119-399: Sneakers ( US ) or trainers ( UK ), also known by a wide variety of other names , are shoes primarily designed for sports or other forms of physical exercise but which are also widely used for everyday casual wear . They were popularized by companies such as Converse , Nike and Spalding in the mid 20th century. Like other parts of the global clothing industry, shoe manufacturing
238-698: A cot–caught merger , which is rapidly spreading throughout the whole country. However, the South, Inland North, and a Northeastern coastal corridor passing through Rhode Island, New York City, Philadelphia, and Baltimore typically preserve an older cot–caught distinction. For that Northeastern corridor, the realization of the THOUGHT vowel is particularly marked , as depicted in humorous spellings, like in tawk and cawfee ( talk and coffee ), which intend to represent it being tense and diphthongal : [oə] . A split of TRAP into two separate phonemes , using different
357-520: A pronunciations for example in gap [æ] versus gas [eə] , further defines New York City as well as Philadelphia–Baltimore accents. Most Americans preserve all historical /r/ sounds, using what is known as a rhotic accent . The only traditional r -dropping (or non-rhoticity) in regional U.S. accents variably appears today in eastern New England , New York City , and some of the former plantation South primarily among older speakers (and, relatedly, some African-American Vernacular English across
476-616: A complex phenomenon of "both convergence and divergence": some accents are homogenizing and leveling , while others are diversifying and deviating further away from one another. Having been settled longer than the American West Coast, the East Coast has had more time to develop unique accents, and it currently comprises three or four linguistically significant regions, each of which possesses English varieties both different from each other as well as quite internally diverse: New England ,
595-447: A consonant, such as in pearl , car and fort . Non-rhotic American accents, those that do not pronounce ⟨r⟩ except before a vowel, such as some accents of Eastern New England , New York City , and African-Americans , and a specific few (often older ones) spoken by Southerners , are often quickly noticed by General American listeners and perceived as sounding especially ethnic, regional, or antiquated. Rhoticity
714-430: A croquet-like ground billiards game (balls on the ground, hoop, bats, and peg) being played over a short , garden-sized distance. The image's caption describes the game as "a curious ancient pastime", confirming that croquet games were not new in early-19th-century England. In Samuel Johnson 's 1755 dictionary, his definition of "pall-mall" clearly describes a game with similarities to modern croquet: "A play in which
833-528: A documentary, Just for Kicks , about the sneaker phenomenon and history was released. Contemporary sneakers are largely made from synthetic materials, and the materials and manufacturing process produce, on average, about 14 kg (31 lb) of CO 2 emissions . Some companies are trying to substitute more sustainable materials in their manufacture. About 90% of shoes end up in landfills at end of life. American English American English , sometimes called United States English or U.S. English ,
952-436: A fixed order, and to strike the central peg. Each of these actions scores a point, with the maximum score being 26 points. The first four turns must be taken to play the four balls onto the lawn from one of two "baulk lines" defined as one yard into the lawn on the western half of the south boundary and the eastern half of the north boundary. After this, players elect at the start of each turn which of their two balls to play for
1071-441: A flexible sole, appropriate tread for the function, and ability to absorb impact. As the industry and designs have expanded, the term "athletic shoes" is based more on the design of the bottom of the shoe than the aesthetics of the top of the shoe. Today's designs include sandals, Mary Janes , and even elevated styles suitable for running, dancing, and jumping. The shoes themselves are made of flexible compounds, typically featuring
1190-642: A high arch of iron, which he that can do at the fewest blows, or at the number agreed upon, wins. It is to be observed that there are two of these arches, that is, one at either end of the alley. The game of mall was a fashionable amusement in the reign of Charles the Second, and the walk in Saint James's Park, now called the Mall, received its name from having been appropriated to the purpose of playing at mall, where Charles himself and his courtiers frequently exercised themselves in
1309-586: A merger with the THOUGHT ( caught ) set. Having taken place prior to the unrounding of the cot vowel, it results in lengthening and perhaps raising, merging the more recently separated vowel into the THOUGHT vowel in the following environments: before many instances of /f/ , /θ/ , and particularly /s/ (as in Austria, cloth, cost, loss, off, often, etc.), a few instances before /ŋ/ (as in strong, long, wrong ), and variably by region or speaker in gone , on , and certain other words. Unlike American accents,
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#17328528560811428-636: A nice day , for sure); many are now distinctly old-fashioned (swell, groovy). Some English words now in general use, such as hijacking, disc jockey , boost, bulldoze and jazz , originated as American slang. American English has always shown a marked tendency to use words in different parts of speech and nouns are often used as verbs . Examples of nouns that are now also verbs are interview, advocate, vacuum, lobby, pressure, rear-end, transition, feature, profile, hashtag, head, divorce, loan, estimate, X-ray, spearhead, skyrocket, showcase, bad-mouth, vacation , major, and many others. Compounds coined in
1547-426: A point awarded to the owner of the first ball to pass through the hoop in the correct direction. After a point is awarded, all players move on to contest the next hoop. Balls that are played more than halfway to the next hoop before a point is scored are considered offside, and are moved to penalty areas. Golf croquet is the fastest-growing version of the game, owing largely to its simplicity and competitiveness. There
1666-475: A process of extensive dialect mixture and leveling in which English varieties across the colonies became more homogeneous compared with the varieties in Britain. English thus predominated in the colonies even by the end of the 17th century's first immigration of non-English speakers from Western Europe and Africa. Additionally, firsthand descriptions of a fairly uniform American English (particularly in contrast to
1785-657: A series of other vowel shifts in the same region, known by linguists as the " Inland North ". The Inland North shares with the Eastern New England dialect (including Boston accents ) a backer tongue positioning of the GOOSE /u/ vowel (to [u] ) and the MOUTH /aʊ/ vowel (to [ɑʊ~äʊ] ) in comparison to the rest of the country. Ranging from northern New England across the Great Lakes to Minnesota, another Northern regional marker
