BS: So!

Subject: RE: BS: So!
From: Senoufou
Date: 12 Nov 16 - 03:29 PM

I've just remembered, when I taught in Glasgow many years ago, I had to learn the lingo, as the pupils were nearly unintelligible to my English ears. And I noticed they put the word 'but' at the end. So for example I'd say, "You haven't underlined the heading." And the child would reply, "Miss, I've lost my ruler but."
I wonder if this is the case in Ireland, because a lot of the Glasgow population had origins in Ireland, judging by the plethora of Irish surnames!

Subject: RE: BS: So!
From: JennieG
Date: 12 Nov 16 - 04:17 PM

McGrath, "Irrits" is just fine. "Absy", however, being a contraction of "absolutely" which is annoying anyway, is not.

While we're on the subject of irrits may I ask a question of our English friends here?

I have noticed while watching TV programs made in England that a question is often answered by another question. As a local scientist used to say on TV here many years ago - why is it so?

An example would be, police person asks of would-be miscreant "where were you at 9 P.M. on Saturday night" to which our wbm replies "I was here, wasn't I?"

Subject: RE: BS: So!
From: Senoufou
Date: 12 Nov 16 - 04:34 PM

Ah Jennie, this is where my much-loved 'innit?' comes into its own.
For example, "I was here all the time, innit?"
             "He's from London, innit?"
             "She's my sister innit?"

It stands in for 'wasn't I?', 'Isn't he?', 'Isn't she?' and a host of others. Just like the Noushi word 'Deh!"

I'm surprised and interested that this 'question to answer a question' is only heard in UK. I reckon it invites the listener to agree as a sort of "Do you see?" or "Do you understand?"
I would guess that it's more commonly heard in the London area, but I may be wrong!

Subject: RE: BS: So!
From: meself
Date: 12 Nov 16 - 04:56 PM

As a non-Englishman, I take the rhetorical "wasn't I?" as turning what would otherwise be a neutral answer into a smart-ass response, letting the questioner know the answerer is not only in the right, and being wrongly accused, but that the answerer is not impressed with the authority of the questioner.

Subject: RE: BS: So!
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 12 Nov 16 - 06:46 PM

Defiant anyway. The term "smart-ass" adds an assumption that defiance is not acceptable, and in fact assumes guilt until innocence can be estaablished( and possibly not even then).

Answering a question with a question is of course one of the classic defensive and evasive techniques used by politicians.

Subject: RE: BS: So!
From: meself
Date: 12 Nov 16 - 10:27 PM

"an assumption that defiance is not acceptable" No - just that it can be gratuitously aggravating to the one on the receiving end.

" in fact assumes guilt" Not at all, in my understanding - other than guilt of defiance.

Subject: RE: BS: So!
From: Mr Red
Date: 13 Nov 16 - 04:47 AM

Answering a question with a question is of course one of the classic defensive and evasive techniques used by politicians.

when they're not telling you they would rather answer the (unasked) question that they have the prepared answer for.

IMNSHO the Irish "So" as in "So it (he/she) is" runs at a pace that gives no time to think. The phrase is merely confirmation as an answer, or duplication to strengthen the message. A big full stop (period) if you will.

Subject: RE: BS: So!
From: fat B****rd
Date: 13 Nov 16 - 05:02 AM

Know what I mean,like.

Subject: RE: BS: So!
From: Senoufou
Date: 13 Nov 16 - 05:54 AM

Isn't the new-fangled 'like' funny? It does make me smile. As in,

"I was like, "Oh my God!" And he was like, "Yeah".
It seems to want to avoid 'I said' or 'He said'.

Subject: RE: BS: So!
From: Mr Red
Date: 13 Nov 16 - 07:38 AM

I like don't like, like.

Subject: RE: BS: So!
From: JennieG
Date: 13 Nov 16 - 03:03 PM

Mr Red, I don't like "like" either......have you ever stopped to wonder how many people would be struck dumb if the word "like" were to suddenly vanish from the English language?

Eliza, your "innit" and my "wasn't I" are also used in the Midsomer villages. As an aside, is there anyone left alive in Midsomer?

Subject: RE: BS: So!
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 13 Nov 16 - 03:17 PM

He goes...I goes....

Subject: RE: BS: So!
From: Thompson
Date: 13 Nov 16 - 08:31 PM

"Innit" always seemed a Cockney thing to me, and seemed to stand in for "is that not so?"
"I was, like…" and "He goes…" are wonderfully vivid ways of presenting dialogue, though they get a bit tiresome when they're overused.

Subject: RE: BS: So!
From: JennieG
Date: 14 Nov 16 - 12:02 AM

You have hit it right there on the head, Thompson......."they get a bit tiresome when they're overused". Funny the first time, mildly amusing the second, then tiresome.

Subject: RE: BS: So!
From: Senoufou
Date: 14 Nov 16 - 04:05 AM

Haha Jennie, I reckon people go to live in Midsomer merely for the excitement of being murdered. A kind of 'more interesting' euthanasia.

Regarding 'innit', I have wondered if it's Jamaican or Caribbean in origin, as it appeared to start among the black people in London. In fact, there seems to be a whole new accent there which I call 'London Black', spoken by young people of all races. I first noticed it about twenty years ago. It's replaced Estuary English in my view.

I do so love languages and accents. They're always coming up with something new. English does indeed evolve, and with the media the process has escalated over the past thirty years or so. Fascinating.

