#EnglishLearning

American English and British English share roots, yet their paths diverged in striking ways. For Thai readers who often study English as a global language, understanding this split helps with practical communication and the broader story of language evolution.

The story begins with settlers in the 17th and 18th centuries who carried English to what would become the United States. As communities grew, the language interacted with Indigenous languages, African languages, and later waves of immigrants from around the world. But it was not only natural growth shaping American English. A conscious effort by American intellectuals sought to build a linguistic identity separate from Britain’s. Noah Webster, a prominent lexicographer and education reformer, became the era’s most influential advocate, shaping American English through dictionaries and spelling books that gradually supplanted older British usage in American classrooms by the mid-19th century.

Although American English and British English share the same linguistic roots, differences between them are striking to speakers on both sides of the Atlantic. But why did American English become so distinct from its British counterpart? And what drove the intentional development—sometimes called “invention”—of American English as its own system? For Thai readers accustomed to studying “English” as a single international language, understanding this historical divergence sheds light on both practical communication and the dynamics of language evolution.

A UC San Diego study shows that songbirds process expectations in a way that mirrors human speech perception. Published in Nature Neuroscience, the work reveals that peripheral sensory systems integrate expectations into auditory processing to preserve accurate environmental perception. The findings deepen our understanding of how the brain interprets complex sounds under changing conditions.

Humans routinely comprehend speech in noisy, variable environments. Lead author Tim Sainburg notes that listeners understand speech despite differences in voice and pronunciation. This adaptability stems from categorical perception, where the brain sorts diverse sounds into stable categories guided by context and expectations.