1904-447: A single turn. Advanced variants of association croquet give further penalties to dissuade skilled players from running every hoop with a ball on a single break , while handicap versions give weaker players chances to continue play after making an error. The extra turns, called "bisques" are effective in levelling the odds of winning. Golf croquet is played between two individuals or teams, each playing with two balls. The object of
2023-433: A sole made of dense rubber. While the original design was basic, manufacturers have since tailored athletic shoes for their specific purposes. An example of this is the spiked shoe developed for track running. Some of these shoes are made up to unusually large sizes for athletes with large feet. Sneakers intended for running come in a range of shapes suited to different purposes. Generally, they are divided by running style:
2142-514: A survey, completed in 2003, polling English speakers across the United States about their specific everyday word choices, hoping to identify regionalisms. The study found that most Americans prefer the term sub for a long sandwich, soda (but pop in the Great Lakes region and generic coke in the South) for a sweet and bubbly soft drink , you or you guys for the plural of you (but y'all in
2261-459: A traditional look with increased comfort rapidly achieved wide popularity and by 2010 was displacing sales of leather shoes for adults in a parallel with the post-1950 success of sneakers among children. The shift was especially noticeable in combination with business-casual clothing. From 1970 (five models), to 1998 (285 models), to 2012 (3,371), the number of sport shoe models in the U.S. has grown exponentially. Sneakers intended for sports have
2380-453: A variation of American English in these islands. In 2021, about 245 million Americans, aged 5 or above, spoke English at home: a majority of the United States total population of roughly 330 million people. The United States has never had an official language at the federal level, but English is commonly used at the federal level and in states without an official language. 32 of the 50 states, in some cases as part of what has been called
2499-642: Is also associated with the United States, perhaps mostly in the Midwest and the South. American accents that have not undergone the cot–caught merger (the lexical sets LOT and THOUGHT ) have instead retained a LOT – CLOTH split : a 17th-century distinction in which certain words (labeled as the CLOTH lexical set ) separated away from the LOT set. The split, which has now reversed in most British English, simultaneously shifts this relatively recent CLOTH set into
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#17328528560812618-637: Is also home to a creole language known commonly as Hawaiian Pidgin , and some Hawaii residents speak English with a Pidgin-influenced accent. American English also gave rise to some dialects outside the country, for example, Philippine English , beginning during the American occupation of the Philippines and subsequently the Insular Government of the Philippine Islands ; Thomasites first established
2737-506: Is an especially large interest in competitive success among players in Egypt . By comparison with association croquet, golf croquet requires a smaller variety of shots and emphasises strategic skills and accurate shot-making. Games are shorter, balls are more likely to be hit harder, and 'jump' shots are more likely to be witnessed, where a ball is played to deliberately jump off the ground and over another ball. The American-rules version of croquet
2856-526: Is common in most American accents despite being now rare in England because, during the 17th-century British colonization, nearly all dialects of English were rhotic, and most North American English simply remained that way. The preservation of rhoticity in North America was also supported by continuing waves of rhotic-accented Scotch-Irish immigrants, most intensely during the 18th century (and moderately during
2975-704: Is heavily concentrated in Asia with nine in ten shoes produced there. Sneakers have gone by a variety of names, depending on geography and changing over the decades. The broader category inclusive of sneakers is athletic shoes . The term 'athletic shoes' is typically used for shoes utilized for jogging or road running and indoor sports such as basketball , but tends to exclude shoes for sports played on grass such as association football and rugby football , which are generally known in North America as " cleats " and in British English as "boots" or "studs". The word "sneaker"
3094-484: Is no coincidence that the game became popular at the same time as the cylinder lawn mower , since croquet can only be played well on a lawn that is flat and finely-cut. By the late 1870s, however, croquet had been eclipsed by another fashionable game, lawn tennis , and many of the newly created croquet clubs, including the All England Club at Wimbledon, converted some or all of their lawns into tennis courts . There
3213-455: Is often attributed to American Henry Nelson McKinney, who was an advertising agent for N. W. Ayer & Son . In 1917, he used the term because the rubber sole made the shoe's wearer stealthy. The word was already in use at least as early as 1887, when the Boston Journal made reference to "sneakers" as "the name boys give to tennis shoes." The name "sneakers" originally referred to how quiet
3332-420: Is often identified by Americans as a "country" accent, and is defined by the /aɪ/ vowel losing its gliding quality : [aː] , the initiation event for a complicated Southern vowel shift, including a " Southern drawl " that makes short front vowels into distinct-sounding gliding vowels . The fronting of the vowels of GOOSE , GOAT , MOUTH , and STRUT tends to also define Southern accents as well as
3451-466: Is played mainly in Canada and the United States and is the game most recreational players in those countries call simply "croquet". In this version of croquet, there are nine wickets, two stakes, and up to six balls. The course is arranged in a double-diamond pattern, with one stake at each end of the course. Players start at one stake, navigate one side of the double diamond, hit the turning stake, then navigate
3570-597: Is the MacRobertson International Croquet Shield . It is contested every three to four years between Australia, England (formerly Great Britain), the United States, and New Zealand. Other nations compete in Tier 2 and Tier 3 World Team Championships. Teams are promoted and relegated between the lower tiers, but there is no relegation to or promotion from the MacRobertson Shield. The current holders of
3689-642: Is the booklet The Game of Croquet, its Laws and Regulations , which was published in the mid-1860s for the proprietor of Eglinton Castle, the Earl of Eglinton . On the page facing the title page is a picture of Eglinton Castle with a game of "croquet" in full swing. The croquet lawn existed on the northern terrace, between Eglinton Castle and the Lugton Water. The 13th Earl developed a variation on croquet named Captain Moreton's Eglinton Castle croquet, which had small bells on
