"...they're having a row with the wankers"

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"...they're having a row with the wankers"
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Jim Lawton
Guest

Posted: Thu Aug 18, 2005 7:09 am Post subject: Re: "...they're having a row with the wankers"

On Wed, 17 Aug 2005 18:53:04 -0500, "Django Cat" <nospam@please> wrote:

Quote:

Jim Lawton wrote:

On Wed, 17 Aug 2005 15:50:36 GMT, the Omrud <usenet.omrud@gmail.com
wrote:

Jim Lawton spake thusly:

On Wed, 17 Aug 2005 15:02:23 GMT, the Omrud
usenet.omrud@gmail.com> wrote:
Tony Cooper spake thusly:

Drifting a bit....I usually associate the use of "me" as used
above >> >> with Irish-speak. Last night I was watching "Shirley
Valentine" on >> >> HBO and noticed that the Liverpuddlian Shirley
used "me" thusly.
It's used throughout the UK in informal speech. I use it meself.
I >> >don't think it's even marked for class.

It's not "me" though is it? It's actually just "mi" - a slovenly
way of saying >> "my".

Perhaps, but it's closer in sound to "me" than to "my".

I say "mi" as in "mix" - I've never thought about it, it's so much
part of having a northern accent, stemming from dialect :-

A'll get mi coit,

Ast' getten thi coit?

exactly the same vowel, actually.

My dialect is Southern, & I say it too.

And no reason why not!
--
Jim
"a single species has come to dominate ...
reproducing at bacterial levels, almost as an
infectious plague envelops its host"
http://tinyurl.com/c88xs

Jim Lawton
Guest

Posted: Thu Aug 18, 2005 7:09 am Post subject: Re: "...they're having a row with the wankers"

On Wed, 17 Aug 2005 15:39:00 GMT, Tony Cooper <tony_cooper213@earthlink.net>
wrote:

Quote:

On Wed, 17 Aug 2005 15:02:23 GMT, the Omrud <usenet.omrud@gmail.com
wrote:

Tony Cooper spake thusly:

Drifting a bit....I usually associate the use of "me" as used above
with Irish-speak. Last night I was watching "Shirley Valentine" on
HBO and noticed that the Liverpuddlian Shirley used "me" thusly.

It's used throughout the UK in informal speech. I use it meself. I
don't think it's even marked for class.

I've seen usages like "I'll get me coat" here (in aue), but it always
seems to be a deliberate affectation.

Quote:

It doesn't seem naturalspeak to anyone in this group.

Omniscience rules OK?

--
Jim
"a single species has come to dominate ...
reproducing at bacterial levels, almost as an
infectious plague envelops its host"
http://tinyurl.com/c88xs

Ben Zimmer
Guest

Posted: Thu Aug 18, 2005 7:09 am Post subject: Re: "...they're having a row with the wankers"

Areff wrote:

Quote:

Alan Jones wrote:

"R H Draney" <dadoctah@spamcop.net> wrote in message
news:ddvvsi031e4@drn.newsguy.com...
Areff filted:

In my freshman year of college, there was a guy who used "wanker" a
lot. I think it might be related to the apparent appropriation of
certain pseudo-British accent features in forming the "stoner
accent" (which is heard on _The Simpsons_ in the 'Spike' character
BTW).

Can't place Spike...if you mean "Snake", he sounds Baltimorean to
me....

My RightPondian ears heard him actually as British, and slightly
posh at that: a drop-out from a public [BrE sense] school, perhaps.
He doesn't seem to be in the episodes we see at present.

I remember that. Interestingly, one of the features of his speech is
a shifting of normative /aI/ to the back, related to a tendency in
British speech that we've recently discussed here as an "oy-ing" of
the "eye" vowel. (I'm thinking of how Snake says "Bye!" for example.)

IIRC Snake also pronounces the "go" vowel as [EU], a feature of the
stoner dialect that could easily be identified as either British or
Baltimorean (or Philadelphian, or South Jerseyan). I believe the
Calfornia stoner archetype Jeff Spicoli also had this diphthong, though
by now it is apparently a very common Californian feature. See:
http://www.stanford.edu/~eckert/vowels.html

Ben Zimmer
Guest

Posted: Thu Aug 18, 2005 7:09 am Post subject: Re: "...they're having a row with the wankers"

Tony Cooper wrote:

Quote:

On Wed, 17 Aug 2005 19:30:44 +0000 (UTC), Areff <me@privacy.net
wrote:

Here's proof that "row" is chiefly British:

Google:

"having a row with" 680
"having a row with" site:.uk 523
"having a row with" site:.au 44
"having a row with" site:.nz 12
"having a row with" (Total for UK/AU/NZ): 579

I ask Coop to explain these results.

