BS: American English usages taking over Brit

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: GUEST,yokel
Date: 16 Oct 13 - 08:59 PM

Yo is hjardly a respected word in Canada, or anywhere

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: Lighter
Date: 16 Oct 13 - 09:03 PM

> implied a lack of respect.

Because they were heads of state.

If they'd been homies on a B-ball court, no prob!

("Yo, G!" would have been even better.)

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: Gibb Sahib
Date: 17 Oct 13 - 01:07 AM

I just caught myself in another supposed Americanism: "Dang".

Is this heard elsewhere? On the surface, it would seem to be a euphemism for "damn", but people who say it often (e.g. I) have no fear of "damn"...it's just that we like to say "dang."

"Hot dang!" has a silliness to it, but is even uttered ever once in a while!

***

My latest "favorite" greeting is one I heard in Long Beach (California) a couple years ago. LB is a city (unlike many places in the Northeast US, for example) where, rather than passers-by putting their heads down and ignoring each other while quickly scampering along, most people walk more slowly, greet strangers, and make conversation on the street. Just comments like, "Hey man, I like that shirt! Where you get that at?" It's a fun place to be if you're gregarious and not "scared" of strangers.

Anyway, a guy came up to me and said, "What it do, bra-bra?" I felt very old and behind-the-times, as no doubt the expression has been around a while. And like the more popular, "What's good?" I wasn't sure quite how to answer! ("It do good"? "Nothin' much"?)

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 17 Oct 13 - 01:51 AM

Nobody says "Dang" in the UK - that always smacks of American false prudishness, a bit like your daft refusal to describe public toilets (i.e those not in the home) as the toilet or lavatory, and instead call it the 'bathroom' or 'rest room' -even though there's nowhere to take a bath or have a rest!

Very strange, bearing in mind that USA-Ian's seem to pride themselves on their straight-talking, no bullshit manner! :-)

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: Gibb Sahib
Date: 17 Oct 13 - 02:30 AM

Hmm, so is it "false prudishness" or actual prudishness? :)

You missed the part where I said it is *not* being *used* as a euphemism (though I understand why it may sound that way to you)? The true euphemism is "darn"! "Dang" just has a special flavor to it. (Speaking in the present, not historically.) The same person may say (and excuse my prudishness for apologizing for the following language!:) "Dang, that bitch is fuckin' hot!"

I realize the toilet thing was already discussed here, though it was maybe years ago so:

"Bathroom" is used for both home facilities and public ones. I see it as more a case of using the same word for the "same" thing. I agree that it is euphemistic, but so is "toilet", to an extent. Bathrooms in public contain toilets, urinals, and sinks for washing. You might go their to blow your nose, for example. The lack of any "bath" in public leads the change, in official language, to "restroom"!
In Canada (or some parts at least) it's a "washroom."
In North India, it's a "bathroom" (using English loan word)...or sometimes "washroom" (where Canadians have had their influence), and also "toilet!" However, in Hindi-Urdu it is "ghusal-khaana," literally "bathroom" - except in some rustic areas, where (in coarse Punjabi for example) it is "TaTTiaan" = "shitters". I recall once asking, on behalf of a female fellow traveler in Pakistan: "oe, zanaanian diaan tattian kithe hagiaan ne?" - "Yo, where are the ladies' shitters?" It felt kind of silly, given my "sahib" status!
A "public toilet" seems to me to be the *official* term, in Europe, for something that generally does not exist in the USA...it's like the yard vs. garden thing. And "toilet" shortens that.
In short: the reading of the level of cultural prudishness from these terms seem premature to me.

Indeed, since everyone knows what "bathroom" is, and what one does there, it no longer (if it ever did) functions as much of a euphemism - it's just the word one uses. Now: Euphemisms are:
1) Go to the library
2) Go to my office
3) Pay the water bill
4) Go to download some stuff (cyber-euphemism)
:D

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 17 Oct 13 - 06:23 AM

"Toilet" & "Lavatory" originally meant the place one goes to wash [see Susan Coolidge's "What Katy Did at School" for an example of the latter use]; but became unusable for such meanings because they became euphemisms for the shithouse

([or, perhaps still slightly euphemistic] water-closet; earlier jakes, on which Shakespeare punned regarding the name of a character in As You Like It; or privy [ie private place]; or latrine [generally a hole-in-ground earth closet]; or, idiomatic, bog);

to be succeeded by words of similar meaning like washroom or bathroom; or, even more evasively, restroom. Or the U [in the Nancy Mitford sense of Upper-class] loo, of disputed etymology, perhaps from French l'eau, or the odd 0-0 (supposedly a pun on deux-eaux = two waters), preceded bu definite article before vowel l'.