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3808-501: Is the common language at home, in public, and in government. Croquet Croquet ( UK : / ˈ k r oʊ k eɪ , - k i / or US : / k r oʊ ˈ k eɪ / ) is a sport which involves hitting wooden, plastic, or composite balls with a mallet through hoops (often called "wickets" in the United States ) embedded in a grass playing court. In all forms of croquet, individual players or teams take turns striking
3927-601: Is the dominant version of the game in the United States and is also widely played in Canada . It is governed by the United States Croquet Association . Its genesis is mostly in association croquet, but it differs in a number of important ways that reflect the home-grown traditions of American "backyard" croquet. Official rules were first published in 1894 by the Spalding Athletic Library, as adopted by
4046-635: Is the set of varieties of the English language native to the United States. English is the most widely spoken language in the United States ; the de facto common language used in government, education, and commerce; and an official language in 32 of the 50 U.S. states . Since the late 20th century, American English has become the most influential form of English worldwide. Varieties of American English include many patterns of pronunciation, vocabulary, grammar and particularly spelling that are unified nationwide but distinct from other English dialects around
4165-463: Is the variable fronting of /ɑ/ before /r/ , for example, appearing four times in the stereotypical Boston shibboleth Park the car in Harvard Yard . Several other phenomena serve to distinguish regional U.S. accents. Boston , Pittsburgh , Upper Midwestern , and Western U.S. accents have fully completed a merger of the LOT vowel with the THOUGHT vowel ( /ɑ/ and /ɔ/ , respectively):
4284-593: The British colonies in its recognizable form, croquet is, like pall-mall and trucco , among the later forms of ground billiards , which as a class have been popular in Western Europe back to at least the Late Middle Ages , with roots in classical antiquity , including sometimes the use of arches and pegs along with balls and mallets or other striking sticks (some more akin to modern field hockey sticks). By
4403-476: The English-only movement , have adopted legislation granting official or co-official status to English. Typically only "English" is specified, not a particular variety like American English. (From 1923 to 1969, the state of Illinois recognized its official language as "American", meaning American English.) Puerto Rico is the largest example of a United States territory in which another language – Spanish –
4522-608: The Mid-Atlantic states (including a New York accent as well as a unique Philadelphia–Baltimore accent ), and the South . As of the 20th century, the middle and eastern Great Lakes area , Chicago being the largest city with these speakers, also ushered in certain unique features, including the fronting of the LOT /ɑ/ vowel in the mouth toward [a] and tensing of the TRAP /æ/ vowel wholesale to [eə] . These sound changes have triggered
4641-827: The NPD Group , one in four pairs of running shoes that were sold in the United States in 2016 were bought from an online retailer . As of 2020, brands with global popularity include: Sneakers have been an important part of hip hop (primarily Pumas, Nike, and Adidas) and rock 'n roll (Converse, Vans) cultures since the 1970s. Hip hop artists sign million dollar deals with major brands such as Nike, Adidas, or Puma to promote their shoes. Sneaker collectors, called " sneakerheads ", regard sneakers as fashionable items. Sneaker companies encourage this trend by producing rare sneakers in limited numbers, often at very high retail prices. Artistically-modified sneakers can sell for upwards of $ 1000 at exclusive establishments like Saks Fifth Avenue. In 2005,
4760-544: The Native American languages . Examples of such names are opossum , raccoon , squash , moose (from Algonquian ), wigwam , and moccasin . American English speakers have integrated traditionally non-English terms and expressions into the mainstream cultural lexicon; for instance, en masse , from French ; cookie , from Dutch ; kindergarten from German , and rodeo from Spanish . Landscape features are often loanwords from French or Spanish, and
4879-655: The Norman invasion of Ireland in 1169. By no later than the early 15th century, the game jeu de mail (itself ancestral to pall-mall and perhaps to indoor billiards ) was popular in France, including in the courts of Henry II in the 16th century and Louis XIV of the 17th. At least one version of it, rouët ('wheel'), was a multi-ball lawn game. Records show a game called "crookey", similar to croquet, being played at Castlebellingham in County Louth, Ireland, in 1834, which
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4998-714: The francophile tastes of the 19th century Victorian era Britain (for example they preferred programme for program , manoeuvre for maneuver , cheque for check , etc.). AmE almost always uses -ize in words like realize . BrE prefers -ise , but also uses -ize on occasion (see: Oxford spelling ). There are a few differences in punctuation rules. British English is more tolerant of run-on sentences , called " comma splices " in American English, and American English prefers that periods and commas be placed inside closing quotation marks even in cases in which British rules would place them outside. American English also favors
5117-713: The interwar period , athletic shoes began to be marketed for different sports, and differentiated designs were made available for men. Athletic shoes were used by competing athletes at the Olympics , helping to popularise them among the general public. In 1936, a French brand, Spring Court, marketed the first canvas tennis shoe featuring signature eight ventilation channels on a vulcanised natural rubber sole. Adolf "Adi" Dassler began producing his own sports shoes in his mother's wash kitchen in Herzogenaurach , Bavaria , after his return from World War I , and went on to establish one of
5236-454: The 12th century, a team ball game called la soule or choule , akin to a chaotic version of hockey or football (depending on whether sticks were used), was regularly played in France and southern Britain between villages or parishes; it was attested in Cornwall as early as 1283. In the book Queen of Games: The History of Croquet , Nicky Smith presents two theories of the origin of
5355-759: The 18th century; apartment , shanty in the 19th century; project, condominium , townhouse , mobile home in the 20th century; and parts thereof ( driveway , breezeway, backyard ) . Industry and material innovations from the 19th century onwards provide distinctive new words, phrases, and idioms through railroading (see further at rail terminology ) and transportation terminology, ranging from types of roads ( dirt roads , freeways ) to infrastructure ( parking lot , overpass , rest area ), to automotive terminology often now standard in English internationally. Already existing English words—such as store , shop , lumber —underwent shifts in meaning; others remained in
