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Learnt Vs. Learned | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| Gareth Groupie United States Joined 5250 days ago 51 posts - 67 votes  Speaks: English* Studies: Cherokee, French | Message 1 of 17 29 March 2011 at 5:19am | IP Logged | |||||
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"Learnt" or "Learned"
Which do you use? When speaking I use "Learned" as it feels odd for me to devoice nasals. When writing I use "Learnt" as I was taught this was standard. Edited by Gareth on 29 March 2011 at 5:19am 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| seldnar Senior Member United States Joined 6924 days ago 189 posts - 287 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Mandarin, French, Greek | Message 2 of 17 29 March 2011 at 5:30am | IP Logged | |||||
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I always used the "d" sound.
Here's an explanation of final sounds in the English past tense. http://www.elearnenglishlanguage.com/esl/grammar/simplepast- pronunciation.html Edit: ignore the space in the URL, cannot remove for some reason. Edited by seldnar on 29 March 2011 at 5:31am 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| mayfair Diglot Senior Member Australia theasiaanalyst.wordp Joined 5211 days ago 48 posts - 74 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: French, Korean, Mandarin | Message 3 of 17 29 March 2011 at 7:08am | IP Logged | |||||
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I was always under the impression that "learned" was American English and "learnt" British English.
Being an Australian, I use the latter almost exclusively, but I have a sneaking suspicion that a "learned" creeps into my speech every now and then. For other similar verbs, though, I only use the British spelling. For instance, I would never say "leaned" instead of "leant". Incidentally, this forum's spellchecker marks both "learnt" and "leant" as misspelt. *shakes his stubborn British English fist* 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| horshod Pentaglot Groupie India Joined 5562 days ago 74 posts - 107 votes Speaks: Hindi, Marathi*, Bengali, Gujarati, English Studies: German, Spanish, Turkish | Message 4 of 17 29 March 2011 at 7:59am | IP Logged | |||||
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I have always thought "learned" is past and "learnt" is the participle:
I learned. I had learnt. (And the spell checker did not mark learnt as misspelt... It did mark "misspelt" as misspelt though :D) 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Cainntear Pentaglot Senior Member Scotland linguafrankly.blogsp Joined 5803 days ago 4399 posts - 7687 votes Speaks: Lowland Scots, English*, French, Spanish, Scottish Gaelic Studies: Catalan, Italian, German, Irish, Welsh | Message 5 of 17 29 March 2011 at 11:31am | IP Logged | |||||
"Leant"? That's a new one on me. We would say "lent" round here -- "he lent it against the wall" and such like.
I don't think the forum has a spell-checker. Check the language settings in your browser.... 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| FrostBlast Diglot Senior Member Canada Joined 4891 days ago 168 posts - 254 votes Speaks: French*, English Studies: Spanish, Russian, Swedish, Icelandic | Message 6 of 17 29 March 2011 at 1:50pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I've always been taught that both forms were correct.
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| hjordis Senior Member United States snapshotsoftheworld. Joined 4978 days ago 209 posts - 264 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French, German, Spanish, Japanese | Message 7 of 17 29 March 2011 at 6:31pm | IP Logged | |||||
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I'm not sure which one I use more. They seem equally okay to me. For the record, my firefox spellchecker doesn't like "learnt" either.
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| Teango Triglot Winner TAC 2010 & 2012 Senior Member United States teango.wordpress.comRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5348 days ago 2210 posts - 3734 votes Speaks: English*, German, Russian Studies: Hawaiian, French, Toki Pona | Message 8 of 17 29 March 2011 at 7:18pm | IP Logged | |||||
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This one pops up every now and again, and the answer is inevitably that both usages are right, depending on how you view the evolution of the English language and what side of the Atlantic you're on.
Another factor is ensuring that the phrase simply "sounds right" in terms of rhythm, rhyme and balance, or perhaps fits in best within a particular peer group or community, and then sticking to this consistently in future. As a general rule of thumb, I tend to be old-fashioned and place a "have" before "learned" (i.e. I have learned, I've learned), or otherwise revert to "learnt". However, I can see this gradually changing in Britain every day. 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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