BS: Language -American/English

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: meself
Date: 03 Nov 09 - 10:32 PM

Back to university and hospital ....

In Canada, it is usual to "go to university" - if someone says, "I'm going to university [or college] in the fall", this could mean any university (or college), possibly one yet to be ascertained. If you are sick, however, you may have to "go to the hospital", which usually does not mean a specific hospital; it could be any hospital.

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Alice
Date: 02 Nov 09 - 08:43 PM

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 12 May 07 - 10:24 AM

Doesn't matter much... 100 is 100 in any language!

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Rusty Dobro
Date: 11 May 07 - 02:21 PM

Going back to generic terms, until fairly recently American record sleeves (all right, perhaps it wasn't that recently!) used the term 'Fender bass' to describe any kind of bass guitar, be it a Gibson, Ricky or even a Fender. Just because they got there first, i suppose.

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 11 May 07 - 01:44 PM

When I was in the US Army, 1953-54-55, the silly, harassing requirements imposed from above were "happy horseshit". "Bullshit" was, as referred to above, either an utterance with intent to deceive or general careless shooting the breeze, probably with a degree of self-glorification.

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Marje
Date: 11 May 07 - 06:51 AM

Re going to the loo: my parents were a bit shocked (this was in Ireland in the 1960s but could have been anywhere)when a male friend said he was "going to shake hands with a friend of the wife's".

Marje

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 10 May 07 - 05:04 PM

Evolution of a phrase:
A few bricks short of a load = conceived in the shallow end of the gene pool (Lawrence Block?).

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: GUEST, Topsie
Date: 10 May 07 - 06:23 AM

I used to be puzzled when my father said he was 'going to see a man about a dog'.

I was brought up to use the term 'lavatory', which, of course, means a place for washing.

As for 'ballocks' - I only guessed the meaning from the context, without which I pronounced it like 'ballast', 'ballet' and 'ballad', and I would have had no idea what you were talking about.

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Marje
Date: 10 May 07 - 05:56 AM

"Going to the bathroom" is (or certainly used to be) standard usage on Scotland, so it doesn't strike me as odd that it is used in the US as well.

Marje

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 09 May 07 - 11:31 PM

The use of bullshit in the British Army (Walrus) led me to look in my references to see if they had anything interesting in their quotations.
The earliest in Lighter* actually refers to shit, and comes from the West:
1866, in W. H. Jackson "Diaries" 51: It would amuse ...and amaze an Eastern person to hear our first cry when we corrall. It is for fuel and thus spoken- "Bull sh-t, Bull sh-t" in stentorian tones. Since leaving Fort Kearney...we have not been able to secure wood for cooking purposes. The universal substitute...in dry weather is the manure of the oxen...which ignites and burns readily."

1914, Ezra Pound used bullshit in the sense of nonsense.

Reverting to the English military usage, T. E. Lawrence in "The Mint," 1922:" "Wash out all that blarsted bull-shit you've been taught."
Several writers used the term in the 1910-1920 period, including T. S. Eliot, e. e. cummings, Wyndham Lewis (1915).

I would guess that bullshit is 19th c. in both England and America. One of those words that come naturally to mind.

"Going to the bathroom" ="going to commune with nature."

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: GUEST,Scoville at Dad's
Date: 09 May 07 - 10:11 PM

I wonder how "going to the bathroom" came to be the standard American euphemism for�well, you know. Surely our ancestors didn't say "go to the bathroom" back before indoor plumbing became the norm. So what did they say? "Go to the outhouse," I suppose. Does anyone know for sure?

I suspect they simply didn't mention it, at least not in anything resembling polite company. I'm sure they had their own sets of vulgar terms, as we do, that didn't directly refer to the plumbing or lack thereof (like our "powder my nose").

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Mrrzy
Date: 09 May 07 - 09:31 PM

I just remembered going out once in London with an English friend who parked a little too close to the corner. I said, you better watch out, you might get nicked! He then complimented me on my command of British rather than American English... and I had to explain that I hadn't meant he might get caught and ticketed, I thought some other driver might ding his car!

