _gyarden_, _gyarlic_, _gyuide_, _cyow_ and _nyow_, which
last approximates a feline note if uttered in a falsetto. The Irish
pronunciation of _sure_ extends far beyond that jargon now. Perhaps
the reader has heard the story of the good bishop’s wife who twitted
her husband about saying _shore_ for _sure_, and who, when reminded
that she pronounced the word the same way, indignantly replied, “Why,
to be _shore_, I do not!”
It must not be inferred from what has been said that the English spoken
in all parts of Ireland is uniform. On the contrary, it differs vastly
and varies with the locality. In some parts, indeed, English is not
spoken at all. But where it is spoken, it bears a striking resemblance,
as has been pointed out, to the English of the times of Dryden and
Pope, which was fossilized by emigration. The “brogue” itself is due to
the characteristic Celtic habit of utterance, and consists mostly in
the intonation, “which appears,” according to Murray, “full of violent
ups and downs, or rather precipices and chasms of force and pitch,
almost disguising the sound to English ears.”
Thus it is evident that not a few of the expressions which now survive
only as provincialisms, or vulgarisms, in the speech of the illiterate
were once in entire accord with polite usage. Many of the locutions
heard now in the negro dialect can boast really an aristocratic
pedigree and, several generations ago, enjoyed the sanction of the
highest orthoepical authority. But these pronunciations, somehow,
drifted out of the main current of standard speech and at present
appear only as jetsam and flotsam in the back-water of our English
tongue. Yet they serve to indicate how extensively our language has
been altered and modified even in modern times, after it found its way
to the New World. The modifications and changes, however, both in idiom
and pronunciation, would have taken place, even if the English speech
had never been transplanted into foreign territory. Conclusive proof of
this is furnished by a comparison of present-day British English with
the English of two centuries ago as spoken in the mother country; and
this, though not explicitly stated, is implied in the discussion of the
theme in the foregoing paragraphs.
BRITICISMS VERSUS AMERICANISMS.
It is a recognized fact that there is a considerable variation in
the English language as spoken by the two great branches of the
Anglo-Saxon race. The English people differ from the American people
in the use of our common speech not only in their characteristic mode
of pronunciation and orthography, but they also differ from us in no
less striking a manner in the use of certain idioms and household
phrases, which constitute the small change of our every-day speech.
This difference is the natural outgrowth of the separation of the two
peoples by the estranging ocean, which is of necessity a great barrier
to complete intercourse. To be sure, the fact that the English people
and the American people have distinct national entities with the
resulting difference, during the last hundred years, of national ideals
and pursuits, has had the natural and inevitable effect of widening the
breach between the speech of the two countries. No doubt the present
variation will be accentuated more and more as the years go by, and the
language of Great Britain and of America, far from becoming absolutely
identical in pronunciation and idiom with the flight of centuries, will
go on developing with an ever-increasing divergence from the common
standard. If this be true--and certainly the facts as to the present
tendency seem to warrant such a conclusion--the final result may be the
unique linguistic phenomenon of two separate and distinct tongues, if
such a thing be not an impossibility.
Before pointing out the variations of our American English from British
English, it may be interesting to note the source of our American
vernacular, and the contributing causes of the chief variations from
the authoritative standard of the mother country.
When our Saxon forefathers found their way to the shores of this
western continent and here established their permanent abode, the
settlers naturally brought with them the language of their native
country. This was, of course, the noble tongue of Shakespeare and
Milton. Our British cousins who criticize our English so freely
and cast reproach upon it as if it were a mere jargon, a barbarous
_patois_, evidently lose sight of the fact that it boasts the same high
pedigree as their own much-vaunted Elizabethan speech. When the English
language was first transplanted in American soil, it was identical in
orthography, orthoepy and idiom with the speech of the mother country.
But the transplanted tongue, having a new and different habitat,
began at once to adapt itself, however imperceptibly, to its changed
environ and new conditions. Nor was the connection with the parent
stock a sufficiently close and vital bond of union to prevent the
English speech on American lips from undergoing at least some slight
modification in the course of time, as a natural consequence of the
altered conditions in the new world.