5474-400: The 1900 Olympic croquet events, France claimed victory in all three competitions. Gaston Aumoitte won the one-ball singles, Chrétien Waydelich won the two-ball singles, and the doubles event was won by the pair of Gaston Aumoitte and Georges Johin, securing all the medals as all 10 participants were French. The oldest document to bear the word croquet with a description of the modern game is
5593-502: The 1990s, shoe companies perfected their fashion and marketing skills. Sports endorsements with famous athletes grew larger, and marketing budgets went through the roof. Sneakers became a fashion statement and were marketed as a definition of identity and personality rather than simply athletic aids. Also during the 1990s, various vendors began producing "walking shoes" for adults using the construction technology of sneakers but visually resembling traditional leather shoes. The combination of
5712-534: The 20th century. The use of English in the United States is a result of British colonization of the Americas . The first wave of English-speaking settlers arrived in North America during the early 17th century, followed by further migrations in the 18th and 19th centuries. During the 17th and 18th centuries, dialects from many different regions of England and the British Isles existed in every American colony, allowing
5831-488: The American game, roqueting a ball out of bounds or running a hoop so that the ball goes out of bounds causes the turn to end, and balls that go out of bounds are replaced only nine inches (23 cm) from the boundary rather than one yard (91 cm) as in association croquet. "Attacking" balls on the boundary line to bring them into play is thus far more challenging. Nine-wicket croquet, sometimes called "backyard croquet",
5950-622: The British form is a back-formation , such as AmE burglarize and BrE burgle (from burglar ). However, while individuals usually use one or the other, both forms will be widely understood and mostly used alongside each other within the two systems. While written American English is largely standardized across the country and spoken American English dialects are highly mutually intelligible, there are still several recognizable regional and ethnic accents and lexical distinctions. The regional sounds of present-day American English are reportedly engaged in
6069-559: The Czech footwear company Botas , whose produce was one of the few foreign brands of sneakers available during the Soviet occupation . These shoes acquired the nickname ' plimsoll ' in the 1870s, derived according to Nicholette Jones' book The Plimsoll Sensation , from the colored horizontal band joining the upper to the sole, which resembled the Plimsoll line on a ship's hull. Alternatively, just like
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#17328528560816188-477: The Earl even launched his own Cassiobury brand croquet set. By 1867, Jaques had printed 65,000 copies of his Laws and Regulations of the game. It quickly spread to other Anglophone countries, including Australia , Canada , New Zealand , South Africa , and the United States . No doubt one of the attractions was that the game could be played by both sexes; this also ensured a certain amount of adverse comment. It
6307-413: The East Coast (perhaps in imitation of 19th-century London speech), even the East Coast has gradually begun to restore rhoticity, due to it becoming nationally prestigious in the 20th century. The pronunciation of ⟨r⟩ is a postalveolar approximant [ ɹ̠ ] or retroflex approximant [ ɻ ] , but a unique "bunched tongue" variant of the approximant r sound
6426-562: The European Golf Croquet championship, and in October, Hanan Rashad of Egypt beat Yasser Fathy (also from Egypt) to win the World over-50s Golf Croquet championship. Croquet was an event at the 1900 Summer Olympics . Roque , an American variation on croquet, was an event at the 1904 Summer Olympics . Croquet is recognized as the first Olympic sport to include female participants. In
6545-565: The Inland North. Rather than one particular accent, General American is best defined as an umbrella covering an American accent that does not incorporate features associated with some particular region, ethnicity, or socioeconomic group. Typical General American features include rhoticity , the father–bother merger , Mary–marry–merry merger , pre-nasal "short a " tensing , and other particular vowel sounds . General American features are embraced most by Americans who are highly educated or in
6664-844: The MacRobertson Shield are England, who won the title in 2023. At the Golf Croquet World Team Championships, eight nations contest the Openshaw Shield. There is promotion and relegation between Tier 1, Tier 2, and Tier 3. The current holders of the Openshaw Shield are New Zealand, who won in 2020. The world's top 10 association croquet players as of October 2023 were Robert Fletcher (Australia), Robert Fulford (England), Paddy Chapman (New Zealand), Jamie Burch (England), Reg Bamford (South Africa), Matthew Essick (USA), Mark Avery (England), Simon Hockey (Australia), Harry Fisher (England), and Jose Riva (Spain). In April 2013, Reg Bamford of South Africa beat Ahmed Nasr of Egypt in
6783-545: The National American Croquet Association. American six-wicket uses the same six-wicket layout as both association croquet and golf croquet, and is also played by two individuals or teams, each owning two balls. Like association croquet, the object of the game is to be the first to pass each of their balls through all six hoops in both directions and to strike the central peg, for a total of 26 points. Unlike association croquet, balls are always played in
6902-582: The Plimsoll line on a ship, if water got above the line of the rubber sole, the wearer would get wet. Plimsolls were widely worn by vacationers and also began to be worn by sportsmen on the tennis and croquet courts for their comfort. Special soles with engraved patterns to increase the surface grip of the shoe were developed, and these were ordered in bulk for the use of the British Army . Athletic shoes were increasingly used for leisure and outdoor activities at
7021-560: The South), sneakers for athletic shoes (but often tennis shoes outside the Northeast), and shopping cart for a cart used for carrying supermarket goods. American English and British English (BrE) often differ at the levels of phonology, phonetics, vocabulary, and, to a much lesser extent, grammar and orthography. The first large American dictionary, An American Dictionary of the English Language , known as Webster's Dictionary ,
7140-528: The U.S. Several verbs ending in -ize are of U.S. origin; for example, fetishize, prioritize, burglarize, accessorize, weatherize , etc.; and so are some back-formations (locate, fine-tune, curate, donate, emote, upholster and enthuse). Among syntactic constructions that arose are outside of, headed for, meet up with, back of, etc. Americanisms formed by alteration of some existing words include notably pesky, phony, rambunctious, buddy, sundae , skeeter, sashay and kitty-corner. Adjectives that arose in
