Page 76 - Practical English Usage 3ed - Michael Swan, Oxford

h Words ending in unstressed -ile (e.g. fertile, reptile, missile, senile) are pronounced with laill in British English; some are pronounced with /II in
j
American English.
fertile AmE /,f3:rtl/ (rhyming with turtle)
BrE /'f3:ta:r1.1 (rhyming with her tile)
Some long words ending in -ary, -ery or -ory are pronounced differently, with one more syllable in American English.
secretary AmE /,sekrateri/ BrE /,sekratri/
Borough and thorough are pronounced differently. ArnE /,bArou, 'BArou/
BrE /,bAra, 'BAra/
k Words borrowed from French are often stressed differently, especially if their pronunciation ends with a vowel sound. The final vowel is usually stressed in American English but not in British English.
pate ArnE /pre'tel/ BrE /,pretel/
ballet ArnE jbre'lel/ BrE j'brelel/
52 and 1 use
.
When we join two or more grammatically similar expressions, we usually put and before the last.
bread and cheese
We drank, talked and danced.
I wrote the letters, Peter addressed them. George bought the stamps and Alice
posted them.
And is sometimes left out in a very literary or poetic style, but this is unusual.
My dreams are full ofdarkness. despair. death.
2 fixed expressions
Some common expressions with and have a fixed order which cannot be changed. The shortest expression often comes first.
bread and butter (NOT btttter flntl bretttl)
hands and knees (NOT knees flntl hflntls)
young and pretty thunder and lightning
black and white cup and saucer knife and fork
Note: and is usually pronounced landI, not /rend/ (see 616).
For and with adjectives. see 16.
For rules about the use of commas, see 476.
For eUipsis after and, in expressions like a knife and (a) {ork, the bread and (the) brltter, see 178. For singular and plural verbs after subjects with and, see 527.5.
For and after try, wait, go, come etc, see 53.
For botlr •.. and, see Ill.
and 52
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