Distinktion Between British and American English Essay Example for Free

Distinktion Between British and American English Essay Abstract In this paper, distincion between British English and American English on the phonetic aspect will be discussed. The whole paper is going to be devided into several parts, in the first part various of English accents and the outline of the differences between these two variants of English will be introduced in biref ; In the second part, the representative of British English – Recerved pronunciation will be presented in detail on the aspect of sound system; in the thirt part, the phonetic peculiarities of American English will be discussed; in the last part, the sound system of British English and American English will be compaired in detail, thus the differences will be presented minutely. DIFFERENCE BETWEEN BRITHS ENGLISH AND AMERICAN ENGLISH ON THE ASPECT OF SOUND SYSTEM Outline: The fanous American author and humorist Mark Twain had said that :English and American are separate languages,..when I speak my native tongue in its utmost purity an Englishman cant understand me at all. (The stolen White Elephant) It is ture, we have already heard the concept of American English and British English when we started to learn this language, although we didnt know and cannot distinguish their differences at that time, we knew, at least, they are different. As an English majoring student, now I know they have distinctions in several aspects including vocabulary, pronunciation, spelling, intonation, etc. and it is my horner and pleasure to write on this theme: distinction between American English and British English on the phonetic aspect. Various accents: One thing which should be mentioned at the very begining is that, in fact,there are various accents in English, in general, linguistists devide  them into two groups: American varient of English and British variant of English, which can also be subdevided as in following graphic: Each of the above mentioned accents has their owen features thus different from each other, in this paper, not all these acctents are going to be discussed, only two representatives will be researched, they are the representative of American Enlish : General American English (GA), and the representative of British English: Received Pronunciation (RP), In general, one of the most siginificant parcularities of Brithish accent is it is cadenced, almost every sylable is pronounced clearly, long vowels and short vowels are distinguished obviously. However in American accent it is kind of ambiguous and vague, most of the long vowels are cutted short. For instance, the vowel a in class belongs to long vowel, British always pronounce it intactly, whereas Americans often enunciate it as a short one, it sound like a in the word bad. An other example can be the word aunt, almost all American pronouce it as ant with out expception, which makes it confusing whether they are reffering to their aunt or the ant creeping in front of their house. British accent invariably enunciate voiceless consonant in unstressed sylables clearly, yet Americans pronouce voiceless consonants as voiced ones, as a result, the word Battery was enunciated as Baddery by Americans. In most countries the English learning materials of schools use British standard English. The English channel of China Central Telivision as well as the dialogues between the spoke men of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and foreing journalists use British English too. Among foreign meida, the accent used by BBC is considered to be acknowledged model of British English. Within Movie stars, Hugh Grant (acted the leading role in Four Wedding and a Funeral) graduated from Oxford University and speaks in standard upper class British accent.. RP: authentic British accent In China, there are various accents in different origins, among them mandarin is the officially stipulated as standard official language, however, although there are also various accents in different origins in Britain, there is no official stipulation on which is the standard one, but in the history of the development of English language, one accent formed its  importance and acknowledged to be the most stand British English, that is: Received Pronunciation, shorter form of which is RP. Retrospect its history, Received Pronunciation formed from an accent used in South Central England. That region extended toward southeast from Midlands to London, among which includes the two famous University towns Oxford and Cambridge. In the 14th century, Received Pronunciation was widely used among traders, and with the rise of Oxford and Cambridge University, this accent is also used by students of the two universities, thus, Received Pronunciation turned into the accent used by people who hav e received good education. From 19th to 20th century, Received Pronunciation became the education language use in British public schools, it was also used by British Broadcasting, and as a result, it is as well named as Public School English and BBC English. The concept of Received English was previously proposed by the English linguistic Daniel S. Jones in his monograph in 1918. To sum up, Received Pronunciation has the following general features: 1. Received Pronunciation is a kind of standard neutral accent, it is deemed to have no definite regional accent character. Whereas, in the British Isles, Received Pronunciation is only used in England, in addition it does not limit area. 2. Received Pronunciation has specific social demarcation. In Britain, RP is regarded as reflection of having received good education, that is, well educated. Hence, it is always connected with upper class of society, sometimes it is termed as Oxford English and King’s/Queen’s English. A coalmine worker frkm Welsh won’t understand and speak elegant Received Pronunciation. 