First, you explain why M-W doesn't say "Chiefly British".

Man does not live by M-W alone. Other dictionaries, including Random
House Unabridged, the Compact OED, and Cambridge Advanced Learner's,
agree with Areff:

http://www.infoplease.com/dictionary/row
http://www.askoxford.com/concise_oed/row_3?view=uk
http://dictionary.cambridge.org/define.asp?key=68829&dict=CALD

Areff
Guest

Posted: Thu Aug 18, 2005 10:02 am Post subject: Re: "...they're having a row with the wankers"

Ben Zimmer wrote:

Quote:

Something very close to this is a feature of my accent too, and some other
(though not all) varieties of Postwar New York Prestige Standard. I
sometimes have to consciously suppress this feature. It's also one of the
few features of my accent that I remember acquiring, as an early teenager.

Mike Barnes
Guest

Posted: Thu Aug 18, 2005 1:36 pm Post subject: Re: "...they're having a row with the wankers"

In alt.usage.english, Skitt wrote:

Quote:

Areff wrote:
Tony Cooper wrote:
Areff wrote:

"having a row with" 680
"having a row with" site:.uk 523
"having a row with" site:.au 44
"having a row with" site:.nz 12
"having a row with" (Total for UK/AU/NZ): 579
I ask Coop to explain these results.

First, you explain why M-W doesn't say "Chiefly British".
AFAIC, M-W has lost all credibility by having unblockable popups.

I noticed that! Pop-unders.

I don't see them. Perhaps I'm doing the wrong thing. I went to www.m-
w.com, typed "row" into the dictionary search box, clicked OK, got the
answer. Not a pop-up, -under, or -around, anywhere in sight. My browser
is Firefox.

--
Mike Barnes
Cheshire, England

the Omrud
Guest

Posted: Thu Aug 18, 2005 1:53 pm Post subject: Re: "...they're having a row with the wankers"

Django Cat spake thusly:

Quote:

the Omrud wrote:

mark spake thusly:

Legend tells of a time when the mysterious hermit the Omrud of
usenet.omrud@gmail.com returned briefly from exile to say ...
Tony Cooper spake thusly:
Drifting a bit....I usually associate the use of "me" as used
above with Irish-speak. Last night I was watching "Shirley
Valentine" on HBO and noticed that the Liverpuddlian Shirley
used "me" thusly.

It's used throughout the UK in informal speech. I use it meself.
I don't think it's even marked for class.

I don't recall any previous discussion here of the "singular us"
in UK speech (but not usually in writing). It is perfectly
common to refer to yourself as "us" under certain circumstances:
"Give us a cuddle", "Throw us that towel", "Pass us the salt,
please".

Chuck us me spanner, mate ... oh, strewth! I didn't say "peg" it
at me, ya burk!

Or, as it says in Viz, "Hoy us me tabs".

Or in Oldham:

"Chuck us us tabs". Really.

Ah, yes, Wife talks like that sometimes (Bradford/Pontefract
upbringing).

--
David
=====
replace usenet with the

the Omrud
Guest

Posted: Thu Aug 18, 2005 1:55 pm Post subject: Re: "...they're having a row with the wankers"

Don Aitken spake thusly:

Quote:

Wayland Young, in his book on the Profumo affair, had a interesting
take on this, applied to the way his upper-class clients regarded
Stephen Ward:

'There is a class of public-school Tory who can best be understood by
examining the prefix "M'". "M'tutor" is what Etonians call the
intellectual lackeys to whom they are put out for education. The
little labial derives from the eighteenth-century pronunciation "me";
"me father", "me daughter", "me butcher". Etonians use it
unselfconsciously for "m'tutor" and will recognise it as something
relevant to themselves if you say "m'tailor", "m'toothmaker" or
"m'tractor", though they might not recognise "m'procurer". But, and
here is the point, it would be impossible to say "m'battalion",
"m'company sergeant major", "m'horse", or even "m'dog"; these are
things which are dignified by exposure to common risk with the master
on the field of battle or the hunting field. If there is no risk of
death or wounding together, the person used is expendable. If there
is, the structure of romantic conservative loyalty, then which nothing
in England is stronger, comes into play. Brigadier John Profumo is
still alive.'

Interesting. I have heard Stephen Fry address Hugh Laurie as
"m'colleage" but I didn't know the background.

--
David
=====
replace usenet with the

Jim Lawton
Guest

Posted: Thu Aug 18, 2005 2:07 pm Post subject: Re: "...they're having a row with the wankers"

On Wed, 17 Aug 2005 18:50:32 -0500, "Django Cat" <nospam@please> wrote:

Quote:

Absolutely - that's RP round here, well not quite.