7259-563: The U.S. are for instance foothill , landslide (in all senses), backdrop , teenager , brainstorm , bandwagon , hitchhike , smalltime, and a huge number of others. Other compound words have been founded based on industrialization and the wave of the automobile: five-passenger car, four-door sedan, two-door sedan, and station-wagon (called an estate car in British English). Some are euphemistic ( human resources , affirmative action , correctional facility ). Many compound nouns have
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#17328528560817378-662: The U.S. are, for example, lengthy, bossy, cute and cutesy, punk (in all senses), sticky (of the weather), through (as in "finished"), and many colloquial forms such as peppy or wacky . A number of words and meanings that originated in Middle English or Early Modern English and that have been in everyday use in the United States have since disappeared in most varieties of British English; some of these have cognates in Lowland Scots . Terms such as fall ("autumn"), faucet ("tap"), diaper ("nappy"; itself unused in
7497-530: The U.S. while changing in Britain. Science, urbanization, and democracy have been important factors in bringing about changes in the written and spoken language of the United States. From the world of business and finance came new terms ( merger , downsize , bottom line ), from sports and gambling terminology came, specific jargon aside, common everyday American idioms, including many idioms related to baseball . The names of some American inventions remained largely confined to North America ( elevator [except in
7616-427: The U.S.), candy ("sweets"), skillet , eyeglasses , and obligate are often regarded as Americanisms. Fall for example came to denote the season in 16th century England, a contraction of Middle English expressions like "fall of the leaf" and "fall of the year." Gotten ( past participle of get ) is often considered to be largely an Americanism. Other words and meanings were brought back to Britain from
7735-541: The U.S., especially in the second half of the 20th century; these include hire ("to employ"), I guess (famously criticized by H. W. Fowler ), baggage , hit (a place), and the adverbs overly and presently ("currently"). Some of these, for example, monkey wrench and wastebasket , originated in 19th century Britain. The adjectives mad meaning "angry", smart meaning "intelligent", and sick meaning "ill" are also more frequent in American (and Irish) English than British English. Linguist Bert Vaux created
7854-701: The UK, US, New Zealand, Australia, and Egypt; many other countries also play. Every four years, the top countries play in the World Team Championships in AC (the MacRobertson Shield ) and GC (the Openshaw Shield). The current world rankings show England in top place for AC, followed by Australia in second place, and New Zealand in third place, with the United States in fourth position. The same four countries appear in
7973-531: The United States and the United Kingdom suggest that, while spoken American English deviated away from period British English in many ways, it is conservative in a few other ways, preserving certain features 21st-century British English has since lost. Full rhoticity (or "R-fulness") is typical of American accents, pronouncing the phoneme /r/ (corresponding to the letter ⟨r⟩ ) in all environments, including in syllable-final position or before
8092-596: The West and Midwest, and New York Latino English , spoken in the New York metropolitan area . Additionally, ethnic varieties such as Yeshiva English and " Yinglish " are spoken by some American Orthodox Jews , Cajun Vernacular English by some Cajuns in southern Louisiana , and Pennsylvania Dutch English by some Pennsylvania Dutch people. American Indian Englishes have been documented among diverse Indian tribes. The island state of Hawaii , though primarily English-speaking,
8211-547: The accents spoken in the " Midland ": a vast band of the country that constitutes an intermediate dialect region between the traditional North and South. Western U.S. accents mostly fall under the General American spectrum. Below, ten major American English accents are defined by their particular combinations of certain vowel sounds: In 2010, William Labov noted that Great Lakes, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, and West Coast accents have undergone "vigorous new sound changes" since
8330-505: The aeronautical sense ], gasoline ) as did certain automotive terms ( truck , trunk ). New foreign loanwords came with 19th and early 20th century European immigration to the U.S.; notably, from Yiddish ( chutzpah , schmooze, bupkis, glitch ) and German ( hamburger , wiener ). A large number of English colloquialisms from various periods are American in origin; some have lost their American flavor (from OK and cool to nerd and 24/7 ), while others have not ( have
8449-511: The ball is struck with a mallet through an iron ring". However, there is no evidence that pall-mall involved the croquet stroke, which is the distinguishing characteristic of the modern game. The second theory is that the rules of the modern game of croquet arrived in Ireland during the 1850s, perhaps after being brought there from Brittany , where a similar game was played on the beaches. Regular contact between Ireland and France had continued since
8568-454: The ball remakes that wicket, it cannot be reverted again. • Nosering Rule (an admittedly stupid name, the origin lost to history): Once per game, or sometimes once per half, at the end of one's turn, one may move one's ball exactly one mallet head, except not into or thru any wicket in either direction, and not to be touching either stake. In a team game, one may use a teammate's unused nosering move. • Alzheimer's Rule: Before or after hitting
8687-407: The ball, if that player or anyone else realizes that the player forgot their current wicket, stake, or other mandatory objective, the hit is retaken (if in fact it has been taken), except when croqueting another ball; all players have the obligation to point this out before the hit. • Act of Dog: If a player's ball is relocated by an unleashed dog, it shall be played from the location the dog released
8806-455: The ball. If the ball is released out of bounds, then the ball shall be played from the point (after adjusting for a mallet width from the boundary) it was removed from the field. • Dynamic Starting Order: After lagging to the stake for starting order, the players exercise the option to go or not go in order of closeness; after each player goes, the remaining players re-choose who goes next in the same order. • McKlintock Start, an option to start
8925-500: The balls, scoring points by knocking them through a hoop. The game ends when a player or team reaches a predetermined number of points. Several variations exist that differ in when and how a stroke may be legally played, when points are scored, the layout of the lawn, and the target score. Commonly, social games adopt further non-standard variations to adapt play to the conditions. In all versions, players of all ages and genders compete on equal terms and are ranked together. Two versions of
