Where Did The "U" Go? Americans, I Need Help!

I am not sure why we drop so many of the U's. I live in the south so the way I say Favorite may be different from the way you say it depending on where you live. I say Faverit. just like that. I know that, Favor is also one of those words favour and favor... I say Fave-r and not Favour (fave-or). I also say Color as Ca-ler (ca as in can)

I have always wondered this myself. I think it is much more proper to spell words such as catalog as "catalogue". It looks better. I think the United States wanted to distance itself from England and this was a way in which to do it. Do you notice also that when you write the number seven here in the United States that we write it as 7 but in Europe it is written as a 7 but with a line through it? It is very interesting that we have all of these differences.... Have a great day and happy myLotting!!!

It is true that American's desire to stand out. Historically they have wanted to be their own nation and wanted to stand separate of England even though much of the culture, history, and such came from England. We also get checks instead of cheques.

I say American English because I have noticed that, too. I guess someone wanted to save time writing! LOL Maybe it is a protest against England! LOL In early US history, it was there, but somewhere along the line, it changed. Interesting. I will have to investigate? Good post!

Well don't quote me but, it probably has a lot to do with good old Thomas Jefferson and the Continental Congress way back in July of 1776. However did you know, that contrary to popular belief, this most wonderful document WAS NOT signed on July the 4th? As it was, Congress had voted for a declaration on July the 2nd, and the actual document was not created until AFTER July the 19th. It wasn't until August 2nd, that most of the Congressional delegates finally signed the document. July the 4th was the day, that the STATEMENT of independence was ADOPTED by Continental Congress, announcing that the 13 American colonies (then at war with Great Britain) be no longer part of the British Empire. Chances are, that the "U's" were written OUT of the English language, THEN, as a gesture to prove to the Empire just how determined the colonies were to secede. That's my guess, anyway? cdrxo

My GUESS is that when we split from England, we rebelled against everything they did including their way of spelling. You know how stubborn we are!!! This latest generation is changing the spelling of the accepted preferred spelling of over half our words so it' only going to get worse!!!

I thnk people now is so lazy to write or type those long words, that will be the reason Y they keep short sentance or short word.

Although my mother tongue is Spanish, I went to a British school in Peru and then later to university in Australia, so I also miss the "U's" and insist on using them!

Our spelling is based on Webster or whoever wrote the first American dictionary. We spell according to complied dictionaries. IF u had been left in, we would still be doing it. Just as well not to do it, we probably save on lots of ink every year and we don't hit the vowel there very hard when we speak anyway.

I wasn't aware that every other English speaking country used the u's but I knew Great Britain did. I'm American and I have to go back and respell things like catalogue and colour, etc. when I'm using spell checker. I don't know why I learned to spell this way, maybe dropping the u's is just a recent thing (I'm pretty old). The other day I wrote favourite and couldn't figure out why it was marked misspelled. I also have to think very hard about jewelry. I've always spelled it jewelery. I think it should have two l's if you add the third e, but I'm not sure.

This is very interesting, I always wondered about that as well. I've always been a decent speller, but I find myself making "mistakes" lately, because I see so many people spelling things the "other" way. lol I don't even think twice anymore when I see British spelling. (I call it that even though, as you said, it seems to be used everywhere else, even Canada, I believe). Maybe with the popularity of the internet, and the way we now communicate with people all over the world, American spelling will eventually disappear. To me, though, the American way is easier as it is spelled more phonetically. For example, you do not hear the "u" in "favourite" or "colour". And "theater" is pronounced "theater", even if you spell it "theatre". Hmm maybe it was just a matter of laziness, or trying to make it easier to spell.

