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BS: Mangling the English Language
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Subject: Mangling the English Language From: The Beanster Date: 10 Sep 00 - 12:42 AM Over the course of the last several years, I've been compiling a list of words I've heard people pronounce in ...um... unique ways. Now, I don't mean to be unkind and of course, I would never call attention to this at the time I hear them--and sometimes, the "new" version of the word I like even better than the original. I just thought some of you may also know a few of these creative concoctions to share here. A few of my favorites: confusement (confusion) misconscrewed (misconstrued) biosexual (bi-sexual) nippelate (manipulate) skipsophrenic (schizophrenic) mybrain headache (migraine headache) |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Thomas the Rhymer Date: 10 Sep 00 - 01:14 AM Oh Beanster, who'd a thunk it? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Lepus Rex Date: 10 Sep 00 - 01:18 AM If we wanna mangulate the language, it's our right. Don't go gettin all snotty with that edjumacation of yours! ---Lepus Rex |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Oversoul Date: 10 Sep 00 - 02:01 AM (axed)asked;(mist-drink)mixed-drink; I know what you mean, but just relax while all these bottom-feeders gum you into an orgasm of guilt for being real. Don't worry, they don't leave any permanent marks! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Racer Date: 10 Sep 00 - 02:10 AM The only one that really bothers me is 'nucular' verses 'nuclear'. It's like someone is scratching their nails on a chalkboard. I've actually heard professors with a doctrate in chemistry doing this. For some reason, they have no problem with talking about the nucleus (not nuculus) of an atom. I'm obsessive. -Racer |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: CarolC Date: 10 Sep 00 - 02:44 AM I think that's the one I hate the most too, Racer. I also hate it when high government officials say "Judisherary" instead of "Judiciary", and also (and almost all politicians do this), when they say "Presnighted States" instead of "President of the United States". Then there's always "prostrate" instead of "prostate". Carol |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Ebbie Date: 10 Sep 00 - 02:49 AM Cavalry for Calvary in gospel songs... Curdles my spine. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Ebbie Date: 10 Sep 00 - 02:58 AM A friend wrote a song in which he mentions 'tempetuous sea'. I believe he means 'tempestuous'. And how do you tell a fella that? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Liz the Squeak Date: 10 Sep 00 - 05:35 AM Burglary, pronounced burgalry.. aAAAAAAAARARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHH. I'm quite happy with fingernails down the chalk board, but say burgalry and I'm up the wall!!!! LTS |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Giac Date: 10 Sep 00 - 05:58 AM Confested - infested/congested, as: I wouldn't live down there, it's too confested. waps - Look out, that waps will sting you! pastgetti - We had pastgetti for supper. kivvers - Put more kivvers on the bed. swored - He brandished a swored (audible w). sar - She sar the light. hit don't - Hit don't make a damn to me. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Bud Savoie Date: 10 Sep 00 - 06:15 AM Racer, it's "versus", not "verses." |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Banjer Date: 10 Sep 00 - 07:13 AM A boss one time could make us climb the walls every time he told us that we must be 'versable'. The illiterate boob was trying to say 'versatile'...A lot of my pet peeves have already been listed above...Espcially Ebbies, but in reverse...I get so damn tired of hearing Civil War reenactors talking about the calvary troops. Does any one work in the automotive field and hear folks refering to their 'university joint', instead of the universal joint? How about where there are machine parts with splines that slide into other splined parts being called 'spleens'? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Lena Date: 10 Sep 00 - 08:19 AM "Mi GRABbi quella borsa?"(instead of:mi prendi quella borsa?!) "E' sotto il TABBoLo"(I.O:e' sotto il Tavolo) The first two examples I can think of the crazy italian/aussie english my sister and I can speak sometimes. Besides,I 'm used to it in italian.It's a much more rogorous and difficult language,since it has been a higher class/intellectual/literary language for centuries before being forced to normal people and everyday life,and it's very demanding.You'll hardly have a conversation without one or two manglings. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Alice Date: 10 Sep 00 - 08:48 AM A couple of years ago my son had a science teacher who would say larnyx instead of larynx and pharnyx instead of pharynx. She would also say alvioli instead of alveoli, making it sound like a pasta, my son said. Some kids in the class reading the text noticed she was mispronouncing the words. After a long time, they pointed out her mistake. I wonder how many of those kids will now pronounce the words incorrectly. (I home school now.) |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: MandolinPaul Date: 10 Sep 00 - 08:49 AM "That's a whole nother issue" |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Sorcha Date: 10 Sep 00 - 09:08 AM My grandmother said alumium (aluminum), cimmammom,and chimbley. Two that drive me nuts are often (voice silent t) and complected (complexioned). |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: GUEST,leeneia Date: 10 Sep 00 - 09:33 AM I don't mind manglings caused by naivete or by being a non-English speaker, but I do mind manglings caused by pretentiousness. The one that comes to mind most often is "comprise." Nobody seems to remember whether big things comprise little or little comprise big. (Do 50 states comprise the Union or does the Union comprise 50 states? I forget.) Anyway, most users don't even know there is a right way. I wish people would just quit using any form of "comprise." BTW, I have heard perfectly cultivated English speakers say "hit" for "it." It depends what sounds preceded it. We probably all do it and have never thought about it. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: rabbitrunning Date: 10 Sep 00 - 09:49 AM I ain't gonna say ain't no more cause ain't no in the dictionary...
Although, I think "complected" may be...
BTW, big things are "comprised of" little things, and little things "comprise" big things, at least so my eleventh grade English teacher led us to believe. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Bill D Date: 10 Sep 00 - 10:52 AM "importating"..... and certain British journalists mangling OTHER languages..like the Central American country of 'Nick-uh-RAG-you-uh' |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Dee45 Date: 10 Sep 00 - 11:05 AM I hate it when someone who is relaying a story says he/she goes instead of he/she replies. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Bagpuss Date: 10 Sep 00 - 11:38 AM My pet hate is football (soccer for you yanks) commentators who insist on saying "subtitute" and "sikth" instead of substitute and sixth. Bagpuss |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: GUEST Date: 10 Sep 00 - 11:38 AM Wow, I'm like, and so, she's like.... and I'm like well, DOH!!!.... The vernacular use of the word "so" which has crept into the local youth idiom in the last twenty years. It isn't a mangle exactly...it is an applicationw hich I find really irritating. You stick it at the end of a sentence with the idea that it is a polite way to avoid an imperative. "I'm going to put my lawn sprinkler right where you are about to park, so....". I always want to say "So, what? Can't you finish the sentence?". A. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Alice Date: 10 Sep 00 - 12:23 PM momento instead of memento (mem - root of memory) |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Liz the Squeak Date: 10 Sep 00 - 12:32 PM Sorry Sorcha, Complected is the archaic version, as seen on many a recruiting form..... but I know what you mean... LTS - who also hates people who say chimbley.