3. Received Pronunciation is always closely bounded together with some particular professions. The main occupations use RP are: lawyers, politicians, diplomats, bond traders, teachers of universities or public schools, as well as announcers of national Broadcasting and Television studios. Evidently, those professions at the same time reflect ‘elegant’ and ‘distinguished’ social positions. What is worth mentioning is that as Received Pronunciation is standard orthodox British English, it is widely used in foreign language education. Therefore, the English learned by non-English first language countries is Received Pronunciation, the English pronounced by some of the excellent learners among them is even more normative than local British people. The principle character of RP is to protrude the sound ‘r’. When two words are connected together, if the  previous one ends with a non-high vowel while the second one starts with a vowel, the RP enunciation will add a non-existing r. By comparing the following two phrases we can see the peculiarities of RP: Regular enuciating situation (ending with a non-high vowel + starting with a consonant): The idea for it saw him in the room. Adding the non-existing r'(ending with a high vowel + starting with a vowel): The idea(r) of it, saw(r) it in the room. Peculiarities of American accent: 1. Abdominal pronunciation: When we listen to American people speak, it is noticeable that their timber is very abundant, the time of resonation sounds very long, even with strong nasal. In fact this is the first peculiarity of American accent abdominal pronunciation. The so called abdominal pronunciation refers to the habit of producing sound from the abdomen in American accent, which is very different in Chinese where the process of sound production is in the chest. More specifically, when we produce vowels, we need to draw in our bellies, then enunciate with vocal cord vibration, only in this way the produced vowels can sound resonant and full. If you want to practice most standard and pure American accent, you must form the habit of producing voice from the abdomen, pronounce with the back of vocal organs, this is the first thing we need to do. 2. Literally pronunciation: The second peculiarities of American accent is literally pronunciation, in general, they are pronounced just as they are spelled., enunciation is more regulated, which exactly match the peculiarity of English language as a kind of phonogram. For instance, the most significant distinction between American accent and British accent is the disposing of the retroflex consonant r. someone always finds it difficult to decide when should he/she roll his/her tongue and when not. It seems very complicated, in fact it is easy when you get it: in American accent, as long as there is letter r in the spelling, you should retroflex when you enunciate the word, on the contrary, if there is no letter r in the word, avoid rolling your tongue by all means. Therefore, we need to retroflex in words like letter, butter,  whereas in words like idea, China we mustn’t roll our tongue. Moreover, American English sounds different from British English mainly because in AE pronunciation tends to agree with spelling. For example, the word vase, according to the rule of ‘if there is a non-pronunced e at the end of the word, then the vowel of that word pronounce its letter sound’, British people pronounce it as [va:z], however, it is enunciated as [veiz] in American English. 3. The third peculiarity of American English is there is clear distinction between stressed and unstressed syllables. When we speak Kazakh and Chinese, every word can be stressed, so our tone sound constant and forceful, but when we speak AE, we have to get rid of this habit. The rhythm of AE comes from alternation of stressed and unstressed syllables, so if we want to make what we say rhythmist, we have to abbey the role of differentiating between stressed and unstressed syllables, also, we should pay attention to stressed syllables of words, firstly, we cannot shift stresses, then we should weaken the syllables without stresses, hence the word industry, the stress falls on the first syllable, but some people may have the habit of putting stress on the second syllable, this is a wrong habit, we must get rid of it. In order to make clear distinction between stressed and unstressed words or syllables, the most important thing to do is to weaken the unstressed syllables, once we can pronounce the unstressed syllables and words correctly, the stressed can be reflected out. Some general differences between American English and British English: 1. The resonance focus of American accent, i.e. where muscle moves most frequently, is on the back of mouth cavity between tongue and palate. That is the so called ‘pronounce rearwardly ’; in British accent the resonance focus is in front of teeth and between the lips, lips and facial muscles moves more frequently, which is so called ‘pronounced forwardly’. 2. In American accent the pitch changes between the syllables rather than within the syllables. There is no pitch glide within the syllables; however, in British accent, they try to emphasize the logically important words by gliding the pitch (The so called pitch glide is to lengthen the syllable and raise the pitch.). 3. There are 3 main vowels pronounce differently in British accent. /o/ in AE is two-stage-enunciation, while in BE a sound / ÊÅ' / is added before /əʊ/ which makes it a three-stage-enunciation. British /É’/  sound brief and powerful, lips glide fleetly, the degree of lip-rounding become smaller. Whereas when pronounce /É”:/ in BE, lips protract forward far away and bend into a round shape, leaving only a small opening. 4. Some sound in British English is different at times. When the sound /i:/ is at the end of a word (especially when spelled as y or ly ), it is weekend to /i/, for instance, in words like pretty, mostly. In American English, the syllables in the end with sound /sri/, /ori/ are always stressed, however, in British English those sounds are weekend to /É™ri/, and stresses are moved forward. For example in words like necessary, ordinary, category, the sound /à ¦/ in British English may change to /É‘:/ when it is in American English, In general, it would change under the following circumstances: * Before /f/, such as after, laugh, half, calf; * Before /s/, such as fast, last, rascal, repast, pass, glass (except for passenger, passage); * Before /th/, such as bath, path, rath, rather, lather (except for gather) * Before /nc/, /nk/ , such as dance, chancellor, lance, france; * Before /nt/, such as advantage, plant, chant, can’t; * Before /nd/ such as commander, demand, slander (except for and, hand, grand, stand) Irregular situations: the sound a does not change in bat, cat, can, changes in banana, example, sample, ranch, branch. Although the sound /u/ in American English might as well not change, but it is common to change to /ju/, for instance, duke, dual, due, neutral, nuclear, news, Tuesday, tune, tunic, lubricate, ludicrous, lunatic. 4. The letter r will drop when it is after a vowel, only when they are followed by another vowel. 6ï ¼Å½In American English sound t at the end of a word is incomplete plosive, while in British English it is complete plosive. 7. There are also a lot of irregular sound changes, for example: (American English→British English)

