Though people from different geographical areas and ethnic groups settled
in America, there is a uniformity in American English . The reasons for this
uniformity have been discussed below.
Traditionally American is called a Salad Bowl and the most prominent
characteristic of the occupation of the United States is the constant mingling
of settlers from one part with settlers from other parts. Not only the English
settlers, but also the French and German settlers also have this tendency. Thus colonists from Massachusetts went north
into Maine and New Hampshire and south into Rhode Island and Connecticut.
Others moved from New England into New York, New Jersey, and colonies as far
south as Georgia, as when a body from Dorchester in Massachusetts, known as the
Dorchester Society, moved to Georgia in 1752.
Thus, due to this admixture of peoples the American society has become highly homogeneous. Linguistically the circumstances under which the American
population spread over the country have had one important consequence in the
fact that the English spoken in America shows a high degree of uniformity. Those
who are familiar with the pronounced dialectal differences that mark the
popular speech of different parts of England will know that there is nothing comparable
to these differences in the United States. Thus, being much more unsettled, and moving
frequently from place to place, the Americans are not so liable to local peculiarities
either in accent or phraseology.
The merging of regional differences through the mixture of the population
that has been described has been promoted since by a certain mobility that
characterizes the American people. It has been said that it is unusual to find
adult Americans living in the place in which they were born, and while this is
an obvious exaggeration, it is nevertheless true that change of abode is
distinctly common. Americans are so accustomed to distance that they disregard
it. So, the Americans share a feeling
that tends to create an attitude of mind that may almost be said to diminish
space.
The Americans share an instinct of
conformity and the fact that they readily accept standardization in linguistic
matters as in houses, automobiles, and other things.
Another factor that helped the American English gain a uniformity is the
influence of Webster. Americans respect in language the authority of those who
are supposed to know it. So, the
language of the Americans was influenced by Webster’s spelling book and Lindley
Murray’s grammar. The public education
in America has been a constant influence in the uniformity of the American
English.
It is true that like any major language of the world American English also
has some variations. There are at least nine varieties of American English
which have enough coherence within themselves and distinction from other
varieties, to warrant their description as separate dialects. But the
variations are so negligible that the speakers of any dialect can easily understand
the dialect of other groups. Thus,
compared to the situation in
European countries, such as France or Italy or even England, dialect
differences in American English are relatively small.
Reference:
A
History of the English Language. Baugh, Albert C., and Thomas Cable. 4th ed. Englewood
Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1993.
