words in england that mean something totally different in america!!
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Diet Pepsi rules over diet coke anyday!1
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English belongs to the English so I'll always love them for giving us the most amazing language on this planet.
The majesty of English vocabulary and its unrivaled lyrical qualities make the beauty potential of poetry, literature and song transcendent when expressed in full. There's a reason why English is the most spoken language on the planet. It's truly amazing and has the potential for unparalleled refinement, unlike most other languages.
So I cringe when I hear the Brits, but the English in particular, butchering the English language. Veg, uni, mash, carer, etc. Please, please stop it. You're the true ancestral gatekeepers of your own magnificent language. Protect it and honor it or no one else will.
(Sorry to get all serious about it. Just a peeve of mine.)
English doesn't exclusively belong to the English and the language is constantly evolving and changing, including slang, in England as it is elsewhere. (And slang has been noted in virtually every society throughout history anywhere across the globe that has left written records.) The English can not "preserve" what changes constantly, generation by generation. NO language spoken anywhere is its own original form. Original English (so to speak, as even the word "English" is not its own original word) is unreadable to, I would bet, greater than 98% of the population - you'd have to have specifically studied it; Google to see what I mean.
English does not "belong" to the British; it is today an extreme evolution of an original already changing language that came, more or less, from (today's) Germany and combined with other languages. It has never been stagnant or stationery. Ever. And it has never been spoken "just" in England as its own evolution and changes made their way back and influenced today's German root languages as well.
Just my own pet peeve, as a Language Arts major.
The "preserve dying societies" was a 19th century construct from the German-born father of anthropology, Franz Boaz, and was within a few generations realized to be a fallacy as there is no way to trace an original anything...including language.
By the way, you use a lot of non-original, so to speak, English in your post right down to grammatical structure (for instance, adjective placement) and slang ("butchering" when used in a nonphysical context).
English and s NOT superior, BTW, and does not have more potential for refinement than other languages; in fact, we are LESS specific and, if you will, refined in, for example, not giving genders to our adjectives, not giving different designations to extended family members based on which side of the family they came from, and gosh, many many many !any othernways. I lobe English, it is my jam, but be real.
It does indeed belong to the English. That's why it and they are called English. We have borrowed it along with everyone else who has borrowed it. It's theirs, they initiated and developed it and that's that. The glory belongs to them. And the criticism, where it's warranted.
No, indeed. It did not "belong" to the English from the beginning, as I have pointed out in the exchange of languages from its inception, going back (as we understand it; this is never directly linear nor universal; as I said "original" anything is a fallacy when it comes to anthropology) 1500 years+ but farther back than that in (modern-day) Germany, as well as having been "sent back," so to speak, to other nations during the very transitional early Middle Ages.
And no, the English are not called the English because they speak anything even loosely approximating the original (as far as we can tell) language of the continental European Angles, to wit:
They are called "the English" because of politics and timing, just as Britain isn't called Britain because it's Italian (Britain being a Latin word delivered by the temporarily victorious Romans).
If you want to talk about English "belonging to" the English you need to pre-date the accelerated spread of the language throughout the globe about two centuries ago. Is that the "original" English you wish to preserve? Have you read any of it?
It is not called English because it permanently belongs to the English. Original forms of English as we understand them, in England specifically are virtually unreadable to us, to wit:
If you want to say that belongs to the English, you will be loosely right (very loosely as it was also being spoken in a somewhat modified format in, as I pointed out, parts of Europe).
English "belongs to" the people speaking it. NO language is an island and as I stated, every language evolves...including where it was "originally" (if you will) utilized.
And again. If it should be "preserved," what should it be preserved "to"? How far back? If you don't like "today's" slang in Britain you'll need to do a little etymological digging to see how many centuries back it goes (you'll be surprised).
But since you say it all belongs to the Brits anyway, then you have no cause, by your own "rules," to tell them what they can and can't keep, so the point is moot.
Of course they're called English and the language they DEVELOPED and STRUCTURED is called English because of politics. So? The borders of England were also developed and put in place by politics. Does that mean England, its official language and its native, ancestral population does not exist? Are these facts and identities imaginary and moot? No, not as far as I'm concerned.
And if England is Italian, why isn't it a colony of Italy? Silliness.
Why don't we go back to the Cro-Magnon era to determine the true origins of everything we call real today and dismiss the rest. Or wait, that might involve going back to uni and spending many years and a bundle of cash on a useless anthropology degree to argue semantics endlessly. Instead of talking about real things that matter to real people in keeping with basic common sense.
