Two nations divided by a common language.

[DickyP]

Not always the same. After all, in Guardians of the Galaxy, it was a plot point that StarLord was one but not the other. Of course, StarLord's given name was "Peter" which is ALSO slang for a "Dick" so I suspect there was a bit of sneaky writing going on there anyway.

I love what's in a bit of slang - back when Dick as slang meant detective, Peter meant burglar in UK.

 

[DickyP]

Ever since the movie/film 'Dumb and Dumber' we Brits, especially youngsters have started to use the word 'dumb' to mean stupid. The Concise Oxford English Dictionary and Oxford Dictionary of American English show the primary meanings of the words to be:

American English ​	English English ​
Dumb -> idiotic etc​	Stupid or other equivalents -> idiotic etc​
Mute -> Can't speak​	Dumb-> Can't speak​
Elective Mute -> Can but doesn't speak​	Mute -> Can but doesn't speak​

Hence about 20 years ago on UK Evening TV when being interviewed Dustin Hoffman got upset when the expression 'deaf & dumb' was used by the host Terry Wogan because he thought deaf people were being accused of being stupid, whereas it refers to those who can neither hear nor speak.

 

[Pat Hartman]

It must be our dictionaries because I'm pretty sure that most Americans don't know the difference between dumb and mute as the English do. Either that or it's a "politically correct" issue where they can't use the word dumb in its actual meaning of being unable to speak because of it's "stupid" slang meaning so they substitute mute instead so no one will be offended.

 

[DickyP]

It must be our dictionaries because I'm pretty sure that most Americans don't know the difference between dumb and mute as the English do. Either that or it's a "politically correct" issue where they can't use the word dumb in its actual meaning of being unable to speak because of it's "stupid" slang meaning so they substitute mute instead so no one will be offended.

Why would you - its what we (differently) understand. Not right or wrong - just different.

 

[The_Doc_Man]

I fully understand the difference between dumb and mute, both meanings. In our current political situation, we want to find our politicians' "mute" button and wish they were dumb so they would be forced to provide their promises in writing.

 

[ColinEssex]

People who are somehow different seem to attract bullies.

It was the same when I was at school in the late 50's and early 60's. Anyone different - black, not English, deformed, stupid, free school meals, they all got beaten up. Our school had several gangs (mixed sexes). The girls used to urge on the boys to fight other gangs.
Col

 

[DickyP]

It was the same when I was at school in the late 50's and early 60's. Anyone different - black, not English, deformed, stupid, free school meals, they all got beaten up. Our school had several gangs (mixed sexes). The girls used to urge on the boys to fight other gangs.
Col

Essex was obviously different to Cambridgeshire in the same period. Bullying was seldom seen and when it was it was only against a very few misfits by a very few bullies. And it didn't involve beatings up and nor were there any gangs. Perhaps I was just lucky, or maybe it was just that I went to a single sex school.

 

[ColinEssex]

Essex was obviously different to Cambridgeshire in the same period. Bullying was seldom seen and when it was it was only against a very few misfits by a very few bullies. And it didn't involve beatings up and nor were there any gangs. Perhaps I was just lucky, or maybe it was just that I went to a single sex school.

I grew up in Bristol. Cambridge strikes me a bit posh anyway. I went to a comprehensive school (not the grammar bit)
Col

 

[The_Doc_Man]

Unfortunately I had the misfortune of being different, too. When I took the schooling placement tests, most of the kids went to first grade or were placed in a 2nd year of kindergarten. I was recommended for 3rd grade. Mom put her foot down on that one, though. They compromised on direct placement to 2nd grade - which made me the youngest kid in almost every class I was in through grade school. AND youngest meant smallest so that made me a target - a smart kid too small to defend against bullies and socially inexperienced. Even in high school I was bullied because some of the kids from that elementary school and my junior high were in the same school district so followed me for 11 years.

 

[DickyP]

I grew up in Bristol. Cambridge strikes me a bit posh anyway. I went to a comprehensive school (not the grammar bit)
Col

Cambridgeshire not Cambridge - subtle difference. Village school for primary and grammar for secondary (mind you Peterborough wasn't in Cambridgeshire when I started secondary school Northamptonshire and then County of Huntingdon and Peterborough).

 

[ColinEssex]

Cambridgeshire not Cambridge - subtle difference.

