Why do Americans call their language English, and not American language as most of is made up of slang and?

Question

mixed languages from different countries.

Answer 1

The English language has been influenced the most by the Vikings during the 9th and 10th century and the Normans during the Norman Invasions in the 11th century, but you don't see people calling it Danish or French now do you? English has an extremely huge amount of borrowing and mixing from many languages, so you can't just say because American English has some influences it should not be called English, because if that was the case then English today wouldn't even exist. Most linguists would laugh at you and then go put bandages on their hands, which they would hurt after trying to punch you through the screen

Answer 2

A UK English speaker might well have less trouble understanding American speech than the speech of someone from elsewhere in the UK.

Keep in mind also that American and British English have BOTH changed a good bit since the 1600s. (What's a modern Brit's excuse for saying "different to" instead of "different from"? Or for not knowing when a collective noun is supposed to take a plural verb and when it's not?)

Answer 3

ROTFL. Think of the situation when the U.S. was formed. They used an existing language and called it by its known name.

At what point in time or development do you start calling it 'American'. And why should an English variant be 'American'? South and Central America speaks primarily Spanish. So in the big picture, that's just as 'American'.

English has ALWAYS been a voracious and omnivorous language, absorbing words and phrases from every language it encounters. U.S. American usage is no different.

Answer 4

I don't know. Probably because the early settlers from England spoke English, and when some spelling changed and a few foreign words were mixed in, they kept calling it English.

Answer 5

It's Americanized English I guess.

Answer 6

I guess because it is based on the foundation of English, the mixed languages come in as other nationalities came in

Answer 7

This is my great grievance: how can they call their language English when it diverges so greatly from the real thing? If only tey would declare it a American and it could be categorised as a separate language, then we could all have the pleasure of adopting US accents and using quaint American expressions to communicate with them without fear of criticism, as we would be speaking an entirely separate language! And American would be another asset to add to our list of foreign languages. What would be even more gratifying would be to make them learn Englsh in school to talk to Brits! Could they do it, I wonder?

Answer 8

American English. Most of it isn't slang. Of course it depends on where you be hangin'.

Answer 9

It IS American. The English wouldn't be caught dead talking like that!

Answer 10

Almost all of the European languages derive majorly from latin and polotics of the time the language formed.