Have a nice day. And winky poo emoticons to you too.
Wow!
Sorry that logic upsets you. I'll back away now.
As for the rest...that was kind of an odd jumble of things I never actually said (England ISN'T Italian, you didn't understand that? Maybe re-read for clarity?), culminating with, interestingly, your making my point for me with the Cro-Magnon comment, so thank you for that, anyway.
But I can see I have upset you, so apologies and you are free to believe what you wish, as anybody is.
p.s. You're ranting a lot, but you still haven't said what form of English, in which local dialect/style, and which time period/how far back (???) you wish to "preserve". If you did that might help. It might not but you never know...perhaps clarify that? Just "don't say veg anymore" doesn't really help a lot. Thanks for any clarification you can give so we even know what you're talking about.
Oh darling. You're uni educated in language studies. You know I could never answer your sly questions in any meaningful way with my high school diploma. Despite that, I think I'm pretty good at getting my point across and I think I've done that well, despite our disparities in social standing. Ta.
I'm not uni educated in any language. Period. I have taken a total of one semester of college thus far and I have had to begin with the required/general ed courses. My major is Language Arts - I have always loved language - but until at least next year I will not have officially taken a single college-level course in my major. I do read a lot and have focused on language - most specifically but not exclusively English - for as long as I can remember but I am just a few hours "more educated" than you, so that's a wash. I am by no means attacking your education level, that would be impossible, we're about equal there.
Please calm down and maybe just explain yourself better, and we can have a discussion. But if not...please don't blame others for not understanding what you're getting at. You give no particulars, just an admonition for people to do something or other you haven't actually specified. You understand that that's confusing, right?
If you don't know what you want then we can't know what you want. 0 -
animatorswearbras wrote: »HeliumIsNoble wrote: »You can't really borrow languages. They're not library books. More like free shareware apps for communication.
Politically, I feel vehement statements about how other nations are only borrowing English and don't have the right to mod their forced download, so to speak, are unfortunate, given, well, the British Empire, the use of language as a colonisation tool (not just Britain- the French particularly skilled at this as well, actually) and historical efforts made to enforce English usage and eradicate other languages.
Also politically, the UK has four countries/principalities, all of whom use English as a working language, and all of whom have variations thereof. Only one of those nations is called England, and over my dead body do the Scots and Welsh and Northern Irish get told their regional usages are invalid. It'll be enough to trigger #IndyRef2, and my nerves can't stand it. I'm already concerned what recent political events could mean for the peace process...
Edit: Taken to its natural conclusion, who gets the deciding vote of linguistic development- Birmingham, England, York, England, an East End Londoner, or a board from the county of Essex? They will all speak quite differently, but they're all English. Who is "true" English?
York, York is true English. ;P
Anyways ruddy Yanks coming on 'ere telling us we' butchering are own language on't t'internet, dunno tha bloody born dutha?
Seriously though I love the different flavours of English and you wouldn't get half the anecdotes if we were all the same, my favourite was casually asking an American for a "rubber" when I was trying to correct a pencil drawing, they'd never heard a pencil eraser called that before...
Yup! (And I'll take your word for the York thing...you're the expert...)
I love, love, love variations in language. I love playing with language...the world is richer for all the many different ways we express ourselves, even in "our own" language, and yes...it IS ours. Indeed, messing around with language can mean many different things and is at its base a form of self-expression. Conformity and uniformity don't really have a place in any language I've ever heard of, because we're not robots. We're humans, and we change...every single one of us.
Edit: Oh you edited out the right-o, lol
I say right or "reet" (I don't know anyone who says right-o unless they're extremely posh or taking the piss)
there's also "y'reet" - meaning "are you alright" or "hi how are you"
or "y'reet are kid?" - meaning "are you alright, brother/sister/very close friend?" 0 -
blueyandcrazee wrote: »Diet Pepsi rules over diet coke anyday!
Oh HELL to the no.
I feel a new thread coming on... 0 -
So if I was to ask for a doggy bag in a restaurant in america would they know what I meant?1
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animatorswearbras wrote: »animatorswearbras wrote: »HeliumIsNoble wrote: »You can't really borrow languages. They're not library books. More like free shareware apps for communication.
Politically, I feel vehement statements about how other nations are only borrowing English and don't have the right to mod their forced download, so to speak, are unfortunate, given, well, the British Empire, the use of language as a colonisation tool (not just Britain- the French particularly skilled at this as well, actually) and historical efforts made to enforce English usage and eradicate other languages.
