The state of British English

Uriel   Fri Aug 12, 2005 5:42 am GMT
"I can agree with him about American English, but not about Imperial, which is the measurement that put man on the moon."

Adam, Adam, Adam; you are funny. I believe "The Eagle has landed" was said in an AMERICAN accent....
Rick Johnson   Fri Aug 12, 2005 9:34 am GMT
Awoala Jack,

The problem with saying how vowels sounded in the past as in "pan" sounding like "pen" is that it is unlikely this would be universal; for example, if you listen to old British news clips from 1930s, "landing" is often pronounced more like "lending", so in a sense this was alive until qute recently. Also I've hears people say that "sea" sounded more like "say", but this is still alive in some accents, Bimingham, for example. In fact, Shakespeare has a cool rhythm in a Brummy accent.
Damian in Edinburgh   Sun Aug 14, 2005 11:21 am GMT
Britain's dialect revival is right up our twitten:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-1734226,00.html

I'm left-handed and here in Scotland I'm called (among other things):

Ker haundit
A corrie fister
A corrie dukit
Paddy handed
A carrie pod

In the Inverness area only: "a kervag".

Just south of the border in Northumbria a corrie fister is called a "Cuddy wifter", further south in Yorkshire "gallock handed" and further south again in the Midlands "gab handed". In SE England: "keck handed"; in Devon a "tutchy scutchy" and across the Tamar in Cornwall "click handed".

To feel the cold in Scotland you're "coolriff" or "haarie". In the Kilmarnock area only "foonert".

Down in England so many different words for feeling cold:
eg:

Bath and Bristol areas: Shrammed
In Adam's part of Lancashire: Fleeing
Somerset: Nesh
Yorkshire: Nithered
(I heard that for the first time when I was down at uni in Leeds)
Sheffield: Clemmed
East Anglia: Taters
Hertfordshire: Frozzed

Those are just a very few examples of increasingly revived dialect local dialect terms in the UK despite mass communication, transitory population movements, immigration and the mass media. In some areas these dialectal terms are being combined with Estuary as well.

The UK is such a diverse country and it's common to have third generation + Chinese, Asian, Caribbean, European etc etc people speaking with Scouse, Glasgow, Estuary/Cockney, Welsh, West Country, Brummie, Geordie, Yorkie etc accents. Even within individual accent/dialectal areas you have variations of the same - eg Scouse (Liverpool/Merseyside): Chinese Scouse, West Indian Scouse, Asian Scouse, etc etc. The same very much so in Glasgow. In the UK accents vary a lot in a matter of just a few miles...in this crowded island the term "local" really means a very small area unlike in physically very much larger countries.

Ain't English Language movements and trends great to study! Cheers :-)
Awoala Jack   Tue Aug 16, 2005 5:26 pm GMT
Rick Johnson (Fri Aug 12, 2005 9:34 am GMT ),

Thank you Rick for your explanation, but don't you think that the pronunciation of those days was more like how the original QUEENS is?
Travis   Tue Aug 16, 2005 6:12 pm GMT
Damian, I've never before heard any of those terms mentioned in your post ever, that article notwithstanding. Hell, all of this aside, if someone used one of those terms in everyday speech with me, I wouldn't've known what they meant whatsoever myself.
Damian in Edinburgh   Tue Aug 16, 2005 7:00 pm GMT
**I wouldn't've known what they meant whatsoever**

TRAVIS: If you ever paid us a visit here we'd really have fun bamboozling, confusing and perplexing you! Is that not just plain evil? Hee hee! We're not really...only jesting so never mind...we'd treat you to a pint and maybe some haggis, tatties and neeps if your stomach is strong enough. :-)

None of us here are feeling haarie right now....in fact it's getting a wee bit het.
Awoala Jack   Tue Aug 16, 2005 8:26 pm GMT
You know what? Oxford now has come up with a big, big learners dictionary. It's easily the biggest and obviously not the best yet. Cambridge still rules the waves like England's past.

Oxford and it's research crew should strive to teach British English more. How many American dictionaries for learners cater for British English?
Travis   Tue Aug 16, 2005 8:40 pm GMT
I don't know what tatties or neeps are, and considering that those were mentioned in the same sentence as haggis, I'm not sure I want to know. ;)

On another note, what exactly do "haarie" or "het" mean in the context of your pose, Damian?
Travis   Tue Aug 16, 2005 8:43 pm GMT
That should be "post" above.
Damian to Travis   Tue Aug 16, 2005 9:55 pm GMT
Guess you know what a haggis is......in case you don't (and this is why I mentioned a strong stomach) ... it's a dish made up of offal from a sheep or a calf, oatmeal, onion, suet and seasonings and boiled in the skin from the lining of the animal's stomach. If you're not vomiting by now I will just say it sounds horrible, looks a wee bit less horrible....but tastes really, really nice!

In Scotland you can buy them from the street by street delivery vendors along with other goodies..just like you can from the ice cream vendors that come round with their musical chimes when it's het (sorry..hot) weather....like now....well, hot by Scottish standards...like 24C. That's a heatwave here. :-)

Tatties - potatoes
Neeps - turnips (or can be swedes).

Haarie - feeling the cold
Het - hot!

If ye ever come to Scotland and feel peckish I'll offer ye a haggis....I'd love to see ye give it a try......just close your eyes and hash (munch) on it....ye'll just love it.
greg   Wed Aug 17, 2005 6:29 am GMT
En passant : Sc/An <haggis> vient de VF <hachis> [aSi] = Al <Hackfleisch> via une déformation outre-manchaise du terme continental tandis que An <hash> provient de Fr <hacher>.
Awoala Jack   Thu Aug 18, 2005 1:42 pm GMT
Eenie-meenie is the word
Sander   Thu Aug 18, 2005 1:46 pm GMT
Haggis:

''c.1420, now chiefly Scot., but common in M.E., perhaps from O.Fr. agace "magpie," on analogy of the odds and ends the bird collects. The other theory traces it to O.E. haggen "to chop"

LOL, I hope that it's related to O.E. if only for the good name of the French cuisine! /:)
Ben   Thu Aug 18, 2005 8:57 pm GMT
"American English is lazy English, because it butchers beautiful British English to create a "shorthand" version of English."


Bah! The purpose of language is to communicate thoughts, not to sound pretty. I believe that the reason English is such a useful language, because often less words are required to convey a message than in some other languages. If AE shortens this further, it only means that it is making the language more efficient.

*waits for some idiot to restart the "nappy vs. diaper" argument*
Sander   Thu Aug 18, 2005 9:03 pm GMT
I doubt people learn English for it's efficiency