Some day I suspec wet might run out of available euphemisms & have to return to good old shithouse, eh?

Appropriate, perhaps, to quote here: "These are deep waters, Watson."

LoL [or LoO?]

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: Lighter
Date: 17 Oct 13 - 09:00 AM

The reason we don t say "toilet" (as I may have noted years ago) is that in the US has come to mean, specifically and unambiguously, the porcelain fixture used for defecation, etc., and not the room.

The OED seems not to realize just how fully synonymous in the US are "toilet" and "lavatory bowl or pedestal" (as they so prudishly phrase it). When I was a lad, the Palmolive company still advertised "toilet soap" on TV. For your complexion! If you were five, it was beyond hilarious!

Eventually they got wise.

Americans do not call a "rest room" a "toilet," because "I need to use the toilet" is a bit too graphic for most of us. Hence the desperate need for a euphemism.

"Dang" has been around forever. Submitted for your approval, from Thomas Morton's West-Country comedy smash, "Speed the Plough" (1800):


"ASHFIELD. Dang it, I ha' gotten it all in my head; but zomehow--I can't talk it. ... Dang it! never be down hearted. I do know as well as can be, zome good luck will turn up."



(Pedants will note "gotten." Others may remember Roger Miller's 1964 CW hit, "Dang me!")

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 17 Oct 13 - 09:57 AM

Oh Lighter, I remember that song, "...they ought take a rope and hang me..."
I find expressions such as 'good to go', 'in back', a 'heads-up', 'raincheck' etc make me feel very old and out of touch. I have to have them explained to me, which is tedious for the speaker. It could be that I don't watch much TV and so am not exposed to the changing language. I don't resent the changes, but I find it hard to keep up with them. It's sheer ignorance on my part I admit.

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: Lighter
Date: 17 Oct 13 - 10:35 AM

> 'good to go', 'in back', a 'heads-up', 'raincheck' etc make me feel very old and out of touch

Cheer up! All but "good to go" were common (even indispensable) in my NYC childhood.

I first heard "good to go" in the build-up to the 1991 Iraq War. It caught on instantly. We primitives used to say, "Ready to go."

For the past ten years I've heard people saying "It's all good." Before then it was, "Everything's fine," "It's OK," etc.

Why the switch, trivial as it is? Who knows? What's interesting is there's no obvious reason why they shouldn't have been saying it in Shakespeare's time.

But they weren't.

Not logical, psychological.

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 17 Oct 13 - 10:54 AM

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 17 Oct 13 - 11:06 AM

Oh look! a blank post.
It should have been:

The things that get to me:

When I ask "How are you?" and get the reply "Good". I'm asking after their health, not their morals!

Or, if someone beats me to it, they may say "How are we?". I tend to respond "I'm fine, but I cannot speak for you."

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: Gibb Sahib
Date: 17 Oct 13 - 11:24 AM

Yo Nigel - What's good with it?

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 17 Oct 13 - 11:36 AM

Fries & ketchup?

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: Lighter
Date: 17 Oct 13 - 11:49 AM

Words no good, yo. Do psychic contact.

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 17 Oct 13 - 01:39 PM

Ah now, 'fries' to me is the correct word for those ghastly rock-hard little matchstick bits of potato you get with a MacDonald burger. The word 'chips' refers to the delicious, tasty and more-ish piano-key- sized fried potatoes you have with a bit of cod or haddock. Soft inside and crispy outside, they absorb vinegar like a dream, taste gorgeous and that's why I'm so fat! I'd never call them 'fries'!

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: GUEST,sciencegeek
Date: 17 Oct 13 - 03:15 PM

for those of us who would get their mouths washed out with soap for swearing or cursing... "dang or dang it" was the only way to express ones self safely.

"But, Mom.. I didn't say #@*&." Saved by a technicality.

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 17 Oct 13 - 04:33 PM

'"toilet" (as I may have noted years ago) is that in the US has come to mean, specifically and unambiguously, the porcelain fixture used for defecation, etc., and not the room.'
.,,.
Originally, of course, it meant neither. The original meaning was the *process* of washing, arranging hair, (for a woman) making up, &c, prior to dressing and presenting oneself to company; either in the morning on rising, or later in the day before a meal or going out.