Also politically, the UK has four countries/principalities, all of whom use English as a working language, and all of whom have variations thereof. Only one of those nations is called England, and over my dead body do the Scots and Welsh and Northern Irish get told their regional usages are invalid. It'll be enough to trigger #IndyRef2, and my nerves can't stand it. I'm already concerned what recent political events could mean for the peace process...
Edit: Taken to its natural conclusion, who gets the deciding vote of linguistic development- Birmingham, England, York, England, an East End Londoner, or a board from the county of Essex? They will all speak quite differently, but they're all English. Who is "true" English?
York, York is true English. ;P
Anyways ruddy Yanks coming on 'ere telling us we' butchering are own language on't t'internet, dunno tha bloody born dutha?
Seriously though I love the different flavours of English and you wouldn't get half the anecdotes if we were all the same, my favourite was casually asking an American for a "rubber" when I was trying to correct a pencil drawing, they'd never heard a pencil eraser called that before...
Yup! (And I'll take your word for the York thing...you're the expert...)
I love, love, love variations in language. I love playing with language...the world is richer for all the many different ways we express ourselves, even in "our own" language, and yes...it IS ours. Indeed, messing around with language can mean many different things and is at its base a form of self-expression. Conformity and uniformity don't really have a place in any language I've ever heard of, because we're not robots. We're humans, and we change...every single one of us.
Edit: Oh you edited out the right-o, lol
I say right or "reet" (I don't know anyone who says right-o unless they're extremely posh or taking the piss)
there's also "y'reet" - meaning "are you alright" or "hi how are you"
or "y'reet are kid?" - meaning "are you alright, brother/sister/very close friend?"
I did because I thought it just sounded so dumb of me...like a cliche of an American pretending to be a Brit.
I like "reet" and I also love but simultaneously am mystified by "ay-up!" That thing should come with its own pronunciation key.1 -
Oh, I thought that was just because of the hair.
p.s. #jelousofthebling1 -
animatorswearbras wrote: »animatorswearbras wrote: »HeliumIsNoble wrote: »You can't really borrow languages. They're not library books. More like free shareware apps for communication.
Politically, I feel vehement statements about how other nations are only borrowing English and don't have the right to mod their forced download, so to speak, are unfortunate, given, well, the British Empire, the use of language as a colonisation tool (not just Britain- the French particularly skilled at this as well, actually) and historical efforts made to enforce English usage and eradicate other languages.
Also politically, the UK has four countries/principalities, all of whom use English as a working language, and all of whom have variations thereof. Only one of those nations is called England, and over my dead body do the Scots and Welsh and Northern Irish get told their regional usages are invalid. It'll be enough to trigger #IndyRef2, and my nerves can't stand it. I'm already concerned what recent political events could mean for the peace process...
Edit: Taken to its natural conclusion, who gets the deciding vote of linguistic development- Birmingham, England, York, England, an East End Londoner, or a board from the county of Essex? They will all speak quite differently, but they're all English. Who is "true" English?
York, York is true English. ;P
Anyways ruddy Yanks coming on 'ere telling us we' butchering are own language on't t'internet, dunno tha bloody born dutha?
Seriously though I love the different flavours of English and you wouldn't get half the anecdotes if we were all the same, my favourite was casually asking an American for a "rubber" when I was trying to correct a pencil drawing, they'd never heard a pencil eraser called that before...
Yup! (And I'll take your word for the York thing...you're the expert...)
I love, love, love variations in language. I love playing with language...the world is richer for all the many different ways we express ourselves, even in "our own" language, and yes...it IS ours. Indeed, messing around with language can mean many different things and is at its base a form of self-expression. Conformity and uniformity don't really have a place in any language I've ever heard of, because we're not robots. We're humans, and we change...every single one of us.
Edit: Oh you edited out the right-o, lol
I say right or "reet" (I don't know anyone who says right-o unless they're extremely posh or taking the piss)
there's also "y'reet" - meaning "are you alright" or "hi how are you"
or "y'reet are kid?" - meaning "are you alright, brother/sister/very close friend?"
Oh wait wait wait, there's another one! (In a slightly different context.) "Pissed"...doesn't it mean drunk? Here, it means seriously angry.
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animatorswearbras wrote: »HeliumIsNoble wrote: »You can't really borrow languages. They're not library books. More like free shareware apps for communication.
