Read the following passage. Draw up a list of terms denoting the university teaching staff in Great Britain and in the USA. What are the corresponding Russian terms?

Q: But speaking of universities, we've also got a different set of labels for the teaching staff, haven’t we?

M: Yes, in the United States, for example, our full time faculty, which we call staff incidentally — is arranged in a series of steps which goes from instructor through ranks of assistant professor, associate professor to that of professor. But I wish you'd straighten me out on the English system. Don for example, is a completely mysterious word and I'm never sure of the difference, say, between a lecturer and a reader.

Q: Well, readers say that lecturers should lecture and readers should read! But seriously, I think there's more similarity here than one would imagine. Let me say, first of all, that this word don is a very informal word and that it is common really only in Oxford and Cambridge. But corresponding to your instructor we've got the rank of assistant lecturer, usually a beginner's post. The assistant lecturer who is successful is promoted, like your instructor and he becomes a lecturer and this lecturer grade is the main teaching grade throughout the university world. Above lecturer a man may be promoted to senior lecturer or reader, and both of these — there's little difference between them — correspond closely to your associate professor. And then finally he may get a chair, as we say — that is a professorship, or, as you would say, a full professorship. It's pretty much a difference of labels rather than of organization, it seems to me.

(From A Common Language by A.H. Marckwardt and R. Quirk)

Comment on the formation of the following words.

rattlesnake

foxberry

auto

americanism

colonist

addressee

copperhead

pipe of peace

fire-water

6. In the following sentences find the examples of words which are characteristic of American English. State whether they belong to the group of:

a) historical Americanisms;

b) proper Americanisms;

c) American shortenings;

d) American borrowings.

Take note of their spelling peculiarities.

1. As the elevator carried Brett downward, Hank Kreisel closed and locked the apartment door from inside. 2. A raw fall wind swirled leaves and dust in small tornadoes and sent pedestrians scurrying for indoor warmth. 3. Over amid the bungalows a repair crew was coping with a leaky water main. 4. We have also built, ourselves, experimental trucks and cars which are electric powered. 5. In a plant bad news travelled like burning gasoline. 6. May Lou wasn't in; she had probably gone to a movie. 7. The bank was about equal in size to a neighbourhood drugstore, brightly lighted and pleasantly designed. 8. Nolan Wainwright walked towards the apartment building, a three-storey structure probably forty years old and showing signs of disrepair. He guessed it contained two dozen or so apartments. Inside a vestibule Nolan Wainwright could see an array of mail boxes and call buttons. 9. He's a barber and one of our bird dogs (a person who helps to sell cars). We had twenty or so regular bird dogs, Smokey revealed, including service station operators, a druggist, a beauty-parlour operator, and an undertaker. 10. Barbara put a hand to her hair — chestnut brown and luxuriant, like her Polish Mother's; it also grew annoyingly fast so she had to spend more time than she liked in beauty salons. 11. He hadn't had an engineering degree to start, having been a high school dropout before World War II. 12. Auto companies regularly invited design school students in, treating them like VIP's, while the students saw for themselves the kind of aura they might work in later.

7. Read the following joke and find examples of words which are characteristic of American English.

The Bishop of London, speaking at a meeting recently, said that when he was in America he had learned to say to his chauffeur, " Step onthe gas, George." but so far he had not summoned sufficient courage to say to the Archbishop of Canterbury, " О. К. Chief."

Read the following extract. Explain the difference in the meanings of the italicized words in American and British English.

In America just as in England, you see the same shops with the same boards and windows in every town and village.

Shopping, however, is an art of its own and you have to learn slowly where to buy various things. If you are hungry, you go to the chemist's. A chemist's shop is called a drugstore in the United States. In the larger drugstores you may be able to get drugs, too, but their main business consists in selling stationery, candy, toys, braces, belts, fountain pens, furniture and imitation jewellery. You must be extremely careful concerning the names of certain articles. If you ask for suspenders in a man's shop, you receive a pair of braces, if you ask for a pair of pants, you receive a pair of trousers and should you ask for a pair of braces, you receive a queer look.

I should like to mention that although a lift is called an elevator in the United States, when hitch-hiking you do not ask for an elevator, you ask for a lift. There's some confusion about the word flat. A flat in America is called an apartment; what they call a flat is a puncture in your tyre (or as they spell it, tire). Consequently the notice: “Flats Fixed” does not indicate an estate agent where they are going to fix you up with a flat, but a garage where they are equipped to mend a puncture.

(From How to Scrape Skies byG. Mikes)

9. Read the following passage. Do you share Professor Quirk's opinionabout neutralizing the differences between the two formsof English? If so, give your own examples to prove it.

M: ...and finally I notice that although we used to think that baggage was somehow an American term and luggage an English term, we have now come to adopt luggage much more, especially in connection with air travel.

Q: Well, I think it is equally true that we in Britain have more and more to adopt the word baggage. I have certainly noticed that on shipping lines, perhaps chiefly those that are connected with the American trade. But this blending of our usage in connection with the luggage and baggage would seem to me to be rather typical of this trend that we've got in the twentieth century towards neutralizing the differences between our two forms of English.

(From A Common Language by A.H. Marckwardt and R. Quirk)

10. Look through the following list of words and state what spelling norms are accepted in the USA and Great Britain so far as the given words are concerned.

favour — favor

honour — honor

colour — color

practice — practise

offence — offense

defence — defense

centre — center

metre — meter

fibre — fiber

marvellous — marvelous

woollen — woolen

jewellery — jewelry

to enfold — to infold

to encrust — to incrust

to empanel — to impanel

cheque — check

catalogue — catalog

programme — program

judgement — judgment

abridgement — abridgment

acknowledgement — acknowledgment

Write the following words according to the British norms of spelling.

judgment

practise

instill

color

flavor

check

program

woolen

humor

theater

Write the following words according to the American norms of spelling.

honour

labour

centre

metre

defence

offence

catalogue

abridgement

gramme

enfold

marvellous

Read the following passage. Give some more examples illustrating the differences in grammar between the two varieties оf English.

Q: Ithought Americans always said gotten when they used the verb get as a full verb. But you did say I've got your point, didn't you?

M: Yes, I did. You know, it's a common English belief — almost a superstition — about American usage, but it does turn out on examination, as many other things do, that we are closer together than appears on the surface. Actually, we, Americans, use gotten only when our meaning is 'to acquire' or 'to obtain'. We've gotten a new car since yon were here last. Now, when we use get to mean 'possess' or 'to be obliged to' we have exactly the same forms as you do. I've got a pen in my pocket. I've got to write a letter.

( FromA Common Language by A.Н. Marckwardt and R.Quirk)

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