Press 1 to hear this in English. Press 2 to hear this in Hispanola Press 3 to learn English, since you are NOW living in this country! Although the reasons why British spelling keeps the u in certain words, such as colour, flavour and honour, may not be very definite, it may speak to a sense of tradition and a hesitation to make sweeping changes to the accepted spelling rules. While many Brits may blame Americans for hijacking and ruining the language, in reality, English had undergone numerous changes over the centuries, dictated by different influences. The division that had begun to take place between American spelling, which favored -or endings, and British spelling, which used -our endings, was first apparent with the publication of Noah Webster’s An American Dictionary of the English Language, published in 1828. Samuel Johnson, who published the Dictionary of the English Language in 1755, was a spelling purist. His dictionary was and is considered the accepted authority on British spelling. He felt that his purpose wasn’t to advocate spelling reform, but only to document accepted British spelling. He even went as far to say that the “evolution” of spelling was a corruption of the language, particularly with “American” English. Webster, on the other hand, didn’t hesitate to advocate for spelling reform, and included “Americanized” spellings with -or endings. Webster believed that spelling could be simplified and still remain correct.

We have done alot of that as we are a mutt nation. We are not just english. WE are of many. negro is spanish for black and things like that. So we have many coumtries within one. French, Russian,German, and way way more. So that is one of the reason's plus the first people here from a boat were not to learned. Have a nice day.

I have a theory that the Americans are hoarding the world's 'U' supply as part of a nefarious world-domination scheme. While the rest of us frivilously use our Us in colour, favourite, and flavour..the Americans intend to corner the U market and then unleash their mayhem on the world economy. Maybe the U supply has reached capacity, or a majour hurricane will impact the supply of future Us, you never know what inside info the Government has You may think i'm crazy, but know this...if there ever is a worldwide U shortage, you know who i'm blaming? The Nited States! ;)

Oh, why can't the English learn to set A good example to people whose English is painful to your ears? The Scotch and the Irish leave you close to tears. There even are places where English completely disappears. In America, they haven't used it for years! You see, Alan Jay Lerner was obviously also concerned about American English, and that's why he made Henry Higgins to say so in "My Fair Lady"... don't know how it was in Shaw's "Pygmalion", and can't check it at the moment. Yes, I noticed the missing U-s, and English isn't my native language. I don't know why Americans are dropping them but I guess they want to make the words shorter. In fact, it's natural, and it happens to every alive language, sooner or later. FE, "aasta" in my native language means "year". 2000 years ago there wasn't such a word... according some researches on historical linguistics the old Estonians had the word "ajastaega" instead (means literally "from time to time" in our present language but isn't used)! That's what I call shortening Well, the u-s didn't disappear in 2000 years but in much shorter time, and only in one part of English-speaking world, so to say. It's interesting, actually. Do you know, when exactly it happened? When the forms with dropped u-s were first time accepted by dictionaries?

Oh how refreshing, I'm not the only one who has noticed this. The whole english language is screwed up if you ask me. I do fairly well with spelling but it's no wonder so many people have spelling issues. The word phone for example you don't say the ph, would it not make more sense to say fone? Maybe that would be to eazy or easy LOL.

Our language standardized without the "French" spelling that included those "u's." To give an example. I have some old books from the early 1900's that spell the word "clue" "klew." So, even as late as then we were still working on standardizing the writen form of American English.

Webster's Dictionary. In the 19th century American English spelling was standardized and a lot of things were changed. From Wikipedia: Noah Webster, the author of immensely popular readers and spelling books for schools, published his first dictionary, A Compendious Dictionary of the English Language, in 1806. In it, he introduced features that would be a hallmark of future editions such as American spellings (center rather than centre, honor rather than honour, program rather than programme, etc.) and including technical terms from the arts and sciences rather than confining his dictionary to literary words. He spent the next two decades working to expand his dictionary.

I dont know why this is. But English is not the only language that differs from country to country. Spanish is the same way. People in Spain speak a very different Spanish than those in Mexico, but it is still Spanish. America is famous for our slang and laziness. It's like our trademark. I guess some lazy american person sometime somewhere just decided that it takes too much time to put in that little "U". But with or without the "U"s we still understand what the word is and that's all that really matters.

I always wondered about that too. It makes sense though because Americans want to do things differently from the rest of the world, so why not spell words differently too? It probably started as a rebellious act against Great Britain. It would make perfect sense.