Graduate Study of Clinical Psychology :: Graduate Admissions Essays

Graduate Study of Clinical Psychology My dedication to the field of psychology is evident in the various activities in which I am involved. I am a student affiliate of the American Psychological Association, as well as a student member of the Iowa Psychological Association. I have been actively involved in the community as a volunteer working with patients, families, and staff in the emergency room of a local hospital. I have been a devoted member of the psychology club for two years and am currently serving my first year as an officer (Vice-president of Special Events). Finally, I have been a teaching assistant under the supervision of Dr. Frank Barrios, clinical psychologist, and Dr. jack Yates, cognitive psychologist, both of the University of Northern Iowa, where I have had such responsibilities as preparing and grading exams and essays, holding office hours, working with individual students, assisting students with assignments and presentations, and answering any questions students may have about the material. Not o nly do I feel confident about my preparation in psychology, I am also working toward a minor in sociology, acquiring knowledge of the human relations that exist between the individual and the community. In addition to these activities, I have been involved in research under the supervision of Dr. Augustine Osman, clinical psychologist, University of Northern Iowa. Currently, I am working on three separate measures that will soon be submitted for publication. One is an attempt to validate a measure concerning pain and is entitled, "The Pain Catastrophizing Scale (PCS): Factor Structure and Psychometric Properties." The second is an effort to differentiate between anxiety and depression in a college sample. And the third is an attempt to differentiate between anxiety and depression in a clinical sample. Given Dr. Osman's excellent record of previous publications, I fully expect for these articles to be accepted for publication and for myself to be listed as co-author on all of them. Through my experience with research, I have been involved in data entry and collection, interpretation of data using SPSS, as well as scoring of the MMPI-2. To gain applied experience in the field of clinical psychology, I decided to obtain an internship. To accomplish this, I approached the program facilitator of the mental health unit at Covenant Medical Center in Waterloo, Iowa. I spent the summer of 1996 carrying out this voluntary internship under the supervision of Dennis Feltz, LMHC, while gaining hands-on experience working with both the adolescent and the adult populations.