It is a well-established linguistic principle that a language
inevitably undergoes a slight change, determined by the varying
conditions, as long as it is spoken. When a tongue ceases to be spoken,
then and only then does it cease to change and become a dead language,
as, for instance, Latin and Greek. This fact of the gradual change in a
living language is demonstrated through the difficulty one experiences
in understanding the English of Chaucer, or even of Shakespeare, for
the matter of that, although he is not so far removed from the present
age. If a living tongue underwent no alteration with the lapse of
years, then why should not Anglo-Saxon be as readily intelligible to us
as modern English?
Furthermore, a language is affected in its development by contact with
a foreign tongue and by outside influences, such as the climate. The
first of these reasons is so apparent to all that it hardly deserves
comment. But not so the second. Yet the influence of climate on a
living language is very fruitful of change. Ready proof of this is
furnished in our own country in the soft, musical utterance of the
south in contrast with the rather shrill and forceful habits of
enunciation characteristic of the north. In Europe, for example, the
vast preponderance of the harsh, guttural character of the German
tongue offers a glaring contrast to the smooth, liquid notes of the
pure Tuscan speech. This is the reason why Italian appeals so strongly
to music lovers and to all who have an ear trained to be especially
sensitive to sound. Now, this difference between German and Italian,
as respects the musical character of the two languages, is doubtless
to be explained in large measure as the result of climate conditions
extending through many long centuries. If by some violent political
upheaval the Italians were transported to the extreme northern part
of Europe, it is altogether probable that their speech in the course
of centuries would lose much of its native vocalic development, much
of its melody, and become harsh and strident, somewhat like the
Russian language. It follows, therefore, that the English speech on
American soil has undergone some slight modification, in consequence of
climatic influence. Perhaps this explains the variation of the American
pronunciation of the long _o_-sound as in “stone” and “bone” from the
British norm. But the difference in climate between the two countries
is not sufficiently marked to produce any very radical departure.
A striking feature of the English speech on American lips is the
leveling of the long _a_-sound heard in such words as “past,” “fast,”
“plant,” “command,” “dance,” “path,” etc. This could hardly be the
result of climatic influence, however, for it does not appear that
the climate has had the effect of producing any modification in the
pronunciation of such terms in any part of America. The prevailing
pronunciation of these terms is the same, at the south and at the north
alike. Such a variation must, therefore, be inherent in the natural
growth of the English language on American soil. For it must be borne
in mind that just as the English speech, as any other living organism,
has been growing and developing during the centuries in England, so,
likewise, in America it has been growing and developing during the
last three centuries, but not necessarily in the same manner. Those
employing the language in Great Britain and in the United States are no
longer a homogeneous people with the same national ideals and destiny.
On the contrary, they are two separate and distinct nations with
different forms of government and with different aims and aspirations.
Add to this the fact that the nations have been estranged by political
differences which resulted in wars and that they are separated by
the physical barrier of a vast ocean. In the face of these obstacles
it is not at all surprising that the English speech has not gone on
developing _pari passu_ on both sides of the Atlantic. The wonder is
that the present variations are not really greater and more striking
than they are.
Another contributing cause of variation of American English from the
British norm must not be overlooked, the more especially as it has
proved a prolific factor. In our new country some conditions of life
arose which were totally unlike those existing in the old country.
Such strange conditions called imperatively for the invention of new
names and thus gave rise to the employment of new phrases and new
locutions. These had to be coined immediately for the emergency. Since
the most distinctive traits of the American are initiative and wealth
of resource, no time was lost in making such additions to the English
speech as seemed to supply a felt need, and that, too, without any
special reference to British models and precedents. Hence a large
class of terms distinctively American and bearing upon their face
the trade-mark “made in America” found their way into the English
vocabulary on this side of the Atlantic, much to the disgust of the
British precisians and purists, who proceeded forthwith to put these
new coinages under the ban and to brand them with the bend sinister
of “Americanism.” Of this class are many terms indicating mechanical
inventions and appliances, such as “elevator” instead of the British
“lift,” to mention only a single example of a long catalogue of useful
things which American genius has given to the world. Here also belong
numerous words expressing things associated with modern transportation
and rapid transit, such as “street-car,” “railroad,” etc.
