Why do Americans spell certain words differently to English?

Question

for example, colour and color

Answer 1

When the USA gained independence from the UK, spelling was not as 'fixed' as it is now. Disctionaries were for meanings, not spellings (remember, Shakespeare spelt his OWN name 5 different ways!). Indeed, spelling only became unified with the use of trains etc' making 'standard' countrywide communication a habit. Before that, dialects were so different they were almost different languages.

American English is slightly closer to the Elizabethan 'spell as spoken' English, as it didn't have the influence of the other languages from the 'Empire' making spelling more complex.

Spellings therefore, evolved slightly differently in the two countries, and when the came to be fixed by government/military/telegram companies in the 1800s, they naturally had slight differences. It is pretty amazing they weren't more different; if we hadn't developed global communications, we could have ended up speaking different, but related, languages!

Answer 2

Back when the US broke off from England, spelling was not yet established in consistent form. People basically assumed others would understand anyway, just as they do here on the Internet.

So the school teachers who eventually standardized English and the school teachers who eventually standardized American English were different ones, in a process not unlike what happens with divergent evolution of species that get separated by continental drift.

Answer 3

Those are differences between American and British English American: Color, Center, Theater British: Colour, Centre, Theatre

Answer 4

American spelling is more phonetic.They spell a word like it is spoken. Silent vowels & consonants are dropped by them. They find this more sensible.In British English the spoken & written English are completely different. This makes it a illogical language, & foreigners find learning to read & write English is like studying two different languages.

Answer 5

English is one of the most demanding languages to learn. Many words are pronounced identically, but spelt differently: lead, lead and led - heavy metal, to guide along, guided along (perfect tense).

Being British, I could argue that Americans just wan to be different, but then again, they may just want to simplify the spelling to its phonetic equivalent - sulfur instead of sulphur for instance. It could be laziness on the part of Americans, but I love to correct spellings when I'm using a quotation which has been written in Americanspeak.

The real answer to this may be that it happened for no particular reason, and we've just got (not gotten) on with it!

Answer 6

A very interesting though sometimes hard going book by Bill Bryson named Made in America explains this and more of the 2 ways of of speaking the same language.

Answer 7

We Brits often have a chuckle at the expense of our transatlantic cousins (Honestly, you'd think we invented the language!) but in fact it is usually the case that the Americans have retained the original, and to us, archaic, spelling and pronunciation. If you look at 17th and 18th century manuscripts, spelling is wonderfully idiosyncratic, and there is liberal use of 'z' where we now use 's', optional use of vowels etc.

Answer 8

The Americans use Websters dictionary which gives them American/English as opposed to our form of English which is actually made up from many different languages such as French, German and Indian. When you look at it objectively the American version of English is actually a purer form of English/English!

Answer 9

I guess just to Americanize it, that's just the way it's always been. We also us z's instead of s's. Like you probably would have spelled it "Americanise".

Answer 10

yes they do,and it makes more sense,than our spelling