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: The Walrus
Date: 09 May 07 - 09:09 PM

"...The British military have been using 'Bullshit' as a derogatory term for the preparation of uniforms and equipment for parades (often seen as pointless by the participants) for decades...."

this should have read along the lines:

The British military have been using 'Bullshit' as a derogatory term for the preparation of uniforms and equipment for parades (often seen as pointless by the participants) for decades. This 'pointlessness' could be a possible origin for the British use of "bullshit" as 'imposed nonsense' (as opposed to just gobbledegook).

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: The Walrus
Date: 09 May 07 - 09:04 PM

"...I think there are more Brits who understand "bullshit" than Americans who understand "ballocks," and this is probably true about all slang, owing to the fact that Brits see a lot more American-made TV and movies than vice versa.

Is "ballocks" losing ground to "bullshit" in Britain?..."

I would tend to agree with GUEST of 9/V/07 that, in this case "ballocks" is nonesence whilst "bullshit" is deliberate nonsense or an attempt to deceive, however I cannot agree with Jim Dixon (above) in his idea that 'bullshit' is an Americanism popularised by the media.
The British military have been using 'Bullshit' as a derogatory term for the preparation of uniforms and equipment for parades (often seen as pointless by the participants) for decades.
'Bullshit' was sometimes bowdlerised to "Bullshine" but more often abbrieviated to "Bull"
The attitude became applied also to the action and so one would "Bull" boots etc.

My late Father once mentioned a snatch of song from his days as a conscript (early WW2*) with the lines:

"How Green is my Blanco
"How square is my kit,
"That's how we win wars
"With all this bullshit..."


As to the spelling of ballocks/bollocks, I believe either is acceptible, although I favour the former, given its links to balls (testicles) and that there was a dagger hilt design in the medieval period known as the 'ballock dagger' (try looking at: http://www.myarmoury.com/review_ve_ballock.html )


With reference to Azizi's comments about 'bloody', I'm afraid my theory is that Americans simply have no real idea how to swear in English - this could be that, due to the multi-national nature of the origins of the population, they import terms from other languages to do duty for curses, so that they have little or no graduation of swearing in English.
In America, (from limited experience), swearing seems to go from darn to damned to F--k,
In British (and, I suspect other Commonwealth) English there are a number of graduations in between.

It's a little to late at night (2 am) to go into it at the moment.


Walrus


* A pweriod when "Bullshit" would never have been allowed within a mile of appearing on screen, stage or radio**
** There had been some controversery when Shaw had used "Not bloody likely" in 'Pygmalion'.

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 09 May 07 - 08:19 PM

BATHROOMS, etc.

I wonder how "going to the bathroom" came to be the standard American euphemism for—well, you know. Surely our ancestors didn't say "go to the bathroom" back before indoor plumbing became the norm. So what did they say? "Go to the outhouse," I suppose. Does anyone know for sure?

IN THE HOSPITAL, etc.

I've got to hand it to the Brits for being more consistent than Americans on this point. Americans do say: "in prison," "in jail," "in court," "in school," "in college," "in kindergarten," "in class," "in day care," "in church,"—Quakers even say "in meeting"— but it's always "in the hospital." None of those other institutions requires "the." Why should hospital? It doesn't make any sense.

Consequently, I recommend that, for the sake of consistency, Americans adopt the British practice of saying "in hospital" forthwith!

COLLEGE vs. UNIVERSITY

If I say, "My son is a college student," it tells you nothing about whether the particular institution he attends is called a college or university. It would sound pretentious to say "My son is a university student"—as if you were trying to claim some special status for him because he attends a university rather than a college. Why else would you bother to use a 5-syllable word rather than a 2-syllable one?

Unless you're referring to a particular institution, "college" is usually taken to be a generic term that includes "university" e.g. "college textbook," "college courses," "college teacher," "college math" (or "college-level math").

The only reason to use the term "university" is when you are referring to a particular institution of higher learning that happens to be called a university, not a college. That's why you might say, "I went to the university in 1977" (presuming that your hearer knows which university you are talking about) or "I went to college in 1977" (where the identity of the particular institution is unimportant).

There is no need for Americans to adopt the usage "in university" because we would say "in college" instead anyway!

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: GUEST,Scoville
Date: 09 May 07 - 05:14 PM

In the U.S. "tights" are the opaque, thicker form of leg-covering that runs all the way to the waist. "Pantyhose" are the sheer ones. Tights are more often, but not exclusively, worn by little girls and often come in bright colors. So, both terms are common but imply slightly different articles of clothing.