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Brendy Date: 10 Sep 00 - 12:32 PM My old History teacher in school would say 'proctol', for 'protocol', and always pronounced 'Hertzegovina' as 'Herezgovnia'. Couple of favourites from BBC newsreaders: B. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Jon Freeman Date: 10 Sep 00 - 12:48 PM Leenia, the changing of the spelling of a word because of what precedes it is part of Welsh (and I believe other Celtic languages) - try and get your head round Welsh mutations at: http://www.dalati.com/cornel/mutate.html Jon |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Banjer Date: 10 Sep 00 - 01:55 PM One of my pet irritants is people adding letters to words that don't need them and leaving out others. For example...I once worked with an automotive parts man from the Boston area. He could not pronounce the letter R unless he used it where not needed. He would say cah pahts instead of car parts but he would have no trouble telling you those cah pahts came from a weahouse in Tampar (Tampa) |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Mrrzy Date: 10 Sep 00 - 02:09 PM In sports: Feel Gold instead of Field Goal. And what about Brent Favre, pronounced Farve? Is that his choice? In medicine, using visualize when they mean see. In my imagination I can visualize my gall bladder, but on the ultrasound you can see it. In regular life: I like that English is constructivist, in that you can verb nouns and add -ness or -esanytime some new term is coined out of co |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Mrrzy Date: 10 Sep 00 - 02:16 PM In sports: Feel Gold instead of Field Goal. Also, is it Brent Favre's choice that his name be pronounced Farve? In medicine: the use of Visualize for See. I can visualize my gall bladder in my imagination, but I can see it on an ultrasound image. In standard English: the coining of new, constructed terms when there is a perfectly viable extant term. Now, I truly enjoy the constructionism English allows, what with nouning verbs (or verbing nouns), adding -esque to anything, and so on. But why Wellness when we have Health? In slang English: I don't mind Going for Saying nearly as much as I'm comma like comma. As in, "I said 'A' then he went 'B' so I'm, like, 'C'..." - and so on. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Mrrzy Date: 10 Sep 00 - 02:18 PM As you see, I bipped off before clicking Submit so I had to redo it. Interesting how differently phrased things are that way... but anyway, another Pet Peeve is saying Antidote for Anecdote. Amazing how often that happens, when you'd think people using words like those instead of Cure or Story would know better... |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Metchosin Date: 10 Sep 00 - 02:21 PM Fingernails down the blackboard for me....When my children were small, we would constantly get notices from the school regarding the benefit of eating "healthy lunches" with all those "healthy fruits and vegetables". As I was not deliberately in the habit of knowingly sending my children to school with diseased fruits and vegetables in their bags, I found this particularly irksome. Now the term "healthy food" is commonplace and makes me wonder if the word "healthful" has been permanantly dropped from the English language. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Uncle_DaveO Date: 10 Sep 00 - 02:27 PM Rabbitrunning, the United States comprises fifty states, not "is comprised of". Dave Oesterreich |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Amos Date: 10 Sep 00 - 04:08 PM Been down that battle before, David, and I am afraid we are losing it. The bureaucratic uglies have infected it to the extent that "comprise" is used to mean either "compose or consitute" or "consist of". Sigh. Some dictionaries are such wusses about holding the line. It is well and good that English is a volatile and evolving language, but I would love to see a standard held that rejected regressive evolution born of stupidity and ignorance, while honoring those changes creatively added tot he language to reflect new thoughts and new situations. I think there's an important distinction to be made. Those who reinvent the language because they are too lazy or ignorant to know it in the first place are wasting a lot of hard cognitive hitory, and of course they will be condemned to repeat it... A |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Jon Freeman Date: 10 Sep 00 - 04:09 PM It appears that I have been getting comprise wrong as I have been using "is comprised of". My dictionary (Chambers) defines it as "v.t. to contain or to include" and saying "the US is contained of... would certainly grate". I checked that little program, Guru Net, that someone recommended in a Mudcat thread. Here is what it had to say on the usage: USAGE NOTE: The traditional rule states that the whole comprises the parts; the parts compose the whole. In strict usage: The Union comprises 50 states. Fifty states compose (or constitute or make up) the Union. While this distinction is still maintained by many writers, comprise is increasingly used, especially in the passive, in place of compose: The Union is comprised of 50 states. In an earlier survey, a majority of the Usage Panel found this use of comprise unacceptable. Jon
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: sophocleese Date: 10 Sep 00 - 04:43 PM Hell, I've pismronounced a few worms in my day. In highschool I was in a play about Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. I can still remember the frustrations of trying to get one young woman to say dWarves not dRorves and then I went and said, "Beauty withers with the ears(years)". OOps!