Politically, I feel vehement statements about how other nations are only borrowing English and don't have the right to mod their forced download, so to speak, are unfortunate, given, well, the British Empire, the use of language as a colonisation tool (not just Britain- the French particularly skilled at this as well, actually) and historical efforts made to enforce English usage and eradicate other languages.
Also politically, the UK has four countries/principalities, all of whom use English as a working language, and all of whom have variations thereof. Only one of those nations is called England, and over my dead body do the Scots and Welsh and Northern Irish get told their regional usages are invalid. It'll be enough to trigger #IndyRef2, and my nerves can't stand it. I'm already concerned what recent political events could mean for the peace process...
Edit: Taken to its natural conclusion, who gets the deciding vote of linguistic development- Birmingham, England, York, England, an East End Londoner, or a board from the county of Essex? They will all speak quite differently, but they're all English. Who is "true" English?
York, York is true English. ;P
Anyways ruddy Yanks coming on 'ere telling us we' butchering are own language on't t'internet, dunno tha bloody born dutha?
Seriously though I love the different flavours of English and you wouldn't get half the anecdotes if we were all the same, my favourite was casually asking an American for a "rubber" when I was trying to correct a pencil drawing, they'd never heard a pencil eraser called that before...
Oh, wait...actually... ^ It was a Brit who wagged her finger at Brits not speaking the correct English. (I think...based on "uni.")
We Yanks are guilty of a lot of things but this particular thing isn't one of them. Thank God! We can't ALWAYS look like idiots. It hurts our self-esteem.
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animatorswearbras wrote: »animatorswearbras wrote: »HeliumIsNoble wrote: »You can't really borrow languages. They're not library books. More like free shareware apps for communication.
Politically, I feel vehement statements about how other nations are only borrowing English and don't have the right to mod their forced download, so to speak, are unfortunate, given, well, the British Empire, the use of language as a colonisation tool (not just Britain- the French particularly skilled at this as well, actually) and historical efforts made to enforce English usage and eradicate other languages.
Also politically, the UK has four countries/principalities, all of whom use English as a working language, and all of whom have variations thereof. Only one of those nations is called England, and over my dead body do the Scots and Welsh and Northern Irish get told their regional usages are invalid. It'll be enough to trigger #IndyRef2, and my nerves can't stand it. I'm already concerned what recent political events could mean for the peace process...
Edit: Taken to its natural conclusion, who gets the deciding vote of linguistic development- Birmingham, England, York, England, an East End Londoner, or a board from the county of Essex? They will all speak quite differently, but they're all English. Who is "true" English?
York, York is true English. ;P
Anyways ruddy Yanks coming on 'ere telling us we' butchering are own language on't t'internet, dunno tha bloody born dutha?
Seriously though I love the different flavours of English and you wouldn't get half the anecdotes if we were all the same, my favourite was casually asking an American for a "rubber" when I was trying to correct a pencil drawing, they'd never heard a pencil eraser called that before...
Yup! (And I'll take your word for the York thing...you're the expert...)
I love, love, love variations in language. I love playing with language...the world is richer for all the many different ways we express ourselves, even in "our own" language, and yes...it IS ours. Indeed, messing around with language can mean many different things and is at its base a form of self-expression. Conformity and uniformity don't really have a place in any language I've ever heard of, because we're not robots. We're humans, and we change...every single one of us.
Edit: Oh you edited out the right-o, lol
I say right or "reet" (I don't know anyone who says right-o unless they're extremely posh or taking the piss)
there's also "y'reet" - meaning "are you alright" or "hi how are you"
or "y'reet are kid?" - meaning "are you alright, brother/sister/very close friend?"
I did because I thought it just sounded so dumb of me...like a cliche of an American pretending to be a Brit.
I like "reet" and I also love but simultaneously am mystified by "ay-up!" That thing should come with its own pronunciation key.
Haha I've said "ay-up" before that is EXTREMELY Yorkshire, I sometimes have to catch myself as I'm on the darkside of the Pennines nowadays (where they pronounce tongue wrong and don't batter their sausages in the chippy). 1 -
Yorkshire is a world of its own! Love u tho!2
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blueyandcrazee wrote: »So if I was to ask for a doggy bag in a restaurant in america would they know what I meant?
Yes, more than likely.
We typically say: Let's box this up to go.
Sometimes I ask: Does your restaurant provide carry out?
yes, yes it does.