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Marje
Date: 09 May 07 - 10:21 AM

Brand names: in the UK we don't use Xerox as a verb, we'd probably say, "I'll photocopy this" or ".. make a copy of this". We do have Kleenex but we don't generally use it as a generic term, we say "tissues". Band-aids are not the most common brand of plaster dressing, it's Elastoplast, so if we don't just say "a plaster" we might say "some Elastoplast". "Sellotape" is one brand name we use a lot, for transparent sticky tape; I understand that Australians call this "durex" but believe me, you don't want to try that usage in the UK.

Knickers are indeed still worn in the UK, but they're also called pants - and that doesn't mean trousers, it means what USians call "panties". They're often marketed as "briefs" but that's not normal spoken usage. "Tights" are what we call US "pantyhose" (I think).

I hope this has all helped avoid embarrassing international misunderstandings.

Marje

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Snuffy
Date: 09 May 07 - 09:38 AM

In Britain the use of "Isn't it" on the end of a sentence, regardless of person or number or tense, would probably be regarded as a Welsh usage.

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Mrrzy
Date: 09 May 07 - 09:20 AM

Also, I have been reduced to using Bloody a lot since I've banned god, damn, heaven and hell from my swearing. You have Bloody or you have (&^$(&$0^%#.

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: GUEST
Date: 09 May 07 - 09:19 AM

I would say that you are talking ballocks if what you say is nonsense, possibly because you are misinformed, possibly because you are prejudiced.
Bullshit, on the other hand, is a deliberate attempt to mislead people, either to make yourself seem superior, or to put a "spin" on a political situation.
so, where did "spin" come from?

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Mrrzy
Date: 09 May 07 - 09:18 AM

OOh, yeah, nothing sexier than a brogue... and no, I am not a shoe fetishist!

Q - I agree it doesn't make grammatical sense. Nonetheless, I do hear that around these here parts.

Also: store-boughten, as in, did you make that cake or is it store-boughten?

Also mixtures of coulda shoulda wouldas that don't occur in nature (well, in grammatical English), as in She might could do it, or he shouldn'ta oughta done that.

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Donuel
Date: 09 May 07 - 08:45 AM

I prefer irish and british accents

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 09 May 07 - 08:36 AM

By the way, I did run my spell-checker before posting the message with "ballocks." It flagged it as an error, but it didn't suggest "bollocks" as an alternative. (It also flags "bollocks.") It does suggest "bollix" and "bullocks," among other things. This happens regardless of whether I set my language to American or British.

Maybe this is corrected in later versions of Word.

And the misspelling "ballocks" doesn't imply (to me, anyway) a different pronunciation from "bollocks." Isn't the vowel pronounced the same as in "balls" anyway?

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Azizi
Date: 09 May 07 - 08:14 AM

Speaking of words that seem to signal nationality, what about the word "bloody" when used as a down putting adjective?

For example, there's the title of this Mudcat thread:

thread.cfm?threadid=101433&messages=36 "BS: Bloody Freecycle!"

I never knew the word "bloody" was used this way until I read Mudcat threads from Britons, Canadians, and {I think} Australians.

With regard to the above mentioned thread title-I wasn't sure what a "freecycle" was until reading MBSLynne's initial comment.
Before I read that post, I thought a free cycle was a bicycle that someone was giving away for free. And I thought a "bloody freecycle" described a bad accident on a bicycle where the scene or the person riding was covered with a lot of blood.

I wonder what word we UnitedStaters use instead of the British word "bloody"? For those who don't curse, maybe it's a word like "darn". But for those who do curse, it's other four letter words {which-since I'm such a good girl-I'll refrain from writing}.

:o)

Also, I wonder if freecyle" is a newly coined words that quickly crossed the ocean from the UK to the USA but maybe I have the directions reversed.

??

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 09 May 07 - 07:41 AM

Sorry--it's a simple misspelling. I guess I was reasoning by analogy with the American word "balls". Bollocks it is.

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: GUEST, Topsie
Date: 09 May 07 - 05:22 AM

I have never heard anyone anywhere use the term "ballocks". Are you being coy, or is this just a result of the American pronunciation of the vowell 'o'?

