hey man

<<Spanish women have got over this long ago. English women wll have to as well.>>

Get over it? Mate you've got your self arse over face here, this isn't something that is even an issue, I was merely mentioning that I personally dislike this usage - that's all.

It is just a new feature of British English that has been picked up, inevitably, because of American media, and is certainly not one that is even noticed (apart from sad gits like me).

For me though, it is a new addition which I think doesn't sound right and one that, despite it's wide range of use wasn't even needed here. I say this because for as long as English has been spoken here in England, using "guys" to refer to a mixed sex group or even exclusively a female group just didn't exist (up until around 4 years ago that is). Which basically means that we were doing just fine using other readily available alternatives such as "everyone", "you lot", "people", "ladies & gentleman", "boys & girls", "folks" etc etc.

I have read people saying that "Guys" is a 'degendered' word - I have to ask " who says it's been degendered"?? If the Americans' degender it then fine, but that doesn't mean that all other languages need to follow suit does it?? That this rule suddenly applies to all and sundrae.

Which brings me to the point you make about sounding pretentious Travis. To my ears it sounds silly being spoken by a Briton, only I suppose, because of my interest in languages and the association I have made between certain words & the way they are used by the various English speaking countries. I can't really imagine specific British English words such as "tosser" making it across the pond and if it was used there then yeah, I'd imagine the circumstances of it being used would no doubt be 'pretentious'. But the usage of what we would call 'Americanism's' here in Britain isn't us being pretentious in anyway, rather it is because that word is now a very real part of the language spoken here.

I certainly don't have a problem with American words being incorporated into our language here which benefit the language but I do have a problem with the replacement of perfectly good words we have, especially when those words are specific to my dialect, which are being replaced like for like by the American variety, leading (and it is leading) to a near whitewash of British English. Anyway, that is another subject and one that is probably best steared clear off because there is nothing doing, it is the way it is - sadly.

Apologies in advance for any spelling & grammar mistakes.

Maybe it's just a Californian thing, but on the west coast at least, "geezer means" an extremely old, mentally unsound man, so you don't have to worry about that word slipping out of the mouths of any of us girls too often. I have to admit, I do get a good snicker in every so often when Pub Lunch uses the word geezer on himself, just as I'm sure he cringes when I use dude.

>>I have read people saying that "Guys" is a 'degendered' word - I have to ask " who says it's been degendered"?? If the Americans' degender it then fine, but that doesn't mean that all other languages need to follow suit does it?? That this rule suddenly applies to all and sundrae.<<

I am not advocating that you adopt "you guys" or other genderless uses of "guys" yourself; rather, I was just responding to criticism of "you guys" being sexist in nature and demands that its genderless use be dispensed with.

>>I certainly don't have a problem with American words being incorporated into our language here which benefit the language but I do have a problem with the replacement of perfectly good words we have, especially when those words are specific to my dialect, which are being replaced like for like by the American variety, leading (and it is leading) to a near whitewash of British English. Anyway, that is another subject and one that is probably best steared clear off because there is nothing doing, it is the way it is - sadly.<<

That's the thing - I really do not see any reason for Britons to start trying to speak like North Americans, and honestly I dislike it when Britons in particular try to sing like North Americans (as why do they have to dispense with their own dialects when singing and instead try to emulate North American artists in the first place).

<<(as why do they have to dispense with their own dialects when singing and instead try to emulate North American artists in the first place).>>

Follow the money...

Britons sing with American accents simply because of international appeal, singing, hopefully, to a much wider audience than the domestic one. I mean, just look at the difference between their "singing accent" and their "speaking accent", as different as chalk is to cheddar. You hear this singer singing in Californian but talking in Scouse. I mean, who would like to hear anyone singing in broad local accents on the international commercial musical scene? Some Brits (not that many) sort of just go half way - mid Atlantic, somewhere about 45N 65W....north of the Azores or some such place.

The world has yet to hear an American singer hoping to hit the top spots internationally by singing in English English RP. That would be just too silly, wouldn't it.

Well, of course people often sing differently than they normally speak; hell, a lot of North Americans actually sing non-rhotically or pseudo-non-rhotically, even though in this case that is likely more due to the influence of AAVE upon American popular music than English English. That said, though, I really do not see why one couldn't sing in one's native dialect aside from mere commercialism. Hell, here in the US, music in Southern dialects actually has become rather successful, albeit in a genre-specific way, such that individuals singing in such genres who are not from the South may still put on Southern accents. Also, I have heard music in things like Low Saxon (rather than, in that case, Dutch, considering that the Low Saxon dialect in question is Achterhoeks). As for being "broad", I really do not see what the problem with that is myself, considering that is really more a subjective judgement with respect to general popularity than even a more neutral aesthetic judgement than anything else (as shown by how, for example, Brummie is often viewed very poorly in the UK, yet many English-speakers from outside the UK actually like the way it sounds aesthetically).

(Hope that's not repetitive)

How do you use madam/ma'am? The proper usage, I mean.

"Apologies in advance for any spelling & grammar mistakes."

On the contrary, thanks for spelling "grammar" properly, rather than the misspelling "grammer." I've certainly used "Hey man" on occasion, but not habitually. I certainly use "guys" in addressing a mixed gender group. And, for the record, I'll be 69 my next birthday in a few months...

Here in Brazil we came up with a funny solution to call someone with a friendly silly colloquial term without being sexist. Our equivalent word for "man/dude" in the idiomatic sense raised in this thread is "cara" as in "qual é, cara?" (=what's up, man?) "cara" literally means "face", and..yes, at least everyone I know here has some sort of a face, so it's not sexism at all! You should try something like that.

Speaking of face, what about the Germans who came up with the slang "ungesicht"? Ungesicht is literally a made up word meaning "unface" to express that someone has a really ugly face, something like "she's a really unface". It's funny how languages go their own twisted ways.

One's got to love Linguistics ... and not being called an unface..

<<Our equivalent word for "man/dude" in the idiomatic sense raised in this thread is "cara" as in "qual é, cara?" (=what's up, man?) "cara" literally means "face", and..yes, at least everyone I know here has some sort of a face>>

We already have a word like this: it called "person", which originally meant 'an actor's mask'/'face' (Etruscan phersu < Gk. prósōpa "face").

"Ungesicht" sounds like "Angesicht" (face), perhaps a play off that?

<<We already have a word like this: it called "person", which originally meant 'an actor's mask'/'face' (Etruscan phersu < Gk. prósōpa "face")>>

person in Portuguese: "pessoa"

face in Portuguese: "cara" (informal), "rosto" or "face" (formal)

what I meant is that we call people "cara" (face) in the "dude" sense, not "person".

But it's good to know that pessoa (person) comes from "actor's mask/face" so it all makes a little sense in the end.

I think Brtions who sing in non-British accents do so because they're working in the vernacular of the art-form (in this case, North American Blues). I'm fine with it and I don't find it pretensious at all. Mick Jagger sounds perfectly authentic when he does his southern drawl in "Dead Flowers". No one here is offended.

I have an old friend from high school who is a musician and on certain songs he affects an English accent. he says it's because the song has an "English vibe". Somehow, though it just sounds too pretentious. The adoption of the vernacular of the art-form only goes one way across the Atlantic. It's interesting that the English see it the same way.

Madonna's faux British accent was abhorred here in the US.

I wonder what British people think of Madonna's new accent.

But it's fine too when the British sing with their own accents, just look at Blur or Elastica, and many others.