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Heaven: 2021 Proof Americans and Brits speak a different language

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  • Git - this is a new word here if it's a noun. Made popular I think by the Harry Potter books. Previously only heard in the context of "git 'er done".
  • Git - this is a new word here if it's a noun. Made popular I think by the Harry Potter books. Previously only heard in the context of "git 'er done".

    I think Wikipedia's summary is reasonable. I suspect the bit in there about Turkish is nonsense, though.
  • The Beatles taught me that Sir Walter Raleigh was a stupid get.
  • 'Git' and 'get' are interchangeable. My impression is that neither are as common as they were.

    I use 'git' a fair bit, perhaps because it is milder than terms like 'bastard' and worse.

    It does get commented on.
    'I've not heard that in years ...'
  • finelinefineline Shipmate, Host Emeritus
    'Get' is used too, in some parts of the UK, sometimes a bit gentler in meaning than 'git.' I remember 'you soft get' from the musical Blood Brothers (also written by a Liverpudlian, and set in Liverpool).
  • “And curse Sir Walter Raleigh he was such a stupid get” from one of the numbers on the Beatles’ White Album ( think it was “‘I’m so tired”)
  • That will teach me for not scrolling back to see MT’s contribution😂
  • fineline wrote: »
    'Get' is used too, in some parts of the UK, sometimes a bit gentler in meaning than 'git.' I remember 'you soft get' from the musical Blood Brothers (also written by a Liverpudlian, and set in Liverpool).

    Isn't it the same word, but with a regional accent? To be honest if you say 'get' and aren't from e.g. Liverpool or somewhere else where it's common then it comes across to me as an affectation.
  • finelinefineline Shipmate, Host Emeritus
    fineline wrote: »
    'Get' is used too, in some parts of the UK, sometimes a bit gentler in meaning than 'git.' I remember 'you soft get' from the musical Blood Brothers (also written by a Liverpudlian, and set in Liverpool).

    Isn't it the same word, but with a regional accent? To be honest if you say 'get' and aren't from e.g. Liverpool or somewhere else where it's common then it comes across to me as an affectation.

    Well, it's not accent, because a Liverpudlian person wouldn't say het for hit. It's an alternative way of saying it, it is spelt get, but it is specific to certain places, so you aren't likely to get a Londoner saying it. Like how Irish people say 'feck' for 'fuck.' But whether people say it will depend on the people around them. Someone's unlikely to say 'get' out of the blue as an affectation.
  • betjemaniacbetjemaniac Shipmate
    edited August 2021
    fineline wrote: »
    fineline wrote: »
    'Get' is used too, in some parts of the UK, sometimes a bit gentler in meaning than 'git.' I remember 'you soft get' from the musical Blood Brothers (also written by a Liverpudlian, and set in Liverpool).

    Isn't it the same word, but with a regional accent? To be honest if you say 'get' and aren't from e.g. Liverpool or somewhere else where it's common then it comes across to me as an affectation.

    Well, it's not accent, because a Liverpudlian person wouldn't say het for hit. It's an alternative way of saying it, it is spelt get, but it is specific to certain places, so you aren't likely to get a Londoner saying it. Like how Irish people say 'feck' for 'fuck.' But whether people say it will depend on the people around them. Someone's unlikely to say 'get' out of the blue as an affectation.

    true - I just didn't know what the word was I was looking for instead of accent given we're talking about spelling as well as pronunciation. I would imagine it was spoken before it was written down so thought maybe accent would cover it given it's an alternative of the same word? Idiomatic might be a bit closer potentially?

    On the last bit, I bet there are some - there're a couple of very famous professional Brummies (my heartland) who say things publicly in a way that they don't behind closed doors. I expect the same people exist around Merseyside who want to say 'look at me, I'm one of you'...
  • Female agents of SOE (British fore-runner of the CIA during WWII) were given rank in the FANY before being dropped into occupied Europe in the fondly misguided hope that this might give them some protection if/when they were picked up by the Gestapo.
  • Eirenist wrote: »
    Female agents of SOE (British fore-runner of the CIA during WWII) were given rank in the FANY before being dropped into occupied Europe in the fondly misguided hope that this might give them some protection if/when they were picked up by the Gestapo.

    AIUI it was more that telling the volunteers that salved consciences all round (on the Allied side, not the German one)... I don't think SOE actually thought it was going to make a blind bit of difference, but it was a nice fiction...
  • Isn't it the same word, but with a regional accent? To be honest if you say 'get' and aren't from e.g. Liverpool or somewhere else where it's common then it comes across to me as an affectation.

    'get' is probably the origin of 'git'.

    https://www.etymonline.com/word/git
  • We sometimes said 'get' in my native South Wales but generally it was 'git'.

    For some reason I tend to associate 'get' with northern England - which would make our South Walian usage an anomaly.