Same difference to a 'rough end' of Bristol kid.
Col

 

[DickyP]

Same difference to a 'rough end' of Bristol kid.
Col

Nothing like the same - city of Cambridge is full of leftie intellectuals and well paid electronics industry: it does have rough end as well. The shire is/was hardworking farming communities, especially in the 60s. My primary school had a grand total of 90 pupils from 5 different villages.

 

[Space Cowboy]

Unfortunately I had the misfortune of being different, too. When I took the schooling placement tests, most of the kids went to first grade or were placed in a 2nd year of kindergarten. I was recommended for 3rd grade. Mom put her foot down on that one, though. They compromised on direct placement to 2nd grade - which made me the youngest kid in almost every class I was in through grade school. AND youngest meant smallest so that made me a target - a smart kid too small to defend against bullies and socially inexperienced. Even in high school I was bullied because some of the kids from that elementary school and my junior high were in the same school district so followed me for 11 years.

You have my sympathies there, I too was a bit different at school. Almost every fight I ever got into was over bullying. I could not stand it, I was always a good fighter and "****" ( needs to into nations divided by a common language thread) of the school playground in every year, If I ever saw anyone "picking" on someone or bullying them, for whatever reason, I would take them to task and do the same to them and ultimately if the bully wanted to fight about it they had to fight me. It was a grammar school though, so most of the bullies were soft really, just vicious with their mouths when in a group.

 

[DickyP]

Just found another variation actually on this forum. I came across while browsing a thread from last year that talked about Julian dates, which initially caused me some confusion as the only modern Julian dates I know of are the astronomical ones. Gathered the meaning reading the thread but then went and did some dictionary research. Eventually in my US Webster's I found a reference to its usage in North America instead of what is more correctly termed Ordinal dates in English English and elsewhere. Webster's hinted that it was an obscure and unexplained usage and implies that it is a minor usage.

Just how common is this usage in the opinion of our US members?

 

[Pat Hartman]

For some reason, people in IT referred to a date in yyyyddd as a Julian date. This was our most common date data type. It is only one digit shorter than yyyymmdd (mainframe dates did not include punctuation and were always stored year first for sorting purposes) but that made all the difference since it was also odd. It allowed us to use Comp-3 data type which compressed the field to 4 bytes. The 8 digit version would have taken 8 bytes to store since they wouldn't fit in a Comp-3 data type.

 

[DickyP]

We now have an example of convergence between the two language variants. The usage of the adjective military: this now generally refers to all armed services in UK in the same way it changed in 1920s in the USA.

When I joined the Army in 1967 the word solely referred to the Army. Even now the UK equivalent of the USA UCMJ since 2006 is the Manuall of Service Law, which replaced the Manuals of Military, Naval and AirForce Law.

This was a real faux pas in servcie circles in those days to use military the popular modern way!

 

[DickyP]

Came across another difference today which surprised me. I got talking to two American tourists in my home city of Norwich. I used the expression "to throw the baby away with the bathwater", which they'd never heard before. Do our US members recognise this expression?

 

[Pat Hartman]

Came across another difference today which surprised me. I got talking to two American tourists in my home city of Norwich. I used the expression "to throw the baby away with the bathwater", which they'd never heard before. Do our US members recognise this expression?

I also come from Norwich (Connecticut) The expression is pretty common in the US. It always means you've done something truly stupid because your action was applied broadly and indiscriminately rather than specifically to something you wanted to get rid of.

Most of this thread has been about the difference between US and UK English but even within the US we can't understand each other. I grew up in Connecticut and when I moved to Nashville, Tennessee in the early 70's I ordered a diet Coke and the waitress asked me if I wanted root beer, orange, or cola. Apparently all soda (also called soft drinks in some places) is called "coke" in Nashville. Depending on where you are in the country, large sandwiches on long rolls are called grinders, subs, or hoagies.

 

[AccessBlaster]

My Aunt from Ohio had never had a Taco, until visiting us in the 70's

 

[The_Doc_Man]

Depending on where you are in the country, large sandwiches on long rolls are called grinders, subs, or hoagies.

Or, originating in New Orleans, "po-boys" - a sandwich typically on an 8-inch to 12-inch bread loaf, 2 1/2 to 3 inches across. The Subway 12-inch sandwich is on a loaf on the thin side of that measurement. The most common name for the bread used for po-boys is "baguette" - which can be up to 3 feet long in which case it will be cut into three x 1-foot segments.