9044-494: The categorical statement, "One thing only is certain: it is from Ireland that croquet came to England and it was on the lawn of the late Lord Lonsdale that it was first played in this country." John Jaques apparently claimed in a letter to Arthur Lillie in 1873 that he had himself seen the game played in Ireland, writing, "I made the implements and published directions (such as they were) before Mr. Spratt [mentioned above] introduced
9163-406: The country), though the vowel-consonant cluster found in "bird", "work", "hurt", "learn", etc. usually retains its r pronunciation, even in these non-rhotic American accents. Non-rhoticity among such speakers is presumed to have arisen from their upper classes' close historical contact with England, imitating London's r -dropping, a feature that has continued to gain prestige throughout England from
9282-614: The diverse regional dialects of British English) became common after the mid-18th century, while at the same time speakers' identification with this new variety increased. Since the 18th century, American English has developed into some new varieties, including regional dialects that retain minor influences from waves of immigrant speakers of diverse languages, primarily European languages. Some racial and regional variation in American English reflects these groups' geographic settlement, their de jure or de facto segregation, and patterns in their resettlement. This can be seen, for example, in
9401-742: The double quotation mark ("like this") over the single ('as here'). Vocabulary differences vary by region. For example, autumn is used more commonly in the United Kingdom, whereas fall is more common in American English. Some other differences include: aerial (United Kingdom) vs. antenna, biscuit (United Kingdom) vs. cookie/cracker, car park (United Kingdom) vs. parking lot, caravan (United Kingdom) vs. trailer, city centre (United Kingdom) vs. downtown, flat (United Kingdom) vs. apartment, fringe (United Kingdom) vs. bangs, and holiday (United Kingdom) vs. vacation. AmE sometimes favors words that are morphologically more complex, whereas BrE uses clipped forms, such as AmE transportation and BrE transport or where
9520-418: The duration of that turn. During a turn, a player may earn extra shots in two ways. A player earns a single extra shot by scoring a hoop point (hitting the striker's ball through a hoop), or two extra shots by causing their ball to contact another ball-an action called a "roquet". When a roquet is made, the player may pick up their ball and place it in contact with the roqueted ball. The next shot must move both
9639-519: The eight hoops "to ring the changes", two pegs, a double hoop with a bell, and two tunnels for the ball to pass through. In 1865, the 'Rules of the Eglinton Castle and Cassiobury Croquet' was published by Edmund Routledge . Several incomplete sets of this form of croquet are known to exist, and one complete set is still used for demonstration games in the West of Scotland. Croquet is popularly believed to be viciously competitive. That may derive from
9758-467: The fact that (unlike in golf) players will often attempt to move their opponents' balls to unfavourable positions. However, purely negative play is rarely a winning strategy; successful players (in all versions other than golf croquet) will use all four balls to set up a break for themselves, rather than simply making the game as difficult as possible for their opponents. The way croquet is depicted in paintings and books says much about popular perceptions of
9877-745: The final of the Golf Croquet World Championship in Cairo, becoming the first person to simultaneously hold the title in both association croquet and golf croquet. As of 2023, the Golf Croquet World Champion was Matthew Essick (USA), and the Women's Golf Croquet World Champion was Jamie Gumbrell (Australia). In 2018, two international championships open to both sexes were won by women: in May, Rachel Gee of England beat Pierre Beaudry of Belgium to win
9996-467: The first rubber-soled shoes in the country, sparking a surge in demand and production. The first basketball shoes were designed by Spalding as early as 1907. The market for sneakers grew after World War I , when sports and athletics increasingly became a way to demonstrate moral fiber and patriotism . The U.S. market for sneakers grew steadily as young boys lined up to buy Converse All Stars sneakers endorsed by basketball player Chuck Taylor . During
10115-510: The following two centuries) when this ethnic group eventually made up one-seventh of the colonial population. Scotch-Irish settlers spread from Delaware and Pennsylvania throughout the larger Mid-Atlantic region, the inland regions of both the South and North, and throughout the West: American dialect areas that were all uninfluenced by upper-class non-rhoticity and that consequently have remained consistently rhotic. While non-rhoticity spread on
10234-490: The game are directly governed by the World Croquet Federation , which organises individual and team World Championships. Other regional variants which developed in parallel remain common in parts of the world. Association croquet is played between two individuals or teams, each playing with two balls. The object of the game is to be the first to strike each of their balls through all six hoops in both directions, in
10353-411: The game is to reach a certain number of points, typically seven, earned by being the first to run a hoop. The game opens by playing each ball into the lawn from the fourth (south-eastern) corner of the lawn. Balls must be played in order (for the primary ball colours, this is blue, red, black, and yellow), and this order of play is maintained throughout the game. Hoops are contested in a fixed order, with
10472-505: The game: A ball still on start 1-out or 2-out cannot be used to roquet another ball, nor can it be roquet'd without its owner's permission. Nevertheless, such a ball may hit any other ball or be hit by any other ball; however, the hitter's go is over and no deadness is established. As well as club-level games, county-level tournaments, and leagues, there are regular world championships and international matches between croquet-playing countries. The sport has particularly strong followings in
10591-939: The hospital , BrE to hospital ; contrast, however, AmE actress Elizabeth Taylor , BrE the actress Elizabeth Taylor ). Often, these differences are a matter of relative preferences rather than absolute rules; and most are not stable since the two varieties are constantly influencing each other, and American English is not a standardized set of dialects. Differences in orthography are also minor. The main differences are that American English usually uses spellings such as flavor for British flavour , fiber for fibre , defense for defence , analyze for analyse , license for licence , catalog for catalogue and traveling for travelling . Noah Webster popularized such spellings in America, but he did not invent most of them. Rather, "he chose already existing options on such grounds as simplicity, analogy or etymology." Other differences are due to
10710-656: The influence of 18th-century Protestant Ulster Scots immigrants (known in the U.S. as the Scotch-Irish ) in Appalachia developing Appalachian English and the 20th-century Great Migration bringing African-American Vernacular English to the Great Lakes urban centers. Any phonologically unmarked North American accent falls under an umbrella known as General American. This section mostly refers to such General American features. Studies on historical usage of English in both
