A point of English??

[steve836]

I work at a school where we have TEFAL teachers (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) . I still refer to them as the "non-stick" teachers.
I had forgotten to some extent that chit (or chitty) derives from India I still use it along with billy do ( ex French - billet doux or literally soft ticket).
Interesting too the use of hen north of the border; daan sarf  "ducks" was used to address a member of the opposite sex and in the midlands one says "duck" (as in "eyup me duck [pronounced dook]) regardless of the sex of the person being addressed.
In Norfolk the normal mode of address is "How you goin' on bor", bor (being a contraction of neighbor)is used regardless of sex and is quite different to boy which can also be used when addressing a male.
I remember too the amusement caused in the midlands when Bernard Matthews described his turkeys as "bootiful"; having been raised in Norfolk it seemed perfectly normal to me.

[Agrippa]

Don't forget the gooly chit.....

[joe cassidy]

'Empire Made' was definitely 'superior' to 'Made in Hong Kong' and certainly made us feel as if we all 'belonged' to 'one big BRITISH happy family' and that Mummy (aka 'Mother England' for those who may not know what i am referring to) would ALWAYS look after us...
As we know, it didn't quite work out that way (but it was great while we believed it).

Although the "happy family" is long dead politically I feel that it still exists culturally. I say this because I have friends in India and in South Africa, and we have common cultural references that go back to the "bad old days" but which allow us to be on the "same wavelength" today.

In fact the family is growing as countries such as Rwanda, that had no links to Britain, have joined the Commonwealth.

Must be cricket or Marmite that attracts them ?

Best regards,


Joe

[EtchedPixels]

And then there is regional english !

When my daughter started keeping sheep she saw me pointing at each in turn saying " Yan, tahn, thether, mether , , ", she thought I was naming them [ex-pat Cumberland]
I wonder what language root that was from, Norse ? maybe. Some googling is called for I think.

Yan tahn thether is apparently an odd remnant of cumbrian so "celtic" (although the low numbers are from the same roots for most proto indo european languages)

[EtchedPixels]

Must be cricket or Marmite that attracts them ?

We have to keep finding new countries to play cricket with because after a while they always get better than us and we need someone else to beat.

Alan

[MalcolmInN]

And then there is regional english !

When my daughter started keeping sheep she saw me pointing at each in turn saying " Yan, tahn, thether, mether , , ", she thought I was naming them [ex-pat Cumberland]
I wonder what language root that was from, Norse ? maybe. Some googling is called for I think.

Yan tahn thether is apparently an odd remnant of cumbrian so "celtic" (although the low numbers are from the same roots for most proto indo european languages)

Yes, thanks for that,
very odd, after I posted I found this wiki page,
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yan_tan_tethera
facinating ( caveat - I dunno the truth of any of it nor where they get it all from yet,,, )
variations on a theme from _across_ the UK !
All the there quoted for the Cumberland and Westmorland varieties have more more syllables than I remember (eg tethera / terddera, instead of my tether etc. ) so where I got mine from is a bit of a puzzle.
The closest I see is Swaledale, but although I have a greatgranmother  'Swales' I never spent any time in that region, well odd !

So, back to bridies, for years I thought them was either some stange perversion of Finnan Haddies (they being of northeast Scotland origin as well) or a strange ritual involving a silke of sule skerrie ! !!
It was a relief to find that it was an evolution of a haggis !

[Newportnobby]

Has anyone else noticed the number of TV news correspondents who have been/are pronouncing 'General Election' as if the word 'Election' begins with an 'A'?

[Malc]

Has anyone else noticed the number of TV news correspondents who have been/are pronouncing 'General Election' as if the word 'Election' begins with an 'A'?

Wondered what was coming there Mick.