English is a language particularly rich in idioms1, which usually dont obey logical2 and grammatical rules. Without idioms English would lose much of its variety and humor both in speech and writing.
In the old days the written language （novels, poems, plays and the Bible） was the source on which idioms were based. This was the case up until WWII. After the war new mediums3 had appeared in Englishspeaking society, there was a channel for the American way of life and the popular culture of the U.S. TV, movies and nowadays the interactive medium have changed the English language more to the American English direction.
How then does American English differ from British English in the use of idioms? There are no radical differences in actual use. The main differences are in the situations where idiomatic expressions are used. There have been many studies recently on this subject. American English adopts and creates new idioms at a much faster rate compared to British English. Also the idioms of AmE origin4 seem to spread faster and further. After it has first been established in the U.S., an American idiom may soon be found in other variants5 and dialects of English. Nowadays new British idioms seem to stay on the British Isles and are rarely encountered in the U.S. British idioms are in fact more familiar to other Europeans or to the people of the British Commonwealth than to Americans, even though the language is same. The future of idiomatic expressions in the English language seems certain. They are more and more based on American English. This development will continue through new mediums like the Internet and interactive mediums. It is hard to say what this will do to idioms and what kind of new idioms are created. This will be an interesting development to follow, and by no means does it lessen the humor, variety and color of English language.
【生词注释】
1. idiomn. 习语；成语2. logicaladj. 逻辑（上）
的；符合逻辑的
3. mediumn. 媒介物；新闻媒介4. originn. 起点;来源
5. variantn. 导体
1. According to the passage, we can infer that .
A. idioms usually arent created based on logical and grammatical rules
B. idioms mainly come from the written language nowadays
C. British English creates more new idioms than American English
D. British idioms are more important than American idioms
2. Where did idioms come from in ancient times?
A. The written language.
B. New mediums.
C. The spoken language.
D. Speakers creation.
3. When a new idiom is created in America, it will soon .
A. be used all over the world
B. be laughed at by British people
C. be found using in England also
D. be used only in the United States
4. The future of idiomatic expressions in the English language may mainly rely on .
A. American English
B. British English
C. the old idioms
D. languages humor and variety
5. Which one is the best title of the passage?
A. American English and British English
B. American English developed from British English
C. American Idioms will replace British Idioms
D. The Development of English Idioms
During the early years of American settlement, a new form of English was beginning to develop in the islands of the West Indies and the southern part of the mainland, spoken by the incoming black population. The beginning of the seventeenth century saw the emergence1 of the slave trade. Ships from Europe travelled to the West African coast, where they exchanged cheap goods for black slaves. The slaves were shipped in terrible conditions to the Caribbean islands and the American coast, where they were in turn exchanged for such products as sugar and molasses2. The ships then returned to England, completing an “Atlantic triangle” of journeys, and the process began again. Britain and the United States had outlawed the slave trade by 1865, but by that time, nearly 200 years of trading had taken place. By the middle of the nineteenth century, there were over four million black slaves in America.
The policy of the slavetraders was to bring people of different language backgrounds together in the ships, to make it difficult for groups to plan rebellion. The result was the growth of several pidgin3 forms of communication, and in particular a pidgin between the slaves and the sailors, many of whom spoke English. Once arrived in the Caribbean, this pidgin English continued to act as a major means of communication between the black population and the new landowners, and among the blacks themselves. Then, when children came to be born, the pidgin became their mother tongue, thus producing the first black Creole speech in the region. This Creole English rapidly came to be used throughout the cotton plantations4, and in the coastal towns and islands.
【生词注释】
1. emergencen. 浮现; 出现; 显露
2. molassesn. 糖浆
3. pidginn. （在贸易或交往中形成的不同语种的）混杂语言
4. plantationn. 种植园；大农场
1. Which of the following shows the route of slave trade correctly?
A. Europe→West African coast→the Caribbean islands and the American coast→Europe
B. Europe→West African coast→Europe→the Caribbean islands and the American coast
C. West African coast→Europe→the Caribbean islands and the American coast→Europe
D. West African coast→Europe→the Caribbean islands and the American coast→West African coast
2. The underlined word “outlawed” probably means “ ”.
A. finished
B. made something no longer legal
C. blamed
D. thought something wrong
3. It can be inferred that the slaves in the same ship .
A. didnt communicate with each other
B. could understand several languages
C. spoke different languages
D. came from the same place
4. It can be inferred that Creole speech came from .
A. Spanish and English
B. English and an African language
C. a European language and an American language
D. an African language and an American language
No one knows where the phrase “Indian summer” got started. We are sure that the phrase was wellknown by the year 1778, because Crevecoeur, an American writer, described it like this: “A hard frost1 follows the autumn rains. This prepares the ground to receive the shows of winter. But before the snows come, the earth turns warm once again and there are a few days of smoke and mildness called Indian summer.”
