How Americans preserved British English

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In Doc's dictionary post above 'Ain't' one I didn't know it gone back to 1778 and the; "Our evidence shows British use to be much the same as American" which goes back to the OP. I thought it was strictly a Southern thing perhaps I was wrong. Anymore I see writings and videos from our British Cousins that are using the word 'ain't' So, is it truly American Southern or was it Adopted from the Brits originally particularly from Seaman?
 
When you look at what kind of Folks would leave Civilization and become pioneers . Like in the Southern States it would be Irish , Walshe and others from rual parts of Europe . Their settlements would be cut off from the rest of the Country for long stretches of time . So it seems they took the words They used with Them and it would remain unchanged until roads came their way and more People pushed further West .
By the way Bluegrass and Mountain music came from traditional Irish and English music .
 
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bigpaul said:
America didn't "save" Britain in either wars, that's an American fallacy, certainly not in WW2, America didn't join the war until 1941 after Japan bombed Pearl Harbour by which time The Battle of Britain was all over, American certainly saved Europe with the help of Britain and quite a few other nations and nationalities (well it was a WORLD war).by the way the Russians lost more soldiers than the rest of "the allies" put together.
sorry, i'm a patriotic ENGLISHman and i'm proud of my country despite the rubbish politicians we have these days.
as for language I think it was Winston Churchill that said "2 countries DIVIDED by a common language"!!
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I say tomato, you say tomatoe. I say we saved your bacon, you say you had already saved your bacon. We're still friends after the dust clears. I think the British people as a whole are rugged, disciplined sharp folks. I'd put them up against nearly any other society in the world. We can have our differences (hot tea, driving on the wrong side of the road...) and still share both a hearty meal and a foxhole.

I think "ain't" is a very sophisticated word. If my wife were to ask me if I wanted to go into town, I might reply "I wasn't planning to". The implication is that she can convince me to go. But if she were to ask me if I wanted to go to a baby shower, I would more accurately reply "I ain't going". It makes a definitive statement, "it's a firm no and wild horses couldn't drag me there so no use arguing." There is no other way to say all of that in so few letters. Sophisticated. Elegant. It is only the ignorant who don't grasp all of this. And I ain't gonna take any more lip about this great word!
 
I don't think you can contract am not, aint is an American word, I have never heard an English person use such a term.
 
bigpaul said:
I don't think you can contract am not, aint is an American word, I have never heard an English person use such a term.
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From Wikipedia:
For most of its history, ain't was acceptable across many social and regional contexts. Throughout the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries, ain't and its predecessors were part of normal usage for both educated and uneducated English speakers, and was found in the correspondence and fiction of, among others, Jonathan Swift, Lord Byron, Henry Fielding, and George Eliot. For Victorian English novelists William Makepeace Thackeray and Anthony Trollope, the educated and upper classes in 19th century England could use ain't freely, but in familiar speech only. Ain't continued to be used without restraint by many upper middle class speakers in southern England into the beginning of the 20th century.
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like I said, I personally have never met an English person who used this term in everyday conversation, I think it would be considered "slang" and only used by the uneducated .
 
Word Origin and History for ain't

1706, originally a contraction of am not , and in proper use with that sense until it began to be used as a generic contraction for are not, is not , etc., in early 19c. Cockney dialect of London; popularized by representations of this in Dickens, etc., which led to the word being banished from correct English.

aren't
contraction of

are not
informal , mainly British ( used in interrogative sentences ) am not
 
bigpaul said:
like I said, I personally have never met an English person who used this term in everyday conversation, I think it would be considered "slang" and only used by the uneducated .
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Probably true in Britain, I know it is in some Northern cities and towns here and probably the whole West Coast here.
 
not really, its a TV programme, its FICTION.
and like I keep saying, I have never known an English person who would use this term.
"am not " or even "aint" is not something we would use, more likely to say "I'm not" or "we're not" or just plain Won't.
I really don't think American "English" and British English is the same language anymore, might have been at one time but they don't bear any relation anymore. when I watch an American TV programme I cant understand half of what they say.
 
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DrHenley said:
Many parts of Northern U.S. had more "foreign" influence than the South. Germans, Dutch, Scandinavian, etc. We still retain some English words in the South that Yankees never use. "Reckon" for example.

There was a movement at one time to get Southerners to retain original British spellings like colour, etc. Because the spelling simplification was a "Yankee thing."

Also, there was once a large segment of middle to upper class Southerners who were non-rhotic and swallow their ng's ("Dahlin', what time ah we eatin' dinnuh?"). That is dying out.
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We don't use the word dinner in my family, we use supper, someone asked me if I was coming to dinner once and I didn't know which meal they were talking about. We always use reckon too. It may be more regional. I met someone from New York and he said I sounded "country" what ever that is.
 
I visited Australia once and a "mate" kept asking me at a bar if I wanted acoola. I had to ask three times what? He meant a cooler for my beer. Such as a Styrofoam wrap/holder to keep my brewski cold. A friend was saying that the animal police were ticketing old ladies for feeding the roos biscuits, I said why would anyone want to feed them biscuits? They meant cookies. You can get into some interesting conversations.
 
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