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Scoville
Date: 08 May 07 - 11:49 PM

But in the South they tend to use Ain't it as a tag on any sentence, as in He went to school, ain't it? or She goes away, ain't it?

I ain't heard that, neither. ;-)


I'm with Q: I've heard a slurred " 'in't he?", as in "didn't he" with the d's smeared, and I've heard "He's IN school, ain't he?" (with matching temporal context), but not with mixed tense.

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Jim Dixon
Date: 08 May 07 - 10:48 PM

I remember having a conversation with my British brother-in-law—I think it was on my first visit to Britain, in 1985—comparing the British term "ballocks" to the American term "bullshit." (My brother-in-law, being married to an American, was better informed about American usage than the average Brit.) I asked him how Brits would react to the term "bullshit." He answered, "They would know what you meant, but they would also know you were American."

That was then; this is now. On a later trip, I read through a copy of Private Eye (one of the most British of publications, nearly unintelligible to an American) and found several instances of the word "bullshit" in articles that made no reference to Americans.

I think there are more Brits who understand "bullshit" than Americans who understand "ballocks," and this is probably true about all slang, owing to the fact that Brits see a lot more American-made TV and movies than vice versa.

Is "ballocks" losing ground to "bullshit" in Britain?

* * *
In Microsoft Word, if you click "Tools", then "Language", then "Set Language" you are then offered these options (among others):

English (Australian)
English (Canadian)
English (Caribbean)
English (Ireland)
English (Jamaica)
English (New Zealand)
English (South Africa)
English (United Kingdom)
English (United States)

This array astonishes me. I am somewhat acquainted with the differences between American English and British English, and I know that switching between these options changes the behavior of your spell-checker. (One way, it flags "behaviour" as an error, and the other way, it flags "behavior," and so on.) But are all these other varieties of English really significantly different? Is Word really smart enough to distinguish accurately between them?

(By the way, I'm using Word 97. I haven't seen any compelling reason to upgrade. Is it different in newer versions?)

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 08 May 07 - 01:13 PM

Mrzzy- I ain't heard 'ain't it' as an add-on in the South in the phrases you mention.

I have heard didn't altered; "she went away, din't she?"
This sort of approaches the English 'innit' but a different root.
Also "It's true, ain't it?" or "That's a big load, ain't it?" but never "He went to school, ain't it?, which doesn't make sense. It would be "He went to school, din't he?"

(In parts of Canada, it would be "He went to school, eh"? But this 'eh' is nowhere near as prevalent as some would suggest; I haven't heard it in Alberta, where I hang my hat at present.

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 07 May 07 - 05:52 PM

My impression is that "ain't it", generally pronounced "innit", is increasingly being used in just that way in demotic English English..

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Mrrzy
Date: 07 May 07 - 01:22 PM

Another oddity of Southern US English is their use of "ain't it" - now, in French, no matter what the verb or tense or person, at the end you can add n'est-ce pas. In English, normally your tag has to agree with your sentence in verb, tense and person, e.g.:
He went to school, didn't he? versus Il est alle a l'ecole, n'est-ce pas?
She goes away, doesn't she? versus Elle part, n'est-ce pas?
and so on.
But in the South they tend to use Ain't it as a tag on any sentence, as in He went to school, ain't it? or She goes away, ain't it?

Do the british have anything like that in any of their dialects? What do the cockney say, for instance?

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Scoville
Date: 07 May 07 - 12:54 PM

Re: "To Home"--could have been of German or English heritage, I would think; do they say it in Canada (which is near Minnesota)? Or maybe I didn't know enough Pennsylvania Dutch [Deutsche] when I was a kid.

Hmmm.

* * * * *

I'm laughing at how occupations can mess up one's vocabulary. I work in an archive. We don't have a lot of Xeroxes but we break things down into photostatic copies, xerographic copies [from which Xerox derives its name], etc., which age and have to be preserved differently.

Wikipedia list of genericized tradenames. I notice that they omitted "heroin", though.

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Mrrzy
Date: 07 May 07 - 10:13 AM

I know about fanny because my Tasmanian brother-in-law about died laughing when I mentioned my fanny pack...