10829-438: The late 18th century onwards, but which has conversely lost prestige in the U.S. since at least the early 20th century. Non-rhoticity makes a word like car sound like cah or source like sauce . New York City and Southern accents are the most prominent regional accents of the country, as well as the most stigmatized and socially disfavored. Southern speech, strongest in southern Appalachia and certain areas of Texas,
10948-1348: The latter term also used in Hiberno-English . Tennis shoes and kicks are other terms used in Australian and North American English . The British English equivalent of sneaker in its modern form is divided into two separate types: predominantly outdoor and fashionable trainers, training shoes or quality 'basketball shoes' and in contrast cheap rubber-soled, low cut and canvas-topped plimsolls , daps , or flats . In Geordie English , sneakers may also be called sandshoes , gym boots , or joggers . Several terms for sneakers exist in South Africa, including gym shoes , sports shoes and takkies . Other names for sneakers includes rubber shoes in Philippine English , track shoes in Singapore English , canvas shoes in Nigerian English , camboo ("camp boot") in Ghana English, and sportex in Greece. In Latvia any sneakers are still called botas after
11067-529: The leading athletic shoe manufacturers, Adidas . He also successfully marketed his shoes to athletes at the 1936 Summer Olympics , which helped cement his good reputation. Business boomed and the Dasslers were selling 200,000 pairs of shoes each year before World War II. During the 1950s, leisure opportunities greatly expanded, and children and adolescents began to wear sneakers as school dress codes relaxed. Sneaker sales rose so high, they began to adversely affect
11186-550: The majority are for heel-toe joggers/runners which are further subdivided into ' neutral ', ' overpronation ' and ' underpronation '. However, most evidence-based comparisons show no reduction in lower-limb running injuries from prescribing different types of shoe for different foot types. The shoes are constructed with a complex structure of "rubber" with plastic/metal stiffeners to restrict foot movement. More advanced runners tend to wear flatter and flexible shoes , which allow them to run more quickly with greater comfort. According to
11305-427: The mid-nineteenth century onwards, so they "are now more different from each other than they were 50 or 100 years ago", while other accents, like of New York City and Boston, have remained stable in that same time-frame. However, a General American sound system also has some debated degree of influence nationwide, for example, gradually beginning to oust the regional accent in urban areas of the South and at least some in
11424-450: The modern game of croquet, which took England by storm in the 1860s and then spread overseas. The first explanation is that the ancestral game was introduced to Britain from France during the 1660–1685 reign of Charles II of England, Scotland, and Ireland and was played under the name of paille-maille (among other spellings, today usually pall-mall ), derived ultimately from Latin words for 'ball and mallet' (the latter also found in
11543-617: The most formal contexts, and regional accents with the most General American native features include North Midland, Western New England, and Western accents. Although no longer region-specific, African-American Vernacular English , which remains the native variety of most working- and middle-class African Americans , has a close relationship to Southern dialects and has greatly influenced everyday speech of many Americans, including hip hop culture . Hispanic and Latino Americans have also developed native-speaker varieties of English. The best-studied Latino Englishes are Chicano English , spoken in
11662-450: The name of the earlier French game, jeu de mail ). This was the explanation given in the ninth edition of Encyclopædia Britannica , dated 1877. In his 1801 book The Sports and Pastimes of the People of England , Joseph Strutt described the way pall-mall was played in England at the time: "Pale-maille is a game wherein a round box[wood] ball is struck with a mallet through
11781-424: The normal options. A poison ball that hits a stake or passes through any wicket (possibly through the action of a non-poison player) is eliminated. The last person remaining is the winner. The Richmond Virginia Extreme Croquet Club has these rules: • Revert Rule: If a ball traverses its prior wicket in the opposite direction, this now becomes its current wicket; exceptions: (1) a rover cannot be reverted; (2) until
11900-415: The opposite side of the double diamond and hit the starting stake to end. If playing individually ( Cutthroat ), the first player to stake out is the winner. In partnership play, all members of a team must stake out, and a player might choose to avoid staking out (becoming a Rover ) in order to help a lagging teammate. Each time a ball is roqueted, the striker gets two bonus shots. For the first bonus shot,
12019-402: The past forms of a few verbs (for example, AmE/BrE: learned / learnt , burned / burnt , snuck/sneaked , dove/dived ) although the purportedly "British" forms can occasionally be seen in American English writing as well; different prepositions and adverbs in certain contexts (for example, AmE in school, BrE at school ); and whether or not a definite article is used, in very few cases (AmE to
12138-409: The player has four options: The second bonus shot ("continuation shot") is an ordinary shot played from where the striker ball came to rest. An alternative endgame is "poison": in this variant, a player who has scored the last wicket but not hit the starting stake becomes a "poison ball", which may eliminate other balls from the game by roqueting them. A non-poison ball that roquets a poison ball has
12257-403: The player's ball and the roqueted ball, and it is the "croquet" stroke that gives the game its name. After a successful croquet stroke, the player has a single further shot, known as the "continuation". During a turn, each of the other three balls may only be croqueted once between hoop points, but by stringing together a series of roquets, croquets, and scored hoops, several points may be scored in
12376-460: The practice of this pastime." While the name pall-mall and various games bearing this name also appeared elsewhere (France and Italy), the description above suggests that the croquet-like games in particular were popular in England by the early 17th century. Some other early modern sources refer to pall-mall being played over a large distance (as in golf); however, an image in Strutt's 1801 book shows
12495-734: The rubber soles were on the ground, in contrast to noisy standard hard leather sole dress shoes . Someone wearing sneakers could "sneak up", while someone wearing standards could not. Earlier, the name "sneaks" had been used by prison inmates to refer to warders (guards) because of the rubber-soled shoes they wore. The term "sneakers" is most commonly used in Northeastern United States , Central and South Florida , Australia, New Zealand, and parts of Canada. However, in Australian , Canadian , and Scottish English , running shoes and runners are synonymous terms used to refer to sneakers, with