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: R! Date: 10 Sep 00 - 05:23 PM Earlier this year, this appeared in a memo routed to all employees in our department: "...for all intensive purposes..." rather than the more well-known "intents and purposes." Don't forget tenderhooks for tenterhooks. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Liz the Squeak Date: 10 Sep 00 - 05:36 PM AArrrggghh, compared with, instead of compared to..... drives me up the wall...... LTS |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Liz the Squeak Date: 10 Sep 00 - 05:40 PM And draw instead of drawer.... ggggrrrrrrrrrrrrr...... LTS |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Parson Date: 10 Sep 00 - 05:40 PM My Dad had one when I was growing up. It wasn't until I was a teenager that it suddenly dawned on me what he was saying. He would be telling about something funny that happened at work & when the punch line came, he would say, "We come miss laughing." And I couldn't figure how what come miss had to do with it, until I suddenly realized one day that he was saying "commenced." This, BTW is a common Appalachian expression. There are a ton of them. I couldn't begin to list them all. But there is one other word, I will share. It is the plural for the word "Test." As in, I'm going to the hospital tomorrow for tests. As a Pastor, it is all you can do to keep a straight face & look serious and concerned when a lady comes up to you and says, "I'm going to the hospital tomorrow to get some testes." With that, I will say, "Good bye." Randall |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Liz the Squeak Date: 10 Sep 00 - 05:56 PM Like my sister who went in for a hysterical rectomy.... and she used to WORK in a hospital!! LTS |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Helen Date: 10 Sep 00 - 06:09 PM * remuneration confused with renumeration (often in the same sentence by one of my previous bosses, who loved buzzwords and used to make me wish there was a blackboard handy for fingernails) * a school friend in primary (elementary) school used to say hos'-dib-le instead of hospital * not pronouncing the 'r' is an Oz thing. A US friend of mine used to comment on it frequently. "It's Pe'terrrr, not Petah". I tried to tell her the name of a local street one day and she kept saying "Chew-dah, what is Chew-dah? Oh, you mean Too-dorrr (Tudor)?" * rabitrunning, as a former "li-berryan" I have to confess I love annoying people by referring to the "liberry" only half the people I say it to don't realise that it is a joke - i.e a quarter of them say it that way too, and the other quarter get disdainful and think I don't know any better. Just my strange sense of humour. * I like using the word burg-u-lar too. * a Polish teacher I had once used to say "com'putent" because she thought it had something to do with computers. * I find that having studied Latin makes it a lot easier to keep track of words and spelling - it's hard to confuse money and numbers in the remuneration/renumeration mix-up? There are heaps more that I could list but this is enough for now - but I'll probably be aware of people's word usage now and pick up a few more. I heard a really funny one the other day but I can't remember it right now. Helen
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Jon Freeman Date: 10 Sep 00 - 06:22 PM Thinking of hospitals, one that used to tickle my mother was a little old lady with "creptipuss knees" (crepitus). Continuing with things medical, I have met people who have said "I've got blood pressure" not to mention having a cardiac heart or renal kidneys, etc. Jon |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: GUEST,Kit Date: 10 Sep 00 - 06:23 PM One that makes my blood run cold is when people put an apostrophe in its when it shouldn't have one - like "I gave the cat IT'S milk". AAAHHH!!! My English teacher actually pronounced "hyperbole" phonetically, like hyper-bowl. Guess that's like the Superbowl only bigger. Also gets me when people say "I won you" when they mean "I beat you" - that's a really annoying one... |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Banjer Date: 10 Sep 00 - 06:54 PM It is interesting to see how meanings of words have so totaly changed over the years. I had a bad time in elementary school when our music teacher was trying to get us to learn some Christmas carols. I wasn't about to 'don my gay apparel'. In 'My Old Kentucky Home' 'the (insert your own favorite word here) are happy and gay' A word that once meant happy and carefree now means something totaly diferent! Why? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: guinnesschik Date: 10 Sep 00 - 08:18 PM One word: Conversate. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: guinnesschik Date: 10 Sep 00 - 08:21 PM I once heard Michael Ervin of the Dallas Cowboys say, "It behooves the hell outta me why we lost that game." I laughed 'til I cried. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Jon Freeman Date: 10 Sep 00 - 08:54 PM How about "can you borrow me £1 [or whatever]?". Does "Me and [whoever] did [whatever]" annoy others? I hate it. Jon |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: bob jr Date: 10 Sep 00 - 09:31 PM my mancurian cousins say likkle instead of little,booook instead of book ditto for coooook and looook (spoken to rhyme with luke) |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Ebbie Date: 10 Sep 00 - 09:44 PM Jon, Me and so and so doesn't bother me as much as, for instance, 'he told my wife and I, etc.' No one would say 'He told I', so why don't they see that my wife and I is also not correct?! (Especially since I'm female.) Ebbie |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Thomas the Rhymer Date: 10 Sep 00 - 09:54 PM Jabberwoky? Walt Whitman? Creativacious Carnivorosity! Stupendocial Schooleries... |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: GUEST,CLETUS Date: 10 Sep 00 - 10:02 PM Yall dun hit rite on wanna my leest favritist subjecks an thets how sum folks can massacree the Merican langwaj. Now I haint wun ta be a braggin er nuthin but Ise rite proud ta have me a forth grayd edgykashun an I no thet sum haint bin thet luckie an all. But itz a mitey fine thing ya axt heer an I doan holt wif nobuddy mezzin up whut thair sain cuz thay doan uze gud grammarly stuff. Jez doan holt wiffit tall. I allus duz my absulutest bez job when Ima tockin er ritin senz commukatin iz reel impotent. CLETUS (BTW--Cletus isn't a buffoon or a "shitkicker"....just a nice, well meaning, friendly, fellow who fell through the cracks in this country.......Spaw) |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: GUEST,John Gray / Australia Date: 10 Sep 00 - 10:41 PM Nonkalont for nonchalent, even sounds better. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: campfire Date: 11 Sep 00 - 12:02 AM Jon, I'm with you on "borrow" instead of "loan". I have a friend who asked if I could borrow her my bicycle. I told her no, but I would loan it to her. She gave me a strange look... A woman I work with insists that the doctors told her that her mother has senile dimensions. campfire |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: The Beanster Date: 11 Sep 00 - 12:42 AM Seems I'm guilty of misusing "comprise," also...learned a few things from this thread! I don't mind the mangulations (!) (ha) that result from a subpar education as much as I do the ones that are the result of being too lazy to look up the word in the dictionary! Expertise is one of those that gets mispronounced as ex-per-tees with an "s" sound on the end when it's supposed to be ex-per-teez with a "z" sound--like strip tease. A word I won't even use is forte (not the musical one, the other one) which is supposed to be pronounced as fort. But almost everyone insists on fort-ay. If I say it correctly, I'm corrected! lol Speaking of medical ones, it really sets my teeth on edge to hear someone say, "I have a temperature." Duh. And lucky you are, to have one! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Crazy Eddie Date: 11 Sep 00 - 01:05 AM There are a few that annoy me, but I can't think of a pacific example right now.
But I wish we could form a committee, from all English speaking countries, to coin some agreed gender-free pronouns.
