Are Americanisms ruining the English language?

Are Americanisms ruining the English language?

 

It’s clear to see that Americanisms have made a huge impact on the English language over the last few years, it’s made very apparent on popular social media sites such as Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Although these sites have never been acclaimed for their literary skills in terms of grammar, spelling and punctuation I feel that this could be down to the rules of e-communication and ‘text speak’ as opposed to the use of American slang in English language which I feel is a much bigger problem.

I know that the media has a big influence on everything that goes on in my generation’s lives, and their language is clearly no exception. The excessive use of American English that we are shown on our screens every day is having detrimental effect on our historically profound language, teenagers and even older people now are getting so caught up in the ‘norms’ of today’s society that they are losing all essence of their identities as English people.

While scrolling down my twitter feed the other day, as I do several times in one day I began to notice how excessive the use of these Americanisms are, and all from people born and raised in England? Things such as ‘goddamn awful’ and ‘I feel like I’m going to vomit’ are always creeping onto my timeline, now although these Americanisms that have somehow gotten into the English language do grind my gears, they’re not as easily noticed because they’re heard on an everyday basis from things such as TV programmes, celebrities etc. you just forget that they are intruding on a great language and let them pass.

One thing however I have noticed that I cannot tolerate is the use of the proper noun ‘Mom’ as opposed to ‘Mum’ as it was intended to be in the English language. I know the two words mean the exact same thing but that’s the problem? Why change how the English have written the word for years just because of a TV show or whatever other media influence that has corrupted the English language.

According to Webster's New World Dictionary (1991) there are roughly 11,000 words in British English that can trace their heritage to the USA, showing that the invasion began quite a while ago. It’s hard to tell now which words do actually originate from English and differentiate them from those that do not, every day we must hear and read so many of these American English words and not even acknowledge it because it’s so common in today’s society.

Even the BBC have written an article on Americanisms in English language, prompting thousands of the general public to send in examples that they have noticed, several were seen time and time again: "Can I get a...", "gotten" and "A half hour" as well as many more, proving that it’s an issue noticed by many but also something that has gone unnoticed by the majority.

As much as it pains me to say it, there’s nothing anyone could do to prevent this from happening, the media is a much too powerful, influential force to overcome and without the use of many of these Americanisms the English language wouldn’t be what it is today, American English forms much more of our day to day language than we realise and whether that’s a good thing or a bad thing, Who knows?

 

Shannon Cavie.