Analysis on “Behind the Veil” Essay

In the short story â€Å"From Behind the Veil,† written by Dhu’l Nun Ayyoub, the author changes how we feel about the main character throughout the sequencing of the plot. We as the readers learn more about how the protagonist really thinks coupled with what her motives are. The author also presents language that clearly expresses how the protagonist feels and uses examples to show an overall theme in the story. In the exposition we meet our protagonist who is a young women of Islam who wears the traditional veil that muslim women are advised to wear under the law of the Quran were it says, â€Å"And tell the believing women to reduce some of their vision and guard their private parts and not expose their adornment except that which necessarily appears thereof and to wrap a portion of their head covers over their chests and not expose their adornment except to their husbands, their fathers, their husbands’ fathers, their sons, their husbands’ sons, their brothers, their brothers’ sons, their sisters’ sons, their women, that which their right hands possess, or those male attendants having no physical desire, or children who are not yet aware of the private aspects of women.(Quran).† Some women are not wearing veils. As readers, we come to the conclusion that the protagonist is a faithful woman of Islam. The veil is a symbol of power to women who wear it because they have the gift of modesty and can show their dedication to Allah. What is interesting is that even though the veil is supposed to cover the body and keep men from giving attention to a woman’s body, men are drawn to the women in veils because they are â€Å"enticing† and have an â€Å"alluring shape, and make the observer yearn to uncover the secrets which lie beneath them (Ayyoub 98).† During the rising action, we continue to have the view about the protagonist that she is a â€Å"good girl† and respectable until she reveals herself to a man she finds enticing and who seems to fancy her. This contradicts what we previously thought about her. We also learn that she wants to have control of their relationship. She won’t allow the man to know her name or have any information that he could use to contact her at any time. This is an interesting exception to the stereotypical and usual relationship between a Muslim man and woman. Usually the man would have the majority of power in the relationship, but the protagonist has made the relationship on her terms  only. We also learn from the narrator that the protagonist has a strong disposition. We can conclude that she seems to exude some power . We also learn that her father thinks highly of her and feels that she is â€Å"intelligent†, â€Å"well brought up†, and â€Å"obviously knows the value of traditions and respects them.† In the climax, we start to have a very different view of our protagonist. We learn that she might not be as genuine as we think she is. The climax is after her father reads the newspaper article a man submitted about a woman who revealed herself to him. She goes to her room and ‘talks’ to her veil stating that she despises the veil, how she uses it only to keep men away from her, she doesn’t care about her veil at all, she feels nothing for it, she defies it, and how she feels that other women say they wear the veil to preserve their virginity, honor, and good morals, but if they were honest about why they wore the veil it would be for no reason but to cover their flaws and scandals. This is extremely surprising to the reader because from what we thought of her before she was a girl who wore the veil as a symbol of good morals when now we learn it isjust a persona that she exudes. This point of view she has toward the veil is very different from what we expect it to be and what most Islamic people’s point of view would be. We as readers now think of her as taking advantage of the veiling tradition for her own purposes instead of for religious ones. It seems as if though she wants everyone to think she wears the veil because she is faithful to Allah, when in all reality it is all staged. The only positive thought she has of her veil is that it creates a sense of anonymity and mystery even though she feels trapped underneath it. The language the author uses to express how the protagonist really feels about the veil give you a sense of the true despise the protagonist has toward it. The author uses words such as â€Å"defy† which mean to challenge the power of, or resist boldly, showing that the protagonist is having an internal conflict with her religion. She also uses the word â€Å"despise† which means disgust. Readers really get the sense now that the protagonist has put on an act to seem like this respectable and honorable Muslim woman when really none of it matters to her. The Theme of the story is that sometimes  we can feel trapped between what we feel and think and what we know is the status-quo or the excepted way of thinking and feeling. This is shown in the example of the protagonist with her father. She acts like she agrees with his thought of the veil because she knows that is what is expected and excepted when really her feelings are that the veil denies her freedom.

Essay on Albert Cohens Theory - 1123 Words

According to Siegel (2013) Albert Cohen developed the theory of delinquent subcultures in his classic 1995 book, Delinquent Boys. Cohen believes that the delinquent behavior of lower class youth actually goes against the norms and values of middle-class U. S. culture. These youths experience what he calls status frustration due to social conditions that enable them to achieve success legitimately. As a result of this social conflict the youths join gangs and become involved in behavior that is â€Å"nonutilitarian, malicious, and negativistic. This gang subculture possesses a value system directly opposed to that of the larger society. Their norms of society are completely opposite. Their conduct is right by the standards of their subculture†¦show more content†¦The corner boy is the most common response. They are not chronically delinquent but may be involved in petty or status offenses. He is loyal to his peers and eventually becomes a stable member of his neighborhood. The college boy embraces the cultural and social values of the middle class and strives to be successful by these standards. These youths are on an almost hopeless path because they are ill-equipped academically, socially, and linguistically to achieve the rewards of middle class life. The delinquent boy adopts a set of norms and principles in direct opposition to middle class values. They live for the day and do not think about tomorrow. They go against efforts made by family, school, or other sources of authority to control their behavior. The attraction, loyalty, and solidarity are some of the reasons they join gangs along with the gangs perception of autonomy and independence. Reaction formation is the result of the delinquent boy’s inability to succeed. The real problem for Cohen is status frustration, not blocked opportunity (Siegel, 2013). Lower-class youth desire approval and status, but because they cannot meet middle-class criteria, they become frustrated (Criminolo gy chapter 4 outline sagepub.com). They overreact to any perceived threat or slight. They are also willing to take risk, violate the law, and flout middle-class conventions. Cohen’s work explains the factors that promote and sustain aShow MoreRelatedAlbert Cohen And The Chemical Warfare Service868 Words   |  4 PagesAlbert Cohen, born in Boston in 1918, where he spent the overwhelming majority of his life in academia. In 1939, he completed his undergraduate studies at Harvard, where he was greatly influenced by his professors, most importantly Merton at Harvard, and Sutherland at Indiana. He chose to leave the New England area for graduate school. 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