"If anyone has a suggestion, he should post it here." Someone, please coin some new pronouns. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Lonesome EJ Date: 11 Sep 00 - 01:26 AM Using the suffix "-ness" on the end of any word.This is popular with sports announcers, who either went through Junior College on a Football scholarship,or studied Journalism Light."The offense was cohesive in the first half,but lost their cohesiveness when the Captain was injured.They were aggressive,but lost their aggressiveness." This can also be done with "-ability" as a suffix."The rain reduced the runnability of the playing field.The Quarterback was throwing hard,reducing the catchability of the ball." Actually,I have less of a problem with "catchability" and "runnability" since at least they describe the situation so that you understand,AND I'm not sure there are any other single words that describe these conditions. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: GUEST Date: 11 Sep 00 - 01:47 AM Nobody has yet mentioned the use of "apostrophe S" to create a plural. Usually seen at the market, listing the vegetables - though a fairly sizeable car repair and tyre depot close to me is called "xxxxx AUTO'S". Cheers, Terry |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Bagpuss Date: 11 Sep 00 - 05:32 AM Actually guest, auto's is correct. You use an apostrophe in a plural if the singular word is an abreviation (automobile). Bagpuss |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: GUEST Date: 11 Sep 00 - 08:38 AM A few years ago the plight of Gorazde in Bosnia became the center of brief media attention and Clinton mentioned it often during his addresses. He always mispronounced it "Goradze" and embarrassed me to be an American. That a world leader couldn't pronounce correctly the name of a city under siege seemed to belittle the suffering of its citizens. In the same vein, Jimmy Carter often talked about the "commonists." Maybe he was trying to coin a new word. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: GUEST,leeneia Date: 11 Sep 00 - 08:56 AM I disagree with Bagpuss that it's correct to say XXX's Auto's. Surely "auto" for "car" is widely understood. The actual principle at work here is that if you are not well-educated and a word frightens you, then you protect yourself by putting an apostrophe in the plural. That's why we see "potato's" at the grocery store, etc. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: GUEST,James Date: 11 Sep 00 - 08:58 AM I am a great fan of crosswords..if you really want to see mangled English, poor spelling and non words galore...do the New York Times Crosswords...they are dreadful.. I often wonder how they do them....is the illiterate person on the clue end or the answer end... ? Also, I once had a teacher tell the class not to conjugate near the water fountain. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: rabbitrunning Date: 11 Sep 00 - 09:01 AM I have to be fairly forgiving of people who learned the word by reading. When I was in high school, f'r example, I kept reading about this author named "go-eathee" who wrote Faust. Imagine my embarrassment in my last year of college when my Norwegian teacher was working a crossword puzzle (at lunchtime) and I contributed my knowledge to fill in one of the answers. She looked at me with appalled eyes and told me "It's pronounced "Gair-ta". ???? *shrug* At least she knew who I meant. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Mrrzy Date: 11 Sep 00 - 09:17 AM Argh, yes, cohesiveness - what happened to cohesion? And one I forgot about from my childhood, when I thought my aunt had "very close veins" - made sense at the time, again! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: LR Mole Date: 11 Sep 00 - 09:25 AM "My-brain headache"?That was a definite "no-one really-says-that" for me until I heard someone call the senior-citizen disorientated condition "Old-Timer's". Makes as much sense as any other term, I guess. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Grab Date: 11 Sep 00 - 10:25 AM Americanisms get me. OK, they have different names for some things, but that's just a dialect thing - you'll find that between different parts of Britain. But what gets me is the common mispronunciation of things where English says it normally, and the Americans have somehow gone off in a direction which not only doesn't match English, but also doesn't match the spelling of the word! For instance, "aloominum" instead of "aluminium" - why the long "u", and is the "i" thief at work over in the States? Grab. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: SINSULL Date: 11 Sep 00 - 10:56 AM Two favorites - posted elsewhere, I think: public hair for pubic digitalis clock menestration for menstruation annoys the hell out of me. Come to think of it they both do. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Steve Latimer Date: 11 Sep 00 - 11:41 AM Ornch instead of orange. irregardless I seen that movie. Youse guys. I am an avid golfer and watch a lot of televised tournaments. It drives me crazy to hear these college educated ahtletes say "I hit it good today."
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Branwen23 Date: 11 Sep 00 - 11:45 AM maybe it's just because i work in a computer field, but it drives me up the wall when clients come in to the service department at my store after having left their computers for repair and say, "i'm here to pick up my modem." or "i left my hard drive here for repair", meaning of course, the computer..... Call it obsessive, but I'm of the opinion taht if you're going to spend a couple thousand dollars on a machine, at least know what it's called..... -Branwen- |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: SINSULL Date: 11 Sep 00 - 11:47 AM Or I gave 110%! Sends me screaming into the night. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Branwen23 Date: 11 Sep 00 - 11:52 AM dammit.... that never works for me... |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Ebbie Date: 11 Sep 00 - 12:02 PM Grab, maybe someone else can tell you why we lost the i but we pronounce it aluminum because of it. To Guest Who Bemoaned Presidential Gaffes: I remember not believing my ears when Reagan told the President of Mexico, Mi 'cazza' est su 'cazza'. I couldn't believe that a person from southern California didn't know the Spanish pronunciation of casa. Still can't believe it. Crazy Eddie, 'pacific' was a deft touch! When I was a young 'un, reading voraciously and already loving words, I tried out many pronunciations on my laughing-uproariously family, i.e. pictureskew, fatigoo, astonn y shed, calfy, a rogant, and on and on... Ebbie |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Lonesome EJ Date: 11 Sep 00 - 12:25 PM Grab...at least in America,it's spelled aluminum,not aluminium.Maybe you guys are pronouncing it wrong(God forbid!). |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: catspaw49 Date: 11 Sep 00 - 12:46 PM Yeah Leej......you be right dere! So like uh, what's the deal with Lefftenant anyway there Grab?