Yes, I'm American - born in the USA but (thankfully) raised overseas, so I see the US as a foreigner. That is, I see the US the way a foreigner would, not as if it were a foreigner. My, language is a lousy means of communication sometimes...

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 07 May 07 - 10:10 AM

Alternately, back in the war years, it was an abbreviation for the Female Auxilliery Nursing Yeomanry.

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 07 May 07 - 10:09 AM

Azizi,
'Fanny' is the female sex organ.

I remember working on security at the Sci-Fi Worldcon in Glasgow and taking in bags before people wandered the Art exhibits. I explained to several people that when we also asked that they 'check' their 'bum bags' it was what they might term 'fanny packs'. I also explained the difference in usage of 'fanny'

CHEERS
Nigel

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Azizi
Date: 07 May 07 - 08:18 AM

Okay, I'll bi...

Umm...I'll ask.

I know what a fanny is in American {USA} English.

But, what's a fanny in UK English?

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: GUEST, Topsie
Date: 07 May 07 - 05:28 AM

And then there's 'fanny' of course - Americans can give quite the wrong impression if they don't realise which bit of the female anatomy that refers to in the UK.

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 06 May 07 - 09:55 PM

Azizi, some (many?) English 'Hoover' a rug. They also have (or did?) have a kind of water heater called a geyser, which I think came from a product name. And Thomas Crapper is memorialized by 'crapper.'
I still say Xerox, but with my computer set-up, I am beginning to say 'scan.' Of course I remember when Kodak was widely used for any personal camera. 'Blueprint' is still used figuratively, but the computer put most draftsmen (draughtsmen?) out of work.
Will 'photograph' continue in use now that 'digitals' are replacing film cameras for much personal and news photography? (I recently found out that "Arizona Highways" and other mags with fine illustrations still request large film negatives for their scenic illustrations; the 35mm and 10+ mp 'digitals' do not produce good enough images for better photographic illustration).

Knickers seems to continue in use in England, although that item of clothing used in golfing and climbing sports in America has largely disappeared. Or are knickers still some peculiar kind of underwear that they have in England? Never did know what they were. Hmmm, what are long johns in England?

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 06 May 07 - 09:42 PM

I'll just mention the tendency (nay, the drive, the compulsion!) to shorten an adjective-noun combination to just the adjective, making the adjective do the job of the whole combination.

Thus, "a transistor radio" is now "a transistor".   "Nylon stockings" became "nylons". I noticed back when I was a magician that what must originally have been "a silk scarf" was universally called "a silk".

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Azizi
Date: 06 May 07 - 08:43 PM

Mrrzy,that was an interesting comment about American Sign Language and American English.

And re: those "x" ending products you listed, maybe someone started a trend and all the others copied off of it.

Maybe it's like because of Watergate, people think that every American scandal has to end in "gate".

Btw, Mrrzy, I take it that you are American {meaning from the USA}?

Do "non-UnitedStaters" use these brand names as a referent for their generic products?

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Mrrzy
Date: 06 May 07 - 07:42 PM

Oh, well, Black Hawk, the one thing I thought I knew...

Kleenex
Kotex
Tampax
Why are all good generics ending in X?

I also ran into an interesting problem in translation between American Sign Language and American English... apparently the deaf (signing) community refers to not-signing deaf people as Hard of Hearing. To the deaf, in other words, "hard of hearing" means "not part of the deaf (signing) community." So once when my sign language was good I saw someone refer to someone else as "very hard of hearing" which I took to mean, oddly enough, very hard of hearing, e.g. practically deaf. Turns out they meant very far from the deaf community, e.g. only slightly hearing-impaired. Oops!

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Azizi
Date: 06 May 07 - 06:36 PM

With all this talk about home & college, no one has mentioned the college "homecoming king and homecoming queen". This couple are selected during a college's {meaning also university's} "homecoming" week.

I suppose that "homecoming" weekend is called that because that's when special activities are held and former students are encouraged to come back "home" to visit that campus.

**

Switching gear, how about words that come from brand names? I find myself still saying "zerox" when I mean that I am going to use the copy machine to reproduce a paper. So what am I "supposed" to say instead? I'm going to copy the paper?

And how about "pampers" for disposable diapers?