Perhaps it may be well just here to call attention to some of the
ordinary terms and expressions heard in England which strike an
American as being quite odd and peculiar. It is to be presumed that
the good Britons will not be offended if we, using the same license
as themselves, venture to call such expressions “Briticisms.” Let it
be distinctly understood, however, that this is not intended as an
opprobrious epithet, but only to signify a word or an idiom which is
peculiar to Great Britain and not familiar in America. For surely the
English people have the right to employ whatever terms they may choose
both in their colloquial and in their written speech.
If an American in London wishes to use a language that is readily
understood, when he goes to the ticket-office he must call it the
booking office of the railway station. There he must ask the clerk, or
rather the “clark,” for a first single or a second return, instead of
a single fare (first-class) and a round trip (second class). He must
then have his luggage labeled, not his baggage checked, and, having
secured his brasses or labels, not his checks, he sees his box, not his
trunk, put in the proper van and then takes his seat in the carriage,
not in the car. Before the train starts off, the guards slam the doors
of the carriages, turning the handles, and at the conductor’s whistle
the engine-driver starts his locomotive-engine. The points all being
set for a clear track ahead, the train speeds along the metals, passing
perhaps a shunting-engine about the station and a train of goods-vans.
The variation of British from American usage is not more noteworthy in
railway parlance than in other circles. If an American goes shopping
in London, he must call for a packet, not a paper, of pins; a reel,
not a spool, of cotton. If he desires to buy a pair of shoes, he must
call for boots, unless he wishes low quarters or Oxford ties; if a
pair of overshoes, he must ask for footholds or galoshes; if a soft
felt hat, he must ask for a squash hat, or if he prefers a Derby,
he must ask for a billy-cock hat or a bowler; if he wishes a pad of
paper, he should request a block of paper. If he goes to a restaurant,
he indicates whether he desires his meat underdone, not rare; if he
wishes corned beef, he calls for silversides of beef; if beets, he
calls for beetroot; if chicken, he calls for fowl; if a cereal of any
sort, he calls for corn; if cold bread, he must order cut bread; and
if he desires pudding, pie, jam, preserves or candy, he must order
sweets, short for sweetmeats. If the waiter should fail for any reason
to give him a napkin, an American should ask for a serviette; and when
he has finished his repast, he is handed a bill which he may pay with
his cheque, or, if he prefers, with the cash from his purse, not his
pocket-book.
If in England you find no bowl and pitcher in your room, you are
expected, as previously observed,[12] to call for a jug and basin,
since there a pitcher means only a little jug and a bowl is used
exclusively for serving food in. On the street, instead of a letter
box near a lamp post, you see a pillar box near a lamp pillar, and
you perhaps meet a person pushing a perambulator, called “pram”
for short, instead of a baby-carriage. For dry-goods you go to a
mercer’s, where you will find white calico sold for muslin. For cloth
you go to a draper’s, for wooden ware to a turnery, for hardware to
an ironmonger’s, for milk, butter and eggs to a cow-keeper’s or a
dairy, and for fish, game and poultry to a fish shop. If you desire
any of your purchases sent to your address, you order them sent by
express-carrier, carriage paid.
If at any time you desire the services of a scrub-woman to clean
your apartments, you send for a charwoman. If you wish to have some
furniture upholstered, you request the upholder to undertake the work
for you. If you need the services of a doctor, you call in a medical
man. You must be careful to address surgeons and dentists by the common
democratic title “mister,” since the English custom does not warrant
you to address them as “doctor.” If you are well, to your inquiring
friends you are reported “fit,” if unwell, “seedy,” if sick, invariably
“ill.”