(:<)) Spaw |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: M.Ted Date: 11 Sep 00 - 01:32 PM "Ne-go-see-ate" for negotiate--the creeping return of the silent "l". first in "Palm", then in "Salmon", and now, and most disturbing, in "walk"(first was "wok", then "Wauk", and now, ever so gradually, people are turning it into "waulk"), and "ignorant", as in, "I hadda get ignorant with him." |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: GUEST Date: 11 Sep 00 - 01:36 PM I was going to take Ebbie's remarks about Ronnie Ray-gun as an opportunity to rag on him a little, but naaah...I'll take the high ground. In the interest of fairness, remember when JFK made clumsy use of the German language - just as I'm about to do now - with that infamous "Ich bin ein Berliner" quote? Pronouncing boldly and confidently, "I am a jelly doughnut!" |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Micca Date: 11 Sep 00 - 01:39 PM The one that always confuses and sounds wrong to me is the American use of the word "momentarily" it seems to mean "back IN a moment"there, whereas in British English it means "back FOR a moment". The other that gets up my snotter is Certificate pronounced" serstifficate" and the word "borrow" used instead of lend, as in " Borrow me your pen" as mentioned above, Guaranteed to get a sarcastic response that one, as in " From whom???". |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Micca Date: 11 Sep 00 - 01:39 PM The one that always confuses and sounds wrong to me is the American use of the word "momentarily" it seems to mean "back IN a moment"there, whereas in British English it means "back FOR a moment". The other that gets up my snotter is Certificate pronounced" serstifficate" and the word "borrow" used instead of lend, as in " Borrow me your pen" as mentioned above, Guaranteed to get a sarcastic response that one, as in " From whom???". |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: catspaw49 Date: 11 Sep 00 - 01:54 PM When I first went south to college and heard someone say, "I got my Daddy to carry me over to the game," I had mental images of some 40 year old guy with his kid riding piggyback as he hiked across town to the ballfield. It was then I also realized just how dumb it was to ask, "Can you give me a lift?" Spaw |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Penny S. Date: 11 Sep 00 - 02:17 PM acrorst, for across - which accent is this? Penny |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: GUEST, Banjo Johnny Date: 11 Sep 00 - 02:31 PM This is a revelation for me: I never realized that other people are just as annoyed by this sort of thing as I am. Now I feel better! A little. During a debate, my worthy opponent called me a sway-do intellectual. He lost -- grin! I would not expect folk-singers to be bothered by regionalisms such as n'other or chimbley. These words add color to our songs and they are not invented by song writers, but by ordinary people. However professional news readers, who are earning more money than I will ever see, are committing grammatical misusages I learned to avoid in the sixth grade. I heard a recent news report about the floundering of the Russian submarine Kursk. A national TV news program uses the expression "more on" such and such a subject. "More on education in a moment." (Education for morons?) I did get a chuckle when they announced, "When we return, we'll have more on George W. Bush." Note to world leaders and diplomats: our country is not called the Unite States. There is a "d". Work on it. Here are a few more for the litany: torturous for tortuous, fermiliar for familiar, preventative for preventive, athalete for athlete, mathmatics for mathematics, loan for lend. === Johnny in Oklahoma City "The best way to expose a fool is to let him speak." |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: GUEST,Kim Date: 11 Sep 00 - 02:48 PM This list is pretty funny, but one I don't get is "chimbley" - for what??? Chimney, like a fireplace, is the only word I can think of, but I've never heard it said like that. For Banjo Johnny - how about: "It is better to keep your mouth shut and appear stupid, than to open it and remove all doubt" Kim |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Lonesome EJ Date: 11 Sep 00 - 03:05 PM Have you ever become familiar with a word through reading it,but are unfamiliar with its actual pronunciation? I was reading a news article to my wife and read "He was the scone of a wealthy family." Lynne laughed,then explained it was "Sye-on"(scion).I also pronounce "sieve" to rhyme with Steve. Humbly,LEJ |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Pseudolus Date: 11 Sep 00 - 03:11 PM This is an Expecially fun thread. Thread's like this are funner to read then anything elst I read. Frank
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: catspaw49 Date: 11 Sep 00 - 03:20 PM Leej, I have several words that I say diffently each time to Karen and then swear I never said it the other way. "Graffitti" is one and I have about 4 ways and then swear "I never said that!" Drives her nuts......or it used to.....now she just ignores me. Spaw |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Melani Date: 11 Sep 00 - 03:31 PM "Artic" for "Arctic" rather annoys me. There is actually a letter missing there. My husband was in a class at the University of Chicago taught by an Indian professor with a heavy accent. He asked the students if they understood the proper use of a "messopotometer". When they all looked blank he began raging, "What? You're all biochemistry majors? The university just spent $10,000 on a brand new messopotometer and you don't even know what it is?" With that clue, the whisper began to go around, "Mass spectrometer!" (I hope I've spelled that right!) I recently heard a radio piece where a linguist commented that the English language is constantly changing, especially in pronunciation--or "pronounciation" as my Canadian friend used to say. She claimed it was another Britishism, but I've never been sure. I assume she meant how you pronunce things. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Steve Latimer Date: 11 Sep 00 - 03:32 PM Geez 'Spaw, I can't see you being ignored by anybody. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: mousethief Date: 11 Sep 00 - 04:54 PM Feb-you-erry. Drives me nuts. On aluminum vs. aluminium: The M-W online says it's from "alumina" -- not sure how the "i" crept into the root for you Brits, but you're not alone.
Spanish: aluminio Isn't the internet a wonderful thing? Still, words do change and mutate, and why should someone be so upset that Americans pronounce things differently than the Brits? 'Slife. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Uncle_DaveO Date: 11 Sep 00 - 05:06 PM "Staunch". when "stanch" is meant. Correctly, "My staunch friend Joe was able to stanch the flow of blood from my wound." As a court reporter I've often heard witnesses use "license" (British licence?) as a plural. "The judge took away my license, and I haven't got them back yet." Dave Oesterreich |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Liz the Squeak Date: 11 Sep 00 - 05:11 PM Ah, two nations divided by a single language..... LTS Oh, and langwidge - that gets right up my nose.... |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: guinnesschik Date: 11 Sep 00 - 05:24 PM This really is a fun thread. Down here in Texas, and pretty much across the south, "I'm fixin' to" do whatever is common usage. Of course, I never say that... Another "mangualtion" that creeps up my posterior is "continue on." As in, "He continued on working for the plant for many years." Sheesh! I hear newscasters say this sort of thing all the time. It drives me crazy.