12614-530: The sales of conventional leather shoes, leading to a fierce advertising war for market share in the late '50s. In the 1970s, jogging for exercise became increasingly popular, and trainers designed specifically for comfort while jogging sold well. Companies also started to target some of their products at the casual fashion market. Soon, shoes were available for football, jogging, basketball, running , etc. Many sports had their relevant shoe, made possible by podiatrist development of athletic shoe technology. During
12733-435: The same sequence (blue, red, black, yellow). The limitation of roqueting each ball once between hoop points is, unlike in association croquet, carried over from turn to turn until the ball scores the next hoop. In American six-wicket, this is termed "deadness", and a separate board is required to keep track of the deadness for all four balls. A further difference is the more restrictive boundary-line rules of American croquet. In
12852-695: The set of rules registered by Isaac Spratt in November 1856 with the Stationers' Company of London . This record is now in the Public Record Office . In 1868, the first croquet all-comers meet was held at Moreton-in-Marsh , Gloucestershire , and in the same year, the All England Croquet Club was formed at Wimbledon, London . Regardless of when and by what route it reached the British Isles and
12971-485: The subject to me." Whatever the truth of the matter, Jaques certainly played an important role in popularising the game, producing editions of the rules in 1857, 1860, and 1864. Croquet became highly popular as a social pastime in England during the 1860s. It was enthusiastically adopted and promoted by the Earl of Essex , who held lavish croquet parties at Cassiobury House , his stately home in Watford , Hertfordshire , and
13090-526: The top six of the GC country rankings, below Egypt in top position, and with Spain at number six. Individual World Championships usually take place every two or three years. The 2023 AC World Championships took place in London; the winner was Robert Fulford . The current Women's Association Croquet World Champion (2023) is Debbie Lines of England. The most prestigious international team competition in association croquet
13209-570: The traditional standard accent of (southern) England, Received Pronunciation (RP), has evolved a trap–bath split . Moreover, American accents preserve /h/ at the start of syllables, while perhaps a majority of the regional dialects of England participate in /h/ dropping , particularly in informal contexts. However, General American is also innovative in a number of its own ways: The process of coining new lexical items started as soon as English-speaking British-American colonists began borrowing names for unfamiliar flora, fauna, and topography from
13328-489: The turn of the 20th century - plimsolls were even found with the ill-fated Scott Antarctic expedition of 1911. Plimsolls were commonly worn by pupils in schools' physical education lessons in the UK from the 1950s until the early 1970s. British company J.W. Foster and Sons designed and produced the first shoes designed for running in 1895; the shoes were spiked to allow for greater traction and speed. The company sold its high-quality handmade running shoes to athletes around
13447-417: The verb-and-preposition combination: stopover, lineup, tryout, spin-off, shootout , holdup, hideout, comeback, makeover , and many more. Some prepositional and phrasal verbs are in fact of American origin ( win out, hold up, back up/off/down/out, face up to and many others). Noun endings such as -ee (retiree), -ery (bakery), -ster (gangster) and -cian (beautician) are also particularly productive in
13566-772: The word corn , used in England to refer to wheat (or any cereal), came to denote the maize plant, the most important crop in the U.S. Most Mexican Spanish contributions came after the War of 1812 , with the opening of the West, like ranch (now a common house style ). Due to Mexican culinary influence, many Spanish words are incorporated in general use when talking about certain popular dishes: cilantro (instead of coriander), queso, tacos, quesadillas, enchiladas, tostadas, fajitas, burritos, and guacamole. These words usually lack an English equivalent and are found in popular restaurants. New forms of dwelling created new terms ( lot , waterfront) and types of homes like log cabin , adobe in
13685-425: The world, eventually receiving a contract for the manufacture of running shoes for the British team in the 1924 Summer Olympics. Harold Abrahams and Eric Liddell won the 100 m and 400 m events, kitted out with Foster's running gear. This style of footwear also became prominent in America at the turn of the 20th century, where they were called 'sneakers'. In 1892, the U.S. Rubber Company introduced
13804-609: The world. Any American or Canadian accent perceived as lacking noticeably local, ethnic, or cultural markers is known in linguistics as General American ; it covers a fairly uniform accent continuum native to certain regions of the U.S. but especially associated with broadcast mass media and highly educated speech. However, historical and present linguistic evidence does not support the notion of there being one single mainstream American accent . The sound of American English continues to evolve, with some local accents disappearing, but several larger regional accents having emerged in
13923-551: Was a revival in the 1890s, but going forward croquet was always a minority sport, with national individual participation amounting to a few thousand players. The All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club still has a croquet lawn, but has not hosted any significant tournaments. Its championship was won 38 times by Bernard Neal . The English headquarters for the game is now in Cheltenham . The earliest known reference to croquet in Scotland
14042-494: Was introduced to Galway in 1835 and played on the bishop's palace garden, and in the same year to the genteel Dublin suburb of Kingstown (today Dún Laoghaire ) where it was first spelled as "croquet". There is, however, no pre-1858 Irish document that describes the way the game was played; in particular, there is no reference to the distinctive croquet stroke, which is described above under " Variations: Association ". The noted croquet historian Dr. Prior, in his book of 1872, makes
14161-469: Was written by Noah Webster in 1828, codifying several of these spellings. Differences in grammar are relatively minor, and do not normally affect mutual intelligibility; these include: typically a lack of differentiation between adjectives and adverbs, employing the equivalent adjectives as adverbs he ran quick / he ran quickly ; different use of some auxiliary verbs ; formal (rather than notional) agreement with collective nouns ; different preferences for
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