Instructors’ Awareness of the Syntactic and Morphological Differences between British and American English

This study explores Turkish English as a foreign language (EFL) instructors’ awareness of the syntactic and morphological variation in British English (BrE) and American English (AmE). The data were collected through a survey which was administered to 38 EFL instructors working at preparatory schools of different universities. The participants were asked to analyze 49 sentence-pairs in the survey to decide whether given sentences were correct or incorrect. The results indicated a) that the participants were better at recognizing the morphology and syntax of BrE than AmE, b) that of all the participants, the ones who were exposed to both varieties were better at recognizing the different uses of the syntactic and morphological forms in BrE and AmE than the ones exposing to the forms only in one variety, c) that the departments the participants graduated from did not have an impact on the recognition of the differences between BrE and AmE in syntax and morphology. 

Instructors’ Awareness of the Syntactic and Morphological Differences between British and American English

This study explores Turkish English as a foreign language (EFL) instructors’ awareness of the syntactic and morphological variation in British English (BrE) and American English (AmE). The data were collected through a survey which was administered to 38 EFL instructors working at preparatory schools of different universities. The participants were asked to analyze 49 sentence-pairs in the survey to decide whether given sentences were correct or incorrect. The results indicated a) that the participants were better at recognizing the morphology and syntax of BrE than AmE, b) that of all the participants, the ones who were exposed to both varieties were better at recognizing the different uses of the syntactic and morphological forms in BrE and AmE than the ones exposing to the forms only in one variety, c) that the departments the participants graduated from did not have an impact on the recognition of the differences between BrE and AmE in syntax and morphology. 

___

  • Algeo, J. (2006). British or american english? A handbook of word and grammar patterns. UK: Cambridge University Press.
  • Cambridge Advanced Learners’ Dictionary (2008). Cambridge University Press.
  • Colins Cobuild Advanced Learners’ English Dictionary (2006). Harper Colins.
  • Farrell, T. & Martin, S. (2009). To teach standard english or world englishes: A balanced approach to instruction. Teaching Forum, 2, 2-7.
  • Finnie, R., Frain, C., Hill, D. H., & Thomas, K. (2010). Top grammar: From basic to upper intermediate. Helbling Languages.
  • Gramley, S. & Pӓtzold, K. M. (1992). A survey of modern english. London: Routledge.
  • Gün, B. (2009). Are teachers fully prepared to teach different varieties of English?: A case study in Turkey. English as an International Language Journal, 5, 164-175.
  • Hassan, F. S. (2012). Syntactical and morphological differences in british and american english. Language in India, 12(1).
  • Heyl, J. D. & McCarthy, J. (2003). International education and teacher preparation in the U.S. Paper presented at the national conference on Global Challenges and U.S. Higher Education: National Needs and Policy Implications. Duke University, Durham, NC. Retrieved from the Duke University Center for International Studies website: http://ducis.jhfc.duke.edu/archives/globalchallenges/pdf/heyl_abstract.pdf
  • Hundt, M. & Smith, N. (2009). The present perfect in British and American English: Has there been any change, recently? ICAME Journal, 33, 45-63.
  • Kövecses, Z. (2000). American english: An introduction. Toronto: Broadview Press, McCrum, R., Cran, W., & MacNeil, R. (1986). The story of english. London: BBC publications.
  • Rohdenburg, G. & Schlüter, J. (2009). One language, two grammars: Differences between british and american english. UK: Cambridge University Press
  • Siemund, P., Davydova, J., & Maier, G. (2012). The amazing world of englishes: A practical introduction. Germany: Walter de Gurter.
  • Tirban, N., Precup-Stiegelbauer, L. R., & Patrauta, T. (2012). The major differences between British English and American English in written and oral communication. Communication, Context, Interdisciplinarity (pp.985-990). Tirgu-Mureş, Romania: Universitatea Petru Maior.
  • Uygun, D. (2012). Awareness of grammatical variations in English dialects: A survey of Turkish pre-service EFL teachers. In Azamat Akbarov and Vivian Cook (Eds) Contemporary Foreign Language Education: Linking Theory into Practice, (pp.199-206). Sarajevo: IBU Publications.
  • Zhang, B. (2008). On grammatical differences between daily british and american english. Asian Social Science, 4(6).