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Branwen23 Date: 11 Sep 00 - 05:33 PM i'm with you on "continue on", guinnesschik.... it's incredibly redundant... drives me nuts. -Branwen- |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Lonesome EJ Date: 11 Sep 00 - 05:53 PM and "redundant"...another Britishism that I find funny.When someone is released from employment,he is declared redundant.Sounds very insulting on a personal level,doesn't it? I'm sorry,old chap,you'll simply have to go.You've become quite redundant,you know." "But....I thought that was what I was being paid for!" |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: catspaw49 Date: 11 Sep 00 - 06:12 PM Along with the hairy chest Liz, you must have one helluva' blower too. What a feat! The entire language up your nose. I bet you're real popular on sunny days huh? Wasn't that song written about you? You know, "The Shadow of Your Nose." Spaw |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: mousethief Date: 11 Sep 00 - 07:02 PM Here's a briticism that I don't get -- our cousins from Old Blighty use "presently" to mean not "at the present time" (which is what it means in America and seems to this peasant to be the etymological meaning) but rather "in a little while." Can anyone explain this?
Click the mouse for my homepage: |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: bflat Date: 11 Sep 00 - 07:59 PM Hey...like...chill...24/7...netspeak ain't gonna make it no better...IMHO...LOL Taken from the new unabriged English Rhetoric Textbook. :) bflat |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: GUEST, Banjo Johnny Date: 11 Sep 00 - 08:39 PM To be fair to JFK, "Berliner" does mean doughnut, but it also means a person who lives in Berlin. It would have been funnier if he had been in Hamburg. == Johnny |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Parson Date: 11 Sep 00 - 10:00 PM OK, I'll add a couple (actually 3) more. (Sorry, it's a "Southernism.") How about using the word "Leave" when you mean "Let." As in "Leave us go to town." When you mean, "Let's go to town." Also I am told that the simple apology (in America) "I'm sorry." means just the opposite to the Brits. My Sister-in-law was in London recently & accidently bumped into another lady on the street. So she apologized by saying, "I'm Sorry." But the other lady was offended, thinking that my Sister-in-law was saying it was the Londoner's fault! But hold on with the expression, "I'm fixing to..." Only in the South can we say, "I'm fixing to get ready to go to town." That means I'm not ready, nor am I ready to get ready, but I'll be ready to start getting ready shortly." Makes perfect sense to me. You have to remember that we live by a slower pace down here. You might be interested to know that in Appalachia, any word that has the letter "A" is pronounced with a "Y" in front of the "A." So a "garden" becomes a gyarden. Why not? After all the Brits don't put their car in a garage, but in a garridge. It's just a part of the local dialect, I guess. Randall
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Bill D Date: 11 Sep 00 - 11:26 PM well, as long as someone else brought up Briticisms......the Brits can slur words like Cholmondely and Worchestershire into 'Chumly' and 'Wusstersher'...yet, THEY are the ones who say..KILL-o-meter while we in the US seem to say Kil-om-eter...just sounds funny to me... but anything you are not used to sounds funny...I used to hear some kids in Kansas talking about a farmer plowing his 'filled' and I had to grit my teeth. (oh, by the way...I DO fret over how to tell someone politely that what they have posted is mis-said or mis-spelled,)[this does NOT refer to hurried typing errors!] I often see chuckling laughter spelled as "he he he" when it SHOULD be "Hee hee hee" to differentiate it from 3 masculine personal pronouns! And I do believe that way back up there ^ someone said "here, here" to signify agreement...sorry, but it's "hear, hear" |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Bill D Date: 11 Sep 00 - 11:35 PM In searching, I found this gem: IMMIGRANTS FROM non-English speaking countries used translation-equivalent surnames such as Jaeger, which became "Hunter," and Bauer, "Farmer." English surnames like Cowper became "Cooper," Coke to "Cook." Featherstonehaugh was spelled and pronounced "Fanshaw," Cholmondely as "Chomley," and Colquhoun became "Calhoun." The following limerick mocks these changes:
A young man called Cholmondely Colquhoun |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Mbo Date: 11 Sep 00 - 11:55 PM Don't forget: Fotherington = "Fungy". My German coalminer relatives & ancesters are sur-named Richards (as am I), we think it may have originally been "Reichartz" before Ellis Island changes. BTW, saw this on a shirt this morning (worn by classmate Kevin Richards who is NOT related to me!) Kelly's Irish Times Pub, Washington, D.C. : "Give me your poor, your thirsty, your befuddled masses..." |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: CamiSu Date: 12 Sep 00 - 01:00 AM We mangle for fun and often wondered if our kids would ever learn to speak properly. They did and even learned to pun...oh dear! But my pet peeves, fed regularly. Jewlery. Is jewelry that hard to say? And mis-used quotes. "Free" Well I guess nothing ever is. Apostrophes. I appreciate the idea that people put these in when a word scares them. Our school menu usually features Shepherds Pie and Taco's. My mother-in-law pronounced a word nye-veet. It took me a while to realise she meant naivete. And she was an elementary school teacher. Her son, (not hte one I married) will choose a mispronounciation and continue to use it in the face of any correction. "That's how it's pronounced here." Grrrrrrrrrrrrr! I don't tend to mind dialectical differences. Makes it fun to listen. CamiSu |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Ebbie Date: 12 Sep 00 - 01:18 AM You're right, CamiSu: 'free gift'; as opposed to a gift that I have to buy? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Crazy Eddie Date: 12 Sep 00 - 01:26 AM People really annoy me when their putting there homophone's & apostrophe's over they're in the wrong place. But its OK if your doing it deliberately to tease you're readers!
Banjo Johnny, I had a protracted discussion with someone about preventative/ preventive once (my middle name is pedant). The consise OED listed only "preventive", but the three-volume edition in the local library also listed "preventative" as a rare but acceptable variant.
