BBC Sherlock Fan Forum - Serving Sherlockians since February 2012 » Awkward words in the US

Molly Hooper · June 9, 2012 5:25 pm

Showing my ignorance agian, but... What's a throw-out word?

m0r1arty · June 9, 2012 5:26 pm

Here's a favourite of mine from down under.

-m0r

Tantalus · June 9, 2012 5:33 pm

Molly Hooper wrote:
Showing my ignorance agian, but... What's a throw-out word?

Oh, just something easily dismissed. Kinda like responding, "Whatever..." (Oh that reminds me, have you seen "We Bought A Zoo". Cute story.

Molly Hooper · June 9, 2012 5:40 pm

No, I haven't, but I want to!
Is it relevant to 'Whatever' or Quavers?!

Tantalus · June 9, 2012 6:51 pm

Whatever. (Not said dismissively, of course, but in answer to your query...)

Smoggy_London_Air · June 9, 2012 7:59 pm

I do use a lot of 'Britishisms' when I speak, and even more when I write because when I was younger I spent all my time reading Harry Potter instead of talking to people!

I still always refer to cookies with tea as 'biscuits' and the mail as 'post'. I didn't realize this was strange until I was seven and said "should I get the post, mom?" and she freaked out!

Randy is one of the worst ones, because it's a name! My personal favorite Australianism (at least I think it's from Australia, correct me if I'm wrong, kazza) is "budgie smuggler"! My history teacher told us about that one last year and was really puzzled as to the origin. I did not explain it for him!

Plastered means the same thing as it does there.

Tantalus, I always thought that saying someone was being an ass or made an ass of himself was still fairly vulgar! Maybe it's different in the South? (no matter what the Brits say, we have much more linguistic variation in this country than they do in theirs!)

Molly Hooper · June 9, 2012 8:11 pm

Ooh, are you asking for a ... DEBATE?!

Smoggy_London_Air wrote:
I"should I get the post, mom?" and she freaked out!

At least you called her MOM (not MUM!)

kazza474 · June 9, 2012 11:33 pm

Budgie smugglers

Band Aids

Tantalus · June 10, 2012 1:52 am

kazza474 wrote:

Budgie smugglers

Band Aids

Thanks for the picture of Band-Aids. I wanted to post one but don't really know how.

So... budgie smugglers are what you call those smooth, round hand-rail thingies on ships. Right?

Tantalus · June 10, 2012 1:57 am

Smoggy_London_Air wrote:
Tantalus, I always thought that saying someone was being an ass or made an ass of himself was still fairly vulgar! Maybe it's different in the South?

Maybe it is more common in the south, but I think it's more a time-period thing. Using ass in this way isn't as common now, but in the late 19th century in America, up until oh, the 50's or so, it was in pretty regular use, even around children, and in children's literature. I collect children's books from the turn-of-the-century, and they're pretty full of the expression.

Still, I could say, "He made quite an ass of himself," in front of the most prudish person down here, and not get more than a raised eyebrow at most.

Davina · June 10, 2012 1:21 pm

Damn is definitely not regarded as swearing in the UK and although bloody is rude it is not regarded is rude a word as it once was. The other word for a cat is used as in the US but is also used to indicate that someone, usually male, is a coward/softie/wimp.

Arse is ruder than saying bottom but is just seen as coarse language rather than really swearing.

Also, why do North American stand in lines rather than queues?

Molly Hooper · June 10, 2012 1:30 pm

Yeah, and why do they say
'Thanks for the ride!' instead of
'Thanks for the lift!' ?

Davina · June 10, 2012 2:02 pm

And why do they call lifts elevators?

Sammy · June 10, 2012 7:44 pm

Hm. I can't really take part in that discussion, not being British or American.
BUT the topic is "Awkward words in the US", soooo... there are some words - called "false friends" - which can be confusing for Germans because they sound similiar to a German word but have a complete different meaning or something like that.
I guess the become/bekommen confusion is quite a famous one.
I don't really know good examples right now, but maybe... well "ankle" sounds quite the same as the German "Enkel"(=grandchild).

Oh, and what really confused not only me but probably a lot of others as well - public schools! Damn, the realization I had when I found out what a public school is in Britain... :D

Tantalus · June 11, 2012 4:24 pm

Molly Hooper wrote:
Yeah, and why do they say
'Thanks for the ride!' instead of
'Thanks for the lift!' ?

Well, I could be biased (probably am), but "ride" seems to make more sense in this usage than "lift"...

Molly Hooper · June 11, 2012 5:08 pm

Yeah, it does; i just wanted something to moan about!!

tobeornot221b · June 11, 2012 5:20 pm

I don't know whether you guys know about this site:
http://www.effingpot.com
I bookmarked it ages ago and I'm having lots of fun reading it.

Molly Hooper · June 11, 2012 5:30 pm

Haha! That's brilliant! The name puts you off a bit though!

Davina · June 11, 2012 9:43 pm

Sammy...what about Gift?
Oh and Mist?
And Lust!

Last edited by Davina (June 11, 2012 9:45 pm)

sherlockskitty · June 11, 2012 10:04 pm

UK==football
USA==Soccer.

they both use the same ball-- round with black spots...so why is this?

UK--Skip
USA--Dumpster

Sherlock said, "Took me less than an hour to find the right skip"

There's a Harry Potter Lexicon...it has a subsection called STRICTLY BRITISH you might find some fun reading there.

Last edited by sherlockskitty (June 11, 2012 10:11 pm)