That's good! ...because I'm stuffed and need someone to carry me out to my car.1 -
Motorsheen wrote: »blueyandcrazee wrote: »So if I was to ask for a doggy bag in a restaurant in america would they know what I meant?
Yes, more than likely.
We typically say: Let's box this up to go.
Sometimes I ask: Does your restaurant provide carry out?
yes, yes it does.
That's good! ...because I'm stuffed and need someone to carry me out to my car.
Oh oh oh!
Takeaway.
We call it fast food...that sort of thing. A takeaway is a message. Takeaway or take-home. "The takeaway to this thread is: there IS no such thing as proper English."0 -
animatorswearbras wrote: »HeliumIsNoble wrote: »You can't really borrow languages. They're not library books. More like free shareware apps for communication.
Politically, I feel vehement statements about how other nations are only borrowing English and don't have the right to mod their forced download, so to speak, are unfortunate, given, well, the British Empire, the use of language as a colonisation tool (not just Britain- the French particularly skilled at this as well, actually) and historical efforts made to enforce English usage and eradicate other languages.
Also politically, the UK has four countries/principalities, all of whom use English as a working language, and all of whom have variations thereof. Only one of those nations is called England, and over my dead body do the Scots and Welsh and Northern Irish get told their regional usages are invalid. It'll be enough to trigger #IndyRef2, and my nerves can't stand it. I'm already concerned what recent political events could mean for the peace process...
Edit: Taken to its natural conclusion, who gets the deciding vote of linguistic development- Birmingham, England, York, England, an East End Londoner, or a board from the county of Essex? They will all speak quite differently, but they're all English. Who is "true" English?
York, York is true English. ;P
Anyways ruddy Yanks coming on 'ere telling us we' butchering are own language on't t'internet, dunno tha bloody born dutha?
Seriously though I love the different flavours of English and you wouldn't get half the anecdotes if we were all the same, my favourite was casually asking an American for a "rubber" when I was trying to correct a pencil drawing, they'd never heard a pencil eraser called that before...
Oh, wait...actually... ^ It was a Brit who wagged her finger at Brits not speaking the correct English. (I think...based on "uni.")
We Yanks are guilty of a lot of things but this particular thing isn't one of them. Thank God! We can't ALWAYS look like idiots. It hurts our self-esteem.
Oh sorry! Bloody Brits being snobbish! Apologies American chums.
(EDIT: although she said "high school diploma" and we don't have those we have GCSE's or o' levels depending on your age, she also said she didn't like us butchering the word uni and then used it herself twice lol)
"Pissed" means drunk more than anything (also see leathered & rat-arsed), "pissed off" means angry (although this could be an adopted Americanism but I have no idea) "taking the piss" means making fun of.
To be fair we get alot of US TV and film so we usually know what you mean and have adopted a fair few things ourselves. I've noticed Americans use Wanker more and douche and *kitten* (rather than *kitten*) gets used more over here.1 -
browneyedgirl749 wrote: »I don't like to discriminate the Pepsi Company by calling everything a coke. It's a soda to me. LOL
Why would you want flavorless carbonated water (Soda) instead of a pop (Carbonated Water with flavoring).
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blueyandcrazee wrote: »A biddy is an old person to us
Here in NC an old biddy is an old woman especially one that is cranky or disagreeable. I have friends from Southern Africa and their English even deviates from UK standard. If you are intelligent and respectful its usually not hard to follow along.
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It's true...one of my friends is from the UK, and I observed him or her on my friends feed...it took me a little time to actually figure out what was being said and what is the emotion behind it....yeah, it's completely true that a different locale can affect a different language.
It's even the same thing in the US. I'm from NC, but my wife is from Philly...they go nuts when I say certain things. I actually think I have more or less "no accent"...but it isn't true. I have an accent.0 -
stanmann571 wrote: »CoffeeAndContour wrote: »Bugger
I think the actual meaning of this is the same on both sides of the pond, it's just that Americans don't usually use it as an expletive.
I can think of another that has an extremely derogatory meaning in the U.S. but is slang in the UK for a cigarette. The original derogatory meaning was probably the same for both and referred to burning a certain segment of society during heretic burning times.
I've never heard an American use bugger, as an expletive or otherwise... unless they had had cross cultural exposure...
It's amusing that the MFP *kitten* filter doesn't pick it up...
my mom used to say it(bugger) and we are american,born and raised. yet her grandparents were born and raised in canada lol1
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