    There are some parallels between South Walian and Liverpudlian speech, although the Welsh influence in Liverpool comes from North Wales of course.

    There are south western English influences on South Walian speech, but that's another story.
  • Gill HGill H Shipmate
    fineline wrote: »
    'Get' is used too, in some parts of the UK, sometimes a bit gentler in meaning than 'git.' I remember 'you soft get' from the musical Blood Brothers (also written by a Liverpudlian, and set in Liverpool).

    “Our Sammy burned the school down
    Well, it’s very easily done
    If the teacher lets
    The silly gets
    Play with magnesium”

    Definitely a regional form of ‘git’.
  • Yes, Betjemaniac, that was my thinking too.
  • "Get" was used when I was growing up in rural Lancashire. I used to think "git" was an Americanism because it sounded so alien to me. A joke I heard when I was younger:

    Two guys were looking in a shop window. One of them points something out, saying "That's the one I'd get". Just then a cyclops comes round the corner and beats him to a pulp.
  • And 'guys' isn't an Americanism?

    Eh, lad, if tha wor reet Lanky lahrk, tha wouldn't be coomin' aht wi' this "guys" shite ...

    (Cod approximation of a Yorkshire accent)
  • And 'guys' isn't an Americanism?

    Eh, lad, if tha wor reet Lanky lahrk, tha wouldn't be coomin' aht wi' this "guys" shite ...

    (Cod approximation of a Yorkshire accent)

    The most common use of "guys" in my hearing is South African immigrants. Every collection of anything is "these guys". My part of the world has been poaching South African medical professionals for decades.
  • I'm surprised. Perhaps this a regional variation, but I heard "guys" all the time growing up in northern Ontario from people who'd never seen a South African, and pretty frequently now in Toronto. I'll have to think about my time in SA.
  • “Guy” is of English origin, being derived from Guy Fawkes. Expansion of the use of the word to mean “fellow” happened in America and spread from there throughout the the Anglosphere.

  • "Guys" (non-gendered!) is also prevalent in Southern California, and since a lot of media emanates from there worldwide, well...
  • I often said that to children mine and others I might be looking after both male and female. "Alright, you guys time to gather up your stuff and get in the car we are going home" I have lived on the East Coast, and California so I am not sure where it came from.
  • I have always used "guys" in a gender-free sense, however, recently I have seen, in things on making your speech inclusive, "guys" should not be used as it is not gender-neutral. So I don't know...
  • Nick TamenNick Tamen Shipmate
    edited August 2021
    It’s not used as gender-nonspecific everywhere in the US. Here, Graven Image’s sentence would start something like “Alright kids” or “Alright y’all.” “Guys” used in a gender-nonspecific way here is typically heard from people who’ve moved here from other parts of the country.

    My 20-year-old daughter does not like being called a “guy,” and has been known to respond to people who refer to her or to a group she’s part of as “guys” by saying something like “Look closely, I am not a guy.” Ditto many of her female friends.
  • Yeah, but that's a regional difference. Making it a matter of ideology is ... not the best way to get along with people who mean no harm? I mean, should I be taking issue with every person who refers to me as "dear" or "love" or (shudder) "my lover"? Sometimes you just gotta roll with it, when it's clearly a regional thing.
  • Yeah, but that's a regional difference. Making it a matter of ideology is ... not the best way to get along with people who mean no harm?
    Agreed; that it’s a regional difference was my point.

    I should probably have added that daughter wouldn’t necessarily correct anyone who calls her a “guy” or calls a group she’s part of “guys.” She’d do it when she thinks under all the circumstances it would be received okay. I should also have added that she’d do it with a laugh or in some other way to convey humor rather than irritation. (Even though she probably would be irritated, especially if it came from a male peer.)

    Perhaps the point about it not being inclusive is just a reminder that in some places it will be perceived as gender-specific, so know your audience if you are trying to be inclusive.

  • MaryLouiseMaryLouise Shipmate, Host Emeritus
    I'm surprised. Perhaps this a regional variation, but I heard "guys" all the time growing up in northern Ontario from people who'd never seen a South African, and pretty frequently now in Toronto. I'll have to think about my time in SA.

    @Pangolin Guerre you and @NOprophet_NØprofit are both right. Usage of 'guys' (men, women and non-binary people are referred to as guys) in South Africa is more and more common in urban slang. It used to be mostly English-speaking white South Africans who used it, now everyone does. It's also found in many places in the US and Canada and I noticed it being used on Masterchef Australia last week, so there too.
  • Gee DGee D Shipmate
    edited August 2021
    I'd agree with that and that it is applied without gender-discrimination.
  • EnochEnoch Shipmate
    Here (England - UK) there's an age difference. If you're my age, one tends to associate the use of 'guy' with a person trying to show they are cool, but come what may a 'guy' is exclusively a bloke. It sound disconcerting to hear younger adults referring to or addressing a group of men and women as 'guys'.

