September usually marks the start of a new season. But what you call that season depends on where you are and whom you ask.

【小题1】 However, cross the Atlantic and you’ll find that people use both “fall” and “autumn” interchangeably (交替地) when referring to this time of year. In the English language, the season has two widely accepted names. 【小题2】

According to Dictionary.com, “fall” isn’t a modern nickname that followed the more traditional “autumn”. The two terms were actually first recorded within a few hundred years of each other.

Before either word appeared in the lexicon (词典), the seasons separating the cold and warm months didn’t have common names. The main thing people did during the pre-winter period was gathering and preserving crops. 【小题3】

Then, in the 1600s, more and more people left rural farmland and moved into cities. Without farming, the term “harvest” became less useful to city residents. 【小题4】 They knew leaves fell from trees during that season. So people called the season “the fall of the leaf”, or “fall” for short. But by the end of the 1600s, autumn, from the French word “autompne” and the Latin “autumnus”, had been introduced in England and overtook “fall” as the standard term for the harvesting season.

At the same time, British colonists were making their first voyages to North America. 【小题5】 Today, using both words to describe the season is a unique American phenomenon.

Do you think the United Kingdom and the United States are alike? Winston Churchill once joked that the people of Britain and the people of America are separated only by their language. Do you think that is true? The British and the Americans both speak English as the official language. However, each uses some different words. We Americans are similar to the British. After all, our country was once owned by the UK, so we have a lot in common. But there are many differences between us.

The UK has a king or queen, and the leader of the government is the Prime Minister. The US has no kings or queens. Our leader is the President.

Both the British and Americans use pounds and ounces, pints, quarts, and gallons. Both use miles, yards, and feet. Our money is different, though. The British use pounds and pence. Americans use dollars and cents.

Driving in a car is very different in the UK. They drive on the left side of the road. We drive on the right. What we call the hood of the car, the British call the “bonnet”. British cars run on “petrol”, which we call gasoline.

In our everyday life, we do many of the same things as the British. But we describe them differently. A young mother here might push a baby in a baby carriage. A British mum pushes a “pram”. The British watch “telly”, while we watch TV. We like to eat French fries, but the British call them “chips”. Millions of Americans drink coffee, but most British prefer tea.

So we are different in many ways. But we stay friendly anyway.

If you’ve been studying English for a while, you’ve probably worked out that there is more than one type of “English”. Everyone knows English is the national language of the UK and the US, but do you know that India has the second largest number of English speakers, followed by Nigeria?

Like most languages, the two main factors (因素) that influence the way people speak English are geographical (where they are in the world) and social (the way their parents, friends and other people they talk to speak). That is why in the UK, people from London speak differently from those who live in Manchester, but there are also lots of different accents within London, which depend on social class.

Australian English and South African English are good examples of how English is different all over the world. These accents sound “funny” to some other speakers of English, because they have been more influenced by other languages and accents. For example, Australian English is strongly influenced by Irish convicts (爱尔兰罪犯) sent by the British to Australia, who also brought their slang with them. Australian English is also influenced by Aboriginal (土著的) English, so we hear words like “Kangaroo” and “Billabong” (a large pool of water in the outback).

So how should a Chinese student choose which accent to use? Well, to an Australian like me, British English sounds more academic and educated than American English. However, American English is cooler — it’s the language of popular culture and blockbuster movies (卖座的电影).

In the end, the choice is yours — just remember to be consistent (一致的，始终如一的).