And "bandaids" for well, bandaids?

Do folks outside the USA recognize these terms?

And what brand names to you have that have become so familiar that they are used for the item or function itself?

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: MartinRyan
Date: 06 May 07 - 06:31 PM

An earlier contribution (Jeez - I typed it roight dis toime, didn't I!) gave:
Growing up in the England, I was always surprised to find out that certain,to me, everyday words, would be unknown elsewhere in the country. For example, the words "mither/mider" ( meaning to bother or annoy) are common in the north of England but pretty much unknown in the south of the country.

We Irish use "moidered" in the same sense. I've seen attempts to gloss it as Gaelic in origin, but am not convinced.

Regards

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Anniecat
Date: 06 May 07 - 06:29 PM

In 1970ish, I went to New York for 6 months to look after 3 children. I was met at JFK by the mother and youngest daughter aged 4. I spent the whole of the journey to their apartment trying to understand them and thinking "Oh My God, this is just as hard as it had been when I worked with a family in Germany - I don't unerstand a thing".
The parents went off sailing to Antigua after 2 days and would not be in contact so I had to get on with it (is that an expression you have too?). We had fun and games making ourselves understood and they laughed at the usual "Stay on the pavement/sidewalk" etc. I had a problem with them not understanding fortnight/two weeks and twice/two times along with a lot of other expressions which we as au-pairs had to learn in order to be understood.

Of course, when we got home, our Mum's wondered why we kept needing a bath and why we said two times instead of just twice.

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: MartinRyan
Date: 06 May 07 - 06:19 PM

Reading some of the later contirbuitons to this thread (zu hause etc.): in fact, use of prepositions is often a good clue to origins. In spoken (Hiberno-) English in Ireland, you will still occasionally hear expressions like "I've known him with years" - which is, again, a direct translation of the Gaelic for. Needless to say, the same person would never WRITE such an expression.

Regards

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: MartinRyan
Date: 06 May 07 - 06:05 PM

I'm not sure why we seem to EXPECT language to be consistent over thousands of miles, dozens (or tens if you prefer) of cultures and a fistfull of centuries!

That said:
(i) On baths/rooms: I remember spending a summer in London as a student, many years ago (England managed to win the soccer World Cup at the time). Living in "digs" at the time (don't start me on "diggings"!), I announced one night that I was "going to take a bath"! My landlady demanded to know where I was taking it. Apparently the English "had" a bath!

(ii) There was a mention of Irish hospitals earlier in this thread. Irish people often speak of someone as being not just "in the hospital" but"in in the hospital" where Standard English would expect one preposition and no article - "in hospital". The explanation is that it derives from the Gaelic structure "isteach san ospidéal"

Regards

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 06 May 07 - 04:35 PM

Yeah, Uncle DaveO,

I've come across this one, and I think it may be of German origin, as for example Ist Herr Schmidt zu hause?

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 06 May 07 - 10:49 AM

In the US, (e.g. Minnesota and Indiana)I've heard "to home", not as where one is going or will go, but meaning what I'd express by "at home".

As: "Ya got a nice cat there. I got one like it to home." Actually that would sound more like "one like it t' home."

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: GUEST, Topsie
Date: 06 May 07 - 06:23 AM

As with 'momentarily', 'presently' can vary. I grew up thinking it meant 'in a little while' but then found that in Scotland it means 'at presemt', which is more logical.

I am told there is an area of Yorkshire where 'while' is used to mean 'until', which is not a big problem until someone comes to a railway crossing with a warning that that says 'DO NOT CROSS WHILE LIGHTS ARE FLASHING'.

Subject: RE: BS: Language -American/English
From: GUEST,Scoville at Dad's
Date: 05 May 07 - 08:20 PM

I could see someone saying they were "at the sink" if they were working in the kitchen in general and their hands were wet or had food on them, so they didn't want to go handle something else (as in, to open the door, answer the phone, break up a sibling squabble), but I've never heard of the term "sink" being generalized to the counter around it in common usage.


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I've never heard anyone say "to home, but then I've never been to New England (I did live in eastern Pennsylvania as a child, twenty-five years ago, but I don't recall hearing it and apparently my parents never picked it up if they heard it). It's definitely not generalized throughout the United States.