Anglicising and Americanizing

Anglicising and Americanizing Services

Amongst our editorial team we have a number of specialists with extensive experience of rendering UK English into American English and vice versa.

It is important to use the appropriate version of English, particularly when addressing an audience of native US or UK speakers. They can be sensitive to the subtle differences in approach between the two forms. Use text written in the wrong form for your audience and it can make them unreceptive or even hostile to the message you are trying to convey.

Our editors not only change the spelling, but also the vocabulary, phrasing and style, so that the final text has the fully authentic feel of American or UK English, whichever you have selected.

How important is the difference?

The English language was first introduced to the Americas by British colonisation, beginning in the early 17th century. Whilst the Americans were building the economic superpower we know today, the British were establishing a worldwide empire, which became the Commonwealth, an association of 53 nations with English speakers based on British English.

Over the past 400 years, the forms of the language used in the United States, and that used in the UK and the British Isles have diverged in many ways, leading to the dialect forms now commonly referred to as American English and UK, or British, English. Differences between the two include pronunciation, grammar, vocabulary, spelling, punctuation, idioms and the formatting of dates and numbers.

American and UK English are generally mutually intelligible, but there are enough differences to cause occasional misunderstandings or at times embarrassment – for example, some words that are quite innocent in one form may be considered vulgar in the other.

The effects of these differences can be magnified when they impact not only on the understanding of words, but also on the relationship of trust and understanding between people based upon those words. When it comes to building confidence in each other it can often be the case that the United States and United Kingdom are, as George Bernard Shaw said, "two countries divided by a common language".