Question about written AE

Is it easy to spot written American English if the writer uses British spelling?
I am studying in the US, but I fear that when I get back to Germany I may get poor grades because I now write in American English. Are there many differences that a German English teacher would notice? In school in Germany I was told that they are totally different.

BTW, I attempted to use only British spelling in this post.

American English is more prestigious, especially if you are a technical student.

Yes, it is quite easy. I see through your British spelling. It's obvious that you are using American English.

This is a joke, right? You attempted to use British spellings in your post? There are absolutely no differences between Standard American English and Standard British English in grammar or spelling in what you wrote. Nobody could possibly tell whether you were American, British, Australian or anything else. They just don't differ very much. It's possible to write paragraphs or even pages in English without giving the reader a clue as to where you are from.

Daniel, it's very rare that you can tell a poster's nationality by what they write unless they use a lot of local slang. Standard English is virtually identical in all English-speaking countries. And there are only a handful of spelling differences -- none of which occurred in your post, as "English" pointed out.

This myth that American and British English differs dramatically crops up from time to time, and Germans largely seem to be the biggest culprits, I've noticed. The reality is that even native speakers are hard pressed to discern each others' origins from the written word, until we chance upon a "colour" where we expected to see "color" or something like that. It's the spoken word that gives us away, as our accents differ quite a bit. However, WHAT we are saying remains the same, even if pronunciation changes quite a bit.

Do Germans differ greatly from Austrians or German-speaking Swiss people on paper? Is that where this assumption about English varieties comes from?

Even though there are only a handful of spelling differences, they're bound to come up over a long enough time period. Moreover, if someone has trouble spelling, their errors give a lot of information about their dialect. If they have trouble distinguishing "where" and "were", or "floor" and "flaw", they're probably not Americans.

<<but I fear that when I get back to Germany I may get poor grades because I now write in American English.>>

That's why you won't get poor grades, but maybe poor marks.
If your teacher has a problem with it, tell them to "Shut the fuck up, asshole". But if they really insist you use British English, then tell them to "Piss off, you bloody bugger".

<< Do Germans differ greatly from Austrians or German-speaking Swiss people on paper? Is that where this assumption about English varieties comes from? >>

Upto 1996, they didn't differ much on paper, because we all used one and the same standard orthography. The Swiss used the ss where all the others used ß, and of course, there are special words in all German dialects. Surely, the pronunciation differs tremendously between the German dialects, but despite that, the written form was very much the same. Then the so-called ''Rechtschreibreform'' was imposed by surprise, and today, nobody really knows how to write correctly. But -- because we are Germans adoring the authorities -- many people feel that they have to use this insane reform spellings, because the children are forced to learn it in school. A few years ago, the daughter of a neighbour told me that they learn the differences between american and english spelling in school. I can't remember that we learned that then. So, to my mind, you're most likely right with your assumption because of today's emphasis in ''correct spelling'' in German schools, even if today's spelling is far from being grammatically and etymologically correct.

<<Even though there are only a handful of spelling differences, they're bound to come up over a long enough time period. Moreover, if someone has trouble spelling, their errors give a lot of information about their dialect. If they have trouble distinguishing "where" and "were", or "floor" and "flaw", they're probably not Americans. >>

A little mystified by "where" and "were" -- surely those have different vowel sounds in all dialects? But it is true that experts have long used spelling errors to discern how a particular variety of English, especially in the past, would have sounded. Rhymes can be used for that purpose as well. (Shakespearian verse, for instance, often fails to rhyme in modern readings because pronunciations have shifted over the intervening centuries.)

The biggest thing that I really notice or pause when reading something written by a Brit or an Australian, or New Zealand is when they write something like:

"Microsoft are one of the biggest software companies"
"The government have decided"

In North American English those forms are simply not correct--and really bother my ears when I hear them or see them written on paper. British spellings don't bother me a bit. We have so many books and magazines from there over here that we are exposed to it a great deal--especially university subjects.

The main spelling differences are, with American on the left and British on the right:

-or / -our, as in rumor/rumour, neighbor/neighbour, harbor/harbour, vapor/vapour, armor/armour, etc (note that there are many more examples of this than the oft-mentioned color/colour!!)

-er/-re as in center/centre, theater/theatre

-se/-ce as in defense/defence, offense/offence

-ize/-ise and -yze/-yse as in realize/realise, analyze/analyse

-og/-ogue as in catalog/catalogue, analog/analogue

-l/-ll as in canceled/cancelled, modeling/modelling, leveler/leveller

as well as a number of isolated words like check/cheque, tire/tyre, draft/draught, gray/grey, plow/plough, mold/mould, sulfur/sulphur, etc.

Differences go beyond spelling too, especially in the colloquial language. This page gives a more comprehensive take: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_and_British_English_differences

Many passages of English will be identical in both versions, others will have a large number of differences, it really depends. I can spot American spelling very easily though. Your teacher probably can too, especially since that is part of his or her job. Be mindful of the language when you are writing for these courses, but on your own time you can just pick whichever version you like better, they are almost the same really, slang notwithstanding.

I always thought that is was ok to mix American and British spelling as long as there is a consistency in the type of mixing. The colors in the glamourous theatre were optimised with greys would look odd, but "the colors of the glamorous theatre were optimized with greys" would be ok. It's more important to be consistent with the type of spelling differences than mixing them.

t"he "gray plough" ok
"the centre of the theater" looks wierd.

In general, publishing houses will maintain spelling standards for that Nation. I remember sifting through articles on American Indian Studies and changing the spelling of Canadian authors. This practice is usual for each of the English speaking nations.

In Germany, some publishing houses pushed the reform.