But what are these "tabs" of which you speak? Cigarettes I think.

Quote:

--
Jim
"a single species has come to dominate ...
reproducing at bacterial levels, almost as an
infectious plague envelops its host"
http://tinyurl.com/c88xs

the Omrud
Guest

Posted: Thu Aug 18, 2005 2:12 pm Post subject: Re: "...they're having a row with the wankers"

Areff spake thusly:

Quote:

Django Cat wrote:
Sara Lorimer wrote:

"Django Cat" <nospam@please> wrote:

CUNY is in Brooklyn?

Among other places, yes.

Ah. Multi-campus then? (I subscribe to one of their email postings.)

I don't think the term "campus" is used, though "campus" seems to be
commonly used for different geographically dispersed units of a state
university system, in some states. It might be more akin to Oxford or
Cambridge University, not that I understand that system.

It sounds more like the University of Wales, which is a federation of
something like a dozen separate universities in different towns
across Wales. Many of these will also be multi-campus.

--
David
=====
replace usenet with the

the Omrud
Guest

Posted: Thu Aug 18, 2005 2:21 pm Post subject: Re: "...they're having a row with the wankers"

Jim Lawton spake thusly:

Quote:

On Wed, 17 Aug 2005 18:50:32 -0500, "Django Cat" <nospam@please> wrote:

the Omrud wrote:

Or, as it says in Viz, "Hoy us me tabs".

Or in Oldham:

"Chuck us us tabs". Really.

Absolutely - that's RP round here, well not quite.

But what are these "tabs" of which you speak? Cigarettes I think.

Yes. North East dialect for cigarettes (which is why I mentioned
Viz). I hadn't heard the word in Lancashire.

--
David
=====
replace usenet with the

Django Cat
Guest

Posted: Thu Aug 18, 2005 3:04 pm Post subject: Re: "...they're having a row with the wankers"

the Omrud wrote:

Quote:

Jim Lawton spake thusly:

On Wed, 17 Aug 2005 18:50:32 -0500, "Django Cat" <nospam@please
wrote:

the Omrud wrote:

Or, as it says in Viz, "Hoy us me tabs".

Or in Oldham:

"Chuck us us tabs". Really.

Absolutely - that's RP round here, well not quite.

But what are these "tabs" of which you speak? Cigarettes I think.

Yes. North East dialect for cigarettes (which is why I mentioned
Viz). I hadn't heard the word in Lancashire.

I think it occurs in Oldham, but as you say, a Vizism which usually
means accurate to the NE. It was that first-person plural possesive
pronoun 'us' I was interested in, as in 'us mam'll kick us arses if
we're home late'.

DC

Mike Barnes
Guest

Posted: Thu Aug 18, 2005 5:09 pm Post subject: Re: "...they're having a row with the wankers"

In alt.usage.english, Django Cat wrote:

Quote:

And in Oldham that's "us" pronounced "uzz" more often than not. Rhymes
with "bus", pronounced "buzz".

--
Mike Barnes
Cheshire, England

Frances Kemmish
Guest

Posted: Thu Aug 18, 2005 5:25 pm Post subject: Re: "...they're having a row with the wankers"

the Omrud wrote:

Quote:

Jim Lawton spake thusly:

On Wed, 17 Aug 2005 18:50:32 -0500, "Django Cat" <nospam@please> wrote:

the Omrud wrote:

Or, as it says in Viz, "Hoy us me tabs".

Or in Oldham:

"Chuck us us tabs". Really.

Absolutely - that's RP round here, well not quite.

But what are these "tabs" of which you speak? Cigarettes I think.

Yes. North East dialect for cigarettes (which is why I mentioned
Viz). I hadn't heard the word in Lancashire.

I don't really remember "tabs" as cigarettes, but I certainly heard
"teb-ends" for cigarette-ends (also "dog-ends" - do they still say
"dimps" in Manchester?) I also remember a Yorkshire friend saying that
one of his friends used to go through ashtrays looking for
cigarette-ends to smoke: they called him "Tab Hunter".

Fran

Frances Kemmish
Guest

Posted: Thu Aug 18, 2005 5:39 pm Post subject: Re: "...they're having a row with the wankers"

Sara Lorimer wrote:

Quote:

I've thought he sounded posh, too. Isn't there an episode where he
refers to going to Middlebury, which is one of -- if not the -- most
expensive colleges in the USA?

Not in the top ten this year:

http://www.bankrate.com/brm/news/college/cfguide/top-ten1.asp

My daughter is at American University, which is also not the most
expensive college, but, believe me, it costs plenty. Only two more years.

Fran

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