Subject: RE: BS: So!
From: Senoufou
Date: 14 Nov 16 - 04:20 AM

By the way, the thing about 'innit' is that it used to attach itself exclusively to statements needing an 'Isn't it?' For example, "Lovely day, innit?" or "It's four pound, innit?" But now, (and this is what amuses me) it happily applies to any statement.

"She's 'orrible innit?"
"They've gone 'ome innit?"
"We've lost our dog innit?"

We used to say 'innit' as children in West London (much to my father's ire) but only to signify 'isn't it?'

I absolutely adored Lee Nelson and his Well Good Show.
'Well good' seems to have died a death nowadays. You could use it with any adjective. Someone could be 'well fit' or 'well ugly', 'well sad', 'well out of order'. Brilliant!

Subject: RE: BS: So!
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 14 Nov 16 - 04:35 PM

"Well out of order" is the odd one out there. It's been a standard English expression for a very long time I'm pretty sure, and still is.

Subject: RE: BS: So!
From: Thompson
Date: 15 Nov 16 - 01:50 AM

Did 'innit' come from Jamaica? I would be surprised. I remember hearing it among cockneys in the 1960s, but not among Caribbean immigrants.

Subject: RE: BS: So!
From: Thompson
Date: 15 Nov 16 - 03:13 AM

This book on London usage has interesting stuff on innit, which is apparently now listed in the Oxford English Dictionary, as blogged in this nice linguistic blog.
People getting ragey about usage isn't a new thing; I remember several of my more Miss Thistlebottom English teachers raging about the lazy use of the word 'get', which was basically banned from our stilted little essays. Language changes and mutates, innit?

Subject: RE: BS: So!
From: Senoufou
Date: 15 Nov 16 - 04:18 AM

Thompson, my sister and I (as I've said) used 'innit?' in London in the fifties. But only as a form of 'isn't it?', never as a general tag for any statement. We would never have said, "We can't find our ball innit?" for example. In those days, 'innit?' or 'ain't it?' was definitely a Cockney thing.

I just wondered if the usage as a general tag was introduced by Caribbean immigrants, since when reggae and ska took off, and later when R&B became popular, a whole new lingo arrived in London. The young people today (of all origins and races) in the Thames area seem to speak in a delightful lilt with a West Indies tang. They use words like bruv and 'ting, which I have heard spoken by Jamaicans. It's so attractive, I don't wonder that it's caught on. Lee Nelson uses this speech too, for example when he says, "Kwalitteeee innit".

In 'It Ain't 'Alf 'Ot Mum' the Indians also used 'isn't it?' indiscriminately, as in "Don't be a silly-billy isn't it?" So it could in fact have come from India.

I remember our teachers being far more interested in stilted, strictly correct grammar than vibrancy and liveliness of style in our essays and stories. One would produce (in my view!) a wonderfully exciting, gripping and fascinating piece of prose, only to have it returned with the single austere comment in red: 'Use another word instead of got.' Soul-destroying innit?

Subject: RE: BS: So!
From: Mr Red
Date: 15 Nov 16 - 07:28 AM

Shoot me down in flames, (dons crash helmet and parashoot sic) but..........

"innit" and the "look you" (actually more likely to be "look see" in Wales itself), the Worcs/Gloucs "look", Canadian "eh", the Australian queried inflection, are all verbal full stops. They have a use, which says - "OK, your turn to respond".

Yes they are annoying at times, but functional nonetheless.

The pre-lex (see what I did there?) is also annoying, in extremis, but - hey - there is a message following, not drivel!

Subject: RE: BS: So!
From: Mr Red
Date: 09 Dec 16 - 09:25 AM

just listened to a talk about these kind of things, predicated on texting being a new dielect based on the arrival of SMS.

John McWhorter: Txtng is killing language. JK!!!

One concept he expresses is just what the OP is asking. He calls them Pragmatic Particles.

Now you have it.

Subject: RE: BS: So!
From: robomatic
Date: 09 Dec 16 - 05:08 PM

The Simpsons

Subject: RE: BS: So!
From: Thompson
Date: 10 Dec 16 - 02:31 PM

Yeah, the new London speech of the young, with an 'inn' sound replacing the old 'ing' at the end of -ing words, and all those Caribbean usages and rhythms, is interesting.

It's not the first change in Cockney accent, though - Dickens phonetically quotes Cockneys as switching V and W sounds and dropping aitches. I've heard this kind of speech in very old Cockneys, Jewish people from the rag trade, but it's almost gone now, if not gone altogether.

Subject: RE: BS: So!
From: Jim Martin
Date: 22 Dec 16 - 08:33 AM

I've worked out why it's been bugging me so much - invariably when someone being interviewed has been asked a difficult question which they have absolutely no intention of directly answering, they start with "So"!

Subject: RE: BS: So!
From: Jim Martin
Date: 10 Jan 17 - 07:12 AM

Funnily enough, since I posted my last message, there seems to have been an imrovement in the question answering rate!

Subject: RE: BS: So!
From: robomatic
Date: 10 Jan 17 - 01:32 PM

Thomnpson wrote:

It's not the first change in Cockney accent, though - Dickens phonetically quotes Cockneys as switching V and W sounds and dropping aitches. I've heard this kind of speech in very old Cockneys, Jewish people from the rag trade, but it's almost gone now, if not gone altogether.

I've heard this mimiced on The Goon Shows.