~M~

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: JennieG
Date: 17 Oct 13 - 05:09 PM

My etiquette book, originally published in 1885 and reprinted in facsimile in 1982, has "Chapter XXXII: The Toilet: Importance of neatness and cleanliness, etc" and "Chapter XXXIII: Toilet Recipes: To remover freckles, pimples and sunburn, etc".

Both chapters make very interesting reading!

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 17 Oct 13 - 06:08 PM

As a midwest American, two weeks shy of 83 years, I can tell
you that I've NEVER heard "Yo" used in general speech, other
than in the US Army in 1953, '54, and '55, and then only
as a response at roll call or mail call, as in, "Smith!"--"Yo!" (meaning, roughly, "Here I am!")

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: Lighter
Date: 17 Oct 13 - 06:45 PM

And they advertised "toilet water" (cologne) too!

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: keberoxu
Date: 06 Oct 19 - 05:19 PM

Refreshing this elderly Mudcat thread
because the question was raised,
pertinent to the coming US Presidential elections,
about the origins of the word
"Kibosh."

I'm shocked to discover that Charles Dickens used the word
in a short story, "Seven Dials,"
printed in 1836 --

of course, he spelled the word "kye-bosk."
We live and learn!

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: Jack Campin
Date: 06 Oct 19 - 06:40 PM

Going back a few years to the comments about "bathroom" being a euphemism for "lavatory" - it wasn't when I was in New Zealand, and wouldn't have made sense. NZ houses generally had a separate roomlet for the toilet, with a separate entrance from the bathroom. "Bathroom" meant a toom with a bath in it. (This may have been reinforced by Maori concepts of hygiene, which prohibit washing and shitting in the same place).

My pet hate Americanism is biscuits in the UK being sold as "cookies". British cuisine doesn't HAVE cookies. They belong to an alien taxonomy of foods.

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: Charmion
Date: 06 Oct 19 - 09:22 PM

As a Canadian, I use both "cookie" and "biscuit". A cookie is soft, and usually made with some kind of inclusion -- raisins, nuts, or cream filling. A biscuit is crisp and may have icing or sprinkles on it. So a Jaffa cake is a cookie and a Hobnob is a biscuit. Shortbread and gingersnaps are biscuits. Sandwich-type confections (e.g., the Oreo) are cookies -- the filling, you see. And those things with chocolate chips in them -- cookies. Soft.

It's easy. Well, easy for a Canadian. Your mileage may vary.

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: Joe_F
Date: 06 Oct 19 - 09:24 PM

H. W. & F. G. Fowler, in _The King's English_ (1906), have a section titled "Americanisms", in which they complain, "Mr. Rudyard Kipling...and his school are americanizing us." So long ago, and under such eminent auspices!

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: robomatic
Date: 06 Oct 19 - 10:10 PM

It's been going on for a long time and is not merely one-way. I've especially noticed over the past few years the phrase "no worries" which when I was young was only heard from the antipodies (Australia and New Zealand). Now I hear it from the local young.

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: JennieG
Date: 07 Oct 19 - 02:54 AM

Come to Oz, you biscuit and cookie loving people......they're all called "bikkies" here, no distinction as to soft or not!

Language is a living growing thing which is continually evolving. While we might not love the direction it's taking, you can bet it won't be long before it takes another turn - and that's what makes it interesting.

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: Mrrzy
Date: 07 Oct 19 - 09:47 AM

Do British websites have biscuits?

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: BobL
Date: 08 Oct 19 - 02:47 AM

No more than British ballet dancers dance a step-of-two, British musicians perform a sounding-together, or British cooks use a garnished bouquet.

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: Jack Campin
Date: 08 Oct 19 - 09:10 AM

Do British websites have biscuits?

Look at what this one says:

https://www.englishcathedrals.co.uk/

Shouldn't it be "accept wafers"?

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 08 Oct 19 - 09:37 AM

"No more than British ballet dancers dance a step-of-two"

Yebbut they do it in tutus...

Subject: RE: BS: American English usages taking over Brit
From: WalkaboutsVerse
Date: 09 Oct 19 - 03:24 PM

My poem, from WalkaboutsVerse, on this "For Better Or Worse"