To an American ear British orthoepy offers quite as noteworthy
surprises as the idiomatic diction does. Of course it is to be
presumed that there should be more or less marked variations in the
matter of habitual utterance of certain sounds, especially the long
_o_- and the long _a_-vowel, as in “fast,” “dance,” “sha’n’t,” etc.,
which are at striking variance with American usage. Indeed, these
sounds are so characteristic that, like the English custom of ending
almost every sentence with a question, when clearly natural and not
an affectation, they serve as a shibboleth of British nativity. But
notable eccentricities are to be observed in the English mode of
pronouncing many proper names such as Derby, pronounced “darby”;
Berkeley, pronounced “barclay”; Magdalen, pronounced “maudlin”;
Cadogan, pronounced “kerduggan”; Marylebone, pronounced “merrybone”;
Cholmondeley, pronounced “chumly”; Marlborough, pronounced “mobrer”;
Albany, pronounced so that the first syllable rhymes with Al- in
Alfred, etc. It is unnecessary to multiply examples. Suffice it to
say that there is a large class of these words the spelling and
pronunciation of which seem to an American rather curiously divorced.
Certainly American usage offers no parallel where there is so complete
a divorce of orthoepy from orthography. American usage makes for
phonetic spelling and tends to make the conventional pronunciation and
spelling conform somewhat, at least.
Having drawn attention to a few Briticisms, we are now prepared to
discuss some of our Americanisms which seem to excite in the pure
minds of the English precisians alternate feelings of disgust and
indignation. Let it be premised, however, that it is not proposed to
include ordinary slang in the present discussion. It must be admitted
that too much slang is employed even in polite circles, not to mention
the speech of those who make no pretense to refinement and culture.
But one should not confuse vulgarisms with so-called Americanisms,
just as one should not confuse vulgarisms with legitimate slang.
The discriminating student distinguishes between ordinary slang and
legitimate slang. The vulgar slang of the street is, of course, to be
universally condemned and tabooed. Legitimate slang, on the contrary,
performs an important function in the development of a living language.
It is not to be inconsiderately ostracized, therefore, and put under
the ban as the chief source of corruption of our vernacular, as certain
of our purists, in their zeal without knowledge, tell us and attempt to
maintain. It is idle for them in their self-appointed rôle of guardian
of the pristine purity of the English tongue to endeavor to defend so
unsound and so indefensible a thesis. For legitimate slang, far from
being an unmitigated evil and a constant menace to the purity and
propriety of our noble tongue, is standard English in the making, is
idiom in the nascent state before it has attained to the dignity of
correctness of usage. To change the figure, legitimate slang is the
recruiting ground whence come the new and untried words which are to
take the place in the vernacular, of the archaic and obsolete words,
dropping out of the ranks. But it is aside from the main purpose of
this chapter to discuss the relation of slang to standard usage (cf.
“What is slang?”) and hence this only in passing.
By an Americanism, as here used, is meant a word, phrase, or idiom of
the English tongue, in good standing, which has originated in America
or is in use only on this side of the Atlantic. It will be seen,
therefore, that all mere slang expressions, even though they be of
American origin, are barred from the present consideration. In his
dictionary of “Americanisms,” Bartlett gives a large collection, many
of which the above limitation, of course, excludes.
Of reputed Americanisms, as one might surmise, there are several
classes to be distinguished, without any very clearly defined line
of demarcation separating them. One class includes a large number
of phrases which had their origin in England and were transported
thence to our shores by the first settlers who came from the mother
country and established themselves in Virginia and Massachusetts. In
the last analysis these locutions appear to be transplanted British
provincialisms, not a few of which came over in the _Mayflower_. Some
of our British critics who are not as familiar with the history of the
English language as they might be do not hesitate to deliver an offhand
opinion, pronouncing an apparent neologism an Americanism, when as a
matter of fact the expression shows a good English pedigree extending
back many generations. A more intimate acquaintance with the history of
our common speech would save them the embarrassment from such a glaring
blunder. But it is so easy to fall into the careless habit of branding
as an Americanism an unfamiliar idiom or a phrase that is rarely heard
in England. This convenient term has thus become in England a reproach,
inasmuch as a certain stigma, somehow, attaches to it in the British
mind. But for all that, like charity, it covers a multitude of sins,
sins of keen prejudice, no less than of crass ignorance.