This thread brings to mind when in the RAF working in Berlin alongside Americans. Some wit put up an English/American dictionary. All the usual ones but the funniest was "jeet?" which transcribed as _ Have you yet partaken of your lunch? this was due to the fact then when lunch was ready a cook walked down the corridors, throwing open doors and yelling "Jeet?" I often wonder if American would be a totally different language to English today if it was not for modern communication.
Douche is one I still don't understand. But do understand it when in ploiticas when it comes doewn to voting you have a giant douche and a turd sandwich to choose between.
My french flatmate got a job in Australia as an english teacher. She was asked do you teach English or American English they apetticually wanted UK English teachers on US English teachers. I assume there's a reason for this. But you may have to ask an an austrailain although I'm not sure if we have one that would know, he may just decide to flush this shit were it belongs or decide it can't lie it's way out of a wet paper bag, who knows.
Might even be by trade too according to babble obama.
as in Dutch, Flemish, German, Afrikaans, Swedish, Danish..all being the same years ago, with no modern communication...
In message , NY writes
Agreed. I have also found Americans struggle with 'half a dozen'. At first, I thought perhaps they don't say dozen as we do, then remembered the US film Dirty Dozen. Most odd.
I think Dutch and Flemish are only about as different as British and American English. Afrikaans is apparently understandable by the Dutch (but the reverse is not true). Dutch and German are actually a continuum of mutually comprehensible dialects (although Standard Dutch and German are not mutually comprehensible).
Swedish, Danish (and both Norwegians) separated from the others quite a lot earlier.
There was once a competition for the best American/British English misunderstanding. The winner was:
English uncle takes his American nephews and nieces for a walk in Florida.
What they heard: Get in the middle of the road, there's a parrot coming! What he should have said: Get on the sidewalk, there's a truck coming! What he actually said: Get on the pavement, there's a lorry coming!
(A "lory" is a sort of parrot:
Er no.
Most countries have significant minority languages (eg Welsh, Irish Gaelic, Scottish Gaelic, and Scots in the UK).
Some countries share languages with other countries (Austria and Germany; Belgium and the Netherlands/France).
A more accurate summary would be "there are many countries and many languages (even if you ignore the languages that are only spoken by a majority in very small areas)."
and some, like Belgium and Switzerland, have more than one major language,
One of the funniest things I have ever seen (linguistically) was in London with some French (aged 19 or 20) students a friend was teaching at summer school (possibly arranged by the French embassy). My friend had invited them and some English friends on a picnic in Hyde Park. We were all chatting in French and English, and a Quebecquios couple approached and asked a question. None of the French speakers could understand a word, and eventually, the conversation was conducted in English.
The French present tried to make excuses, but given how an American can converse with an Australian with no effort, it rather torpedoed the idea of French as an international language.
And the USA is made up of many States, whose language is nominally the same, but mutually incomprehensible in some cases, which has a significant population of Spanish speakers and has many mutually incomprehensible subcultures. What, for example, does an East LA Hispanic gang member have in common with a German speaking Mennonite in Pennsylvania?
My own personal favourite is "tuition".
In the UK, this is instruction in a task or skill.
In the USA, it's the money you pay in order to obtain that instruction.
SWMBO was once reduced to using sign language when buying bread in Gateshead.
An oversized penis?
They think tipping is money or something you do to a cow. They use dump(ing). Eg Dump truck.
And Platdeutsch in the USA.
It started as 'tuition fee', to distinguish it from other fees, such as 'lab fees'.
Probably less than 100 C :)
"Gotten" falls into this category, used commonly in The US, rarely in the UK.
English friends of ours moved to the US, and their well-educated children were put into the Remedial English Class until they could speak like the locals.
What, for example, does an East LA Hispanic gang member have in common with someone living on a sink estate in south London?
They both speak in similar ways.
We use dump too. Both for dumping stuff and dumper trucks. and other unsavoury things.
You must be a foreigner.
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