Ebbie,
ALSO "It costs between five to ten pounds"
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: KT Date: 12 Sep 00 - 01:57 AM "That's all the further it goes" in place of "That's as far as it goes." And the top of my grandmother's list- ANYWAYS
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: GUEST Date: 12 Sep 00 - 04:44 AM CamiSu, and Ebbie, The "free gifts" take on a real fun dimension if you have German speakers about as "gift "is the German for Poison!!!! a German Pharmacist friend visiting was chuckling all day over that , seen as a sign in the local pharmacy. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Astorkhan Date: 12 Sep 00 - 05:01 AM Too long a thread...but, even it is repeats some of the above, here it is. Language mangling should be considered as a "brain sport" like Chess. There are 2 champions in that category: Mark Twain, in "Roughing it" shows how 2 successive translations can mangle things; An author whose name escapes me, who managed to rewrite in mangled french (but that makes some sort of strange sense) the well known Mother Goose Rimes. Think about L'ecurie des Curés d'Oc) Vive le bilinguisme, even if it mangles languages and tongues a bit. Salut, Astor |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Albatross Date: 12 Sep 00 - 05:51 AM Quite a few people say 'Chimley' instead of 'Chimney', not quite figured out why. In norfolk it's not uncommon to hear 'Whatfor hint you' meaning why havn't you. It may actually be quite old this, as it is not to different from the scandinavian 'Hvorfor ikke' or 'hvorfor inte' some remnant from the viking days perhaps. An equivalent to why is not used in scandinavian but instead they use hvorfor (what for or where for). 'wherefore art thou Romeo' in Norwegian would be 'hvor er du Romeo'. Oh aren't languages fun! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: GUEST,micca at work Date: 12 Sep 00 - 07:02 AM Languages are fun, ( the German post above is mine, I have no cookie at work) a friend pointed out that the Danish for king is " Kong" so in Danish does King Kong become Kong King? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Grab Date: 12 Sep 00 - 10:51 AM My hang-gliding instructor, Steve, told us a classic colloquialism, common from northern England, which he was responsible for. His family had a tin under the telephone which they used for general odds-and-ends, so if anything was lost, they'd say, "Look in the tin." Anyway, they had a foreign friend staying with them. At some point, Steve needed to find something. His folks told him to look in the tin, but he said, "It isn't in the tin." This confused his friend. Being a northerner, what my instructor had _actually_ said was, "'T in't in t' tin." So his friend asked, "What is this 'tin-tin-tin'?" Steve was completely confused, bcos as far as he knew, he'd not said anything about a cartoon character with a dog called Snowy. They had to rewind the conversation back a few steps until they finally found what he'd actually said! Re the aluminium point, I apologise - I didn't realise you actually spelled it differently over there. Ah well. Another word which amuses Germans is when an English person takes a shot at something, and says, "Missed!" In German, "Mist" means manure. Somewhat along the lines of the German word for travel or a trip, "Fahrt", which is guaranteed to cause amusement at schools. Grab. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Mbo Date: 12 Sep 00 - 10:57 AM I still detest "Or your money back." It is a fragment and makes no grammatical sense! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: LR Mole Date: 12 Sep 00 - 11:07 AM Something I've never encountered except in this town : "also,too" when only the first word is needed. Some stray Britishism, perhaps (they use the words interchangeably, as in, "Too, there's this topic to mention...), a thing I never hear in the U.S.) But "Also,too"? (Alsotu)? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Little Hawk Date: 12 Sep 00 - 01:25 PM Despite being an almost impeccable speller and grammarian (or is that "grammaratician", ha ha), I have slipped up on occasion. I once used the word quay (pronounced "key") in a song, thinking it was pronounced "kway", and I rhymed it with bay. Imagine my embarrassment when someone pointed out that one. I had to rewrite the verse. The song was an early one anyway...one of those adolescent unrequited love laments...a pretty lousy song. It has been recycled in the compost bin for quite some time. Another word I used to mispronounce was derelict. I pronounced it "derilect". The same someone caught me on that one, and I corrected it. NU-CU-LER is the one that bugs me most!!! Why the hell can they not say it the right way...New-Clee-Arr...I grit my teeth when I hear someone say "Nucular". AAAAAAARGGHH! Then there's "hellacious". Some marines seem to have come up with that. "Hellish" wasn't cumbersome enough for them, so they had to add an extra syllable. Not that "hellacious" doesn't convey the idea effectively, but it's wrong, that's all. "Bodacious" is another word that seems to have evolved in the same fashion. Duh! Same with "humungous", which used to be "huge". And "disorientated", which used to be "disoriented". And "at that point in time" (major Duh!), which used to be "at that point" or "at that time". If you read the book "stalking the wild pendulum", you will discover that there is in fact no such thing as a "point in time"...but I digress. It's odd that rednecks, who are by nature rather inarticulate (generally), and who admire rough and inarticulate speech, will go to great lengths to make the language more complicated and convoluted than it already IS...in their search for simplicity! Gaaaaak! More examples: A country singer almost never simply says "my heart", he says "this heart of mine". Ha! Or to put it more specifically, he/she says "thiyis hooort of mahhhhhn". If he's really seriously country, he says "this here heart of mine", adding yet one more completely redundant word to the phrase. This is probably because he doesn't know that the word "this" already indicates "here", whereas the word "that" indicates "there". "Thiyis hyere hooort of maaahhhn, ayand thayat theyer hoooortt of yoooorn..." God, it's enough to make you turn in your antlers and retire to a monastery, there to ponder the vicissitudes of earthly existence on a planet where numerous visiting aliens have yet to find intelligent life, which is probably why they have avoided making direct dimplomatic contact thus far, especially when visiting Texas. They always keep all shields up on MAXIMUM when flying over Texas. If I made any typos above, forgive me. It's easy to do without noticing. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: mousethief Date: 12 Sep 00 - 01:26 PM "Who's" when "whose" is meant. (E.g. "Do you know who's guitar this is?") And I have long given up hoping that people will use "whom" instead of "who" in the objective case. Sigh. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Uncle_DaveO Date: 12 Sep 00 - 02:18 PM Littlehawk, "bodacious" and "hellacious" are words of almost ancient vintage in American speech, and it seems to me came about NOT because of an effort to simplify but to inject life and energy into speech. Which they do. Dave Oesterreich |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Terry K Date: 12 Sep 00 - 02:45 PM Bill D - you reminded me of another of my pet hates - the British usually say kill-OMM-eter (in those rare moments when we recognise the existence of anything but miles, that is). I much prefer KILL-o-meter. I reckon kill-OMM-eter only works if you're also prepared to cent-IMM-etre. Cheers, Terry |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: sophocleese Date: 12 Sep 00 - 03:04 PM 'Course as kids we always called them klompters. Posters who type out a long list of different people, acts, or whatever and don't put in any commas. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Bert Date: 12 Sep 00 - 04:05 PM It's KILO-Meter - if you must work in those stupid units at least get 'em right;-) It's aliminium 'cos it's a metal like chromium and sodium. Although that is a good candidate for leaving out the 'i' - SOD UM!!! |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: mousethief Date: 12 Sep 00 - 04:26 PM You know, I think I've discovered the problem with "comprise." Look at the parts: COM - Latin for "with" or "together" PRISE - English for "to pull apart." To pull apart together? To pull together apart? No wonder nobody can use this word correctly. Sheesh. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: GUEST,Luther Date: 12 Sep 00 - 05:26 PM OK, the word for the day is:
"Subliminable" (courtesy George W. Bush. Used without permission) |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Little Hawk Date: 12 Sep 00 - 07:03 PM Allan Lamport, a big fat politician in Toronto City Council was once upset because certain allegations had been made against him in the press and elsewhere. "I deny those allegations," he thundered, "and I defy the allegators!" Pretty classic, eh? As for bodacious and hellacious...well, they aren't in Webster's. On the other hand, I have to agree that they are very expressive words, that convey the meaning effectively. If y' wanna use 'em, fine with me. Just don't let me catch you saying "disorientated"! Or NUCULAR! And, yes! Let's hear if for "whom". Whom do you love? Whom do you desire? Whom do you mean? trivia: Bob Dylan once inexplicably used "whom" where the word "who" would have been correct (in "I Pity the Poor Immgrant"). Maybe it was some sly humour on his part....maybe not, but it sounds kind of neat. In a piece of poetry once he said, "And I seen...or rather, I have saw." He was definitely poking fun at certain critics with that line...those who accused him of poor English, that is. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: MarkS Date: 12 Sep 00 - 07:21 PM Chimbley - A structure made of masonary built to keep a fire on the inside of a building and vent the smoke to the outside. At least in central New York State (and maybe other places as well). Not to be confused with a smokestack which is the same deal but made out of sheet metal. And did anybody else have the high school health teacher who cautioned his young male charges to avoid intimacy with young women so as to avoid the contraction and spread of gongarea? MarkS |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Branwen23 Date: 12 Sep 00 - 07:34 PM someone has probably already mentioned this one, but it's a bit of a peeve when people use "your" for "you're" and vice versa.... absolutely grates my nerves... -Branwen- |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Mbo Date: 12 Sep 00 - 08:36 PM What I'm tired of is these "____ing ____" movies. I.e: Educating Rita Chasing Amy Stealing Beauty Etc... |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Lonesome EJ Date: 12 Sep 00 - 09:16 PM How about that question regarding your exact location: "Where are you at?" often shortened to "where y'at?" When I moved to Colorado,it was a long dry spell of summer,and everyone was talking about the "drouth"(drought). |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Banjer Date: 12 Sep 00 - 09:33 PM "Where are you at?"???? Isn't that a dangling participle? I was learnt that 'Where are you' is all you need to axe. One that always causes me to chuckle a bit is when a question is asked and the person answering starts out, "Well, to be honest....." Does that mean any other time he or she isn't being honest? Or how about, "To tell the truth...." Does that indicate you can expect a lie any other time? |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Little Hawk Date: 12 Sep 00 - 09:51 PM Ah! Here's a glaring one. So many people now say "I could care less..." when what they actually mean is that they could NOT care less! If they COULD care less, then why remark on the matter at all? When I was a boy everyone used to say "I couldn't care less", and that actually means what the phrase is intended to mean. Somewhere along the line some people started saying it the wrong way, and now almost everyone says it the wrong way. Also, people used to lie down, not lay down. You lay down a carpet. You then lie down on the carpet, the bed, etc. The dog, too, does not lay down, he lies down. People used to say "a pain in the neck", they now say "a pain in the ass" (which is stupid, IMHO, except maybe in Spaw's case...ha, ha). People used to say "up the creek without a paddle", they now say "up shit creek without a paddle". Why does everything keep getting dumber and cruder? I suspect it is the cumulative effect of TV on a hapless public. It's like witnessing the decline and fall of the Roman Empire, courtesy of the dollar bill and American Excess (You know, the credit card...?). Baseball players used to wear baseball caps. Now dorks of every possible variety wear them, half of the time backwards, which results in a stupid little tan mark on the forehead. They should put a little bunch of cut-out letters in the hat opening through which the sun can tan the word @$$hole just under the guy's hairline. Ha! I'm gonna stop now. I feel a bit queasy. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: GUEST,John Bauman Date: 12 Sep 00 - 10:52 PM Two abuses that drive me to destracticability. "IRREGARDLESS" and "small little" as though small emphasizes the littleness as some adjectival adverb, which brings me to the ultimate abuse over which I may choose the life of a hermit. Latin/Greek derivative compound madethehellup words to make over the counter self-medication concoctions sound like real medicine "Developed in Laboratories by guys who talk like that" or, and more often, to make pseudointellectual guys like me sound like they know whatthehell they're blustering about. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: The Beanster Date: 12 Sep 00 - 11:32 PM Time four a second thread on this if youse ax me. Also, too, this here page takes to long too load. Making me disorientated. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: GUEST, Banjo Johnny Date: 13 Sep 00 - 02:18 AM A couple more Midwesternisms, and a question for Brits. It's never simply "eye", but eye-ball. Never "pen", but always ink-pen. A strange turnabout: instead of, "let's see if we can find the key," it's "let's see if we can't find the key." For Brits ... I have been watching a Britcom called Last of the Summer Wine, about some old folks in a village. They are using words like "summat" for something, and "tha" for you. What part of Britain would this be?? Johnny in Oklahoma City |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Crazy Eddie Date: 13 Sep 00 - 09:31 AM Johnny in Oklahoma City, Last of the summer wine is based in rural Yorkshire. That's pretty far north in England, but still a fair bit from the Scottish Border. One of the actors is also the voice of Wallace in the "Wallace & Grommit" animated films. If you haven't heard of Wallace & Grommit, you probably have heard of "Chicken Run" by the same animators.
For more of the Yorkshire dialect get any book by James Herriot, who was a vet (= aninal doctor, not military) there for many years. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: Kim C Date: 13 Sep 00 - 10:48 AM Expresso instead of espresso. Interpretate. Somebody mentioned "axe" instead of "ask" ---- if I remember my Chaucer correctly, "axe" was "ask" in Middle English. Somebody please let me know if I am wrong here. I will confess, however, to using it in very informal conversation. :) |
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Subject: RE: BS: Mangling the English Language From: robroy Date: 13 Sep 00 - 11:52 AM Always thought 'drooth' meant 'dry' in Scottish dialect. Interestingly amongst older folks in the northwest of England they used the word 'childer' for the plural of child (which I thought was a Germanic thing) Robroy |