Slang
 

So this is mostly for the Brits and the Americans....what slang words do you just dont understand of the guys at the other end of the pond.

I dont like how they say HOLIDAY instead of VACATION.

I know its not exactly slang, but I used that for lack of a better thread title.

This is maybe not slang but the Brits call a cigarette a fag.

But a "fag" is different in the States.

I don't know. Going on holiday sounds much better to me. :)

The Monkees couldn't even use the real title of this song in the UK:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mulrm0wFADE (thanx 2 sarame287)

Yet the title is gibberish to most Americans...
Randy Souse Git :eek:

Somethings just don't translate well "across the pond."

P.S.: I'm a proud American. :cool:

It's weird how Americans say 'I could care less'. Just weird, when they mean the exact opposite. Fucking weird bastards.

FR, I couldn't care less...

Most Americans I know say "I couldn't care less". But most Americans I know are literate. I knew one guy who would say "I could care less, but I don't know how". Clever.

My word from the Brits is "fanny". In America that is such an innocuous word that it's used by parents on their kids (e.g. "sit your fanny over there"). It's a kind of cutesy word that means ass here. Not across the pond though. I have no idea how they came up with their meaning.

How WE came up with OUR meaning?
You know we were here first, do you not? :)

How did YOU come up with YOUR meaning?

In Britain the word "cunt" is used as an insult even when talking about a man. I see this on British political blogs all the time ("Gordon Brown is an utter cunt", etc.).

My parents immigrated from Britain and I grew up with Monty Python and so forth, so I picked up a lot of the British usage, but that one still looks odd to me.

The British comedian Peter Cook once described how, on an early TV appearance in the US, he said "I'm just not happy unless I've got a fag in my mouth." Later on, of course, he understood why everyone looked a bit startled.:D

And why a blowjob is called a blowjob? I could understand a suckjob, but blowjob? Sounds like an alchotest!

Strangely enough in German it means pretty much the same ... "blow" someone.

What do the Greek call it?

We call it a "pipe" or simply a sucking of a cock... prosy greeks... :D

My understanding is that the term "blowjob" comes from hookers at the turn of the century. They would call fellatio "a job down below" this in time shortened to a "below job" then lazy pronunciation came into play and it became "blowjob"

And a bloody lovely word it is :D

And a lovely concept as well

The one I want to know is why is it ass in the US and arse in the UK for bum?

I've always heard Brits say "Grandfather." Never once heard one say "Grandpa, Pa Paw, etc." It's always "Grandfather."

Only posh people use that RapeU, the rest of use Grandad.

Pervipete: The one I want to know is why is it ass in the US and arse in the UK for bum?

Well, you don't pronounce "r" after a vowel over there ("arse" ==> "aass" in pronunciation), so perhaps Americans purloined the locution but spelled it the way it sounded to them.

Interesting about the etymology of "blowjob" -- I had never heard that before. Curious that it's pretty much the same in German though -- sie hat ihm einen geblasen = she blew him one. In Russian you say отсосать which comes from the word for "suck", so that's more logical.

Japanese has rippu saabisu, which is actually a Japanized pronunication of English "lip service". They can be imaginative in the way they adopt our words.

Exactly, it's supposed to be 'I couldn't care less." Everyone I know says the opposite though and when I call them on it they argue with me. Illiterate people frighten me :(

Arse started as a toned down version of ass in England...like saying gad instead of god or demmed instead of damned...difference is that arse stuck around for some reason.

I stick around ass as well... but i know the reason! :D :p

But it's Arsch in German, so unless they got that word from the Brits, the R must be original, assuming the words are true cognates derived from a word in the proto-Germanic common ancestor language (yeesh, I never imagined this discussion back when I was studying linguistics:D).