    I don't think I've heard anyone use it of a group that was exclusively female, but that doesn't mean it never happens.

  • BroJamesBroJames Purgatory Host
    To this Brit, addressing an exclusively male group as ‘Men’ sounds very military. Addressing an exclusively female group as ‘Women’ seems equally odd. For men I’d probably choose ‘Gentlemen’ or ‘Gents’ or ‘Guys’, or even ‘Boys’.

    I’m aware, however, that ‘Ladies’ is unacceptable to many and ‘Girls’ even more so. I’d probably try to avoid using any group term when addressing a group of women.
  • The sources that I've seen that say not to use "guys" for a mixed group suggest "folks".
  • It's interesting that "guy" and "guys" seem different, but then my experience of the gender-neutral plural is the vocative, "OK, guys, let's start". The singular would not be used like that, and I think the non-vocative "guys" is marked as male, hence, "those guys on the corner" could not refer to a mixed group.

    As has been said, it might be the lack of vocative pronouns in English which has led to the use of "guys". In my teaching days, I heard it a lot used to students, both mixed, male, and female. In other words, we used it to groups of women.

  • It's interesting that "guy" and "guys" seem different, but then my experience of the gender-neutral plural is the vocative, "OK, guys, let's start". The singular would not be used like that, and I think the non-vocative "guys" is marked as male, hence, "those guys on the corner" could not refer to a mixed group.

    As has been said, it might be the lack of vocative pronouns in English which has led to the use of "guys".
    As noted above, “y’all” serves as a vocative pronoun in the American South.

  • Nick Tamen wrote: »
    It's interesting that "guy" and "guys" seem different, but then my experience of the gender-neutral plural is the vocative, "OK, guys, let's start". The singular would not be used like that, and I think the non-vocative "guys" is marked as male, hence, "those guys on the corner" could not refer to a mixed group.

    As has been said, it might be the lack of vocative pronouns in English which has led to the use of "guys".
    As noted above, “y’all” serves as a vocative pronoun in the American South.

    Yes, good point. I was thinking about the use of the vocative, but it's pointless, since there are so many, madam, sergeant, sir, mate, etc.
  • Nick Tamen wrote: »
    It's interesting that "guy" and "guys" seem different, but then my experience of the gender-neutral plural is the vocative, "OK, guys, let's start". The singular would not be used like that, and I think the non-vocative "guys" is marked as male, hence, "those guys on the corner" could not refer to a mixed group.

    As has been said, it might be the lack of vocative pronouns in English which has led to the use of "guys".
    As noted above, “y’all” serves as a vocative pronoun in the American South.

    Or more emphatically, according to a Canadian minister who was raised in South Carolina, "All y'all!"

    Around here, "yous guys" is not uncommon.
  • Nick TamenNick Tamen Shipmate
    edited August 2021
    Nick Tamen wrote: »
    It's interesting that "guy" and "guys" seem different, but then my experience of the gender-neutral plural is the vocative, "OK, guys, let's start". The singular would not be used like that, and I think the non-vocative "guys" is marked as male, hence, "those guys on the corner" could not refer to a mixed group.

    As has been said, it might be the lack of vocative pronouns in English which has led to the use of "guys".
    As noted above, “y’all” serves as a vocative pronoun in the American South.

    Or more emphatically, according to a Canadian minister who was raised in South Carolina, "All y'all!"
    Absolutely!

  • Nick Tamen wrote: »
    It's interesting that "guy" and "guys" seem different, but then my experience of the gender-neutral plural is the vocative, "OK, guys, let's start". The singular would not be used like that, and I think the non-vocative "guys" is marked as male, hence, "those guys on the corner" could not refer to a mixed group.

    As has been said, it might be the lack of vocative pronouns in English which has led to the use of "guys".
    As noted above, “y’all” serves as a vocative pronoun in the American South.

    Or more emphatically, according to a Canadian minister who was raised in South Carolina, "All y'all!"

    Around here, "yous guys" is not uncommon.

    Another one I forgot, "youse" is found in Liverpool, and environs, and other areas, e.g. Irish. But not standard English.
  • And in the vicinity of Pittsburgh and western Pennsylvania, there’s “yinz.”
  • BroJamesBroJames Purgatory Host
    NicoleMR wrote: »
    The sources that I've seen that say not to use "guys" for a mixed group suggest "folks".
    Unfortunately I know people both female and male who find ‘folks’ unbearably twee. (I’m not a fan either.)
  • BroJames wrote: »
    To this Brit, addressing an exclusively male group as ‘Men’ sounds very military. Addressing an exclusively female group as ‘Women’ seems equally odd. For men I’d probably choose ‘Gentlemen’ or ‘Gents’ or ‘Guys’, or even ‘Boys’.

    I think I'd draw a distinction between addressing a group that was intentionally men (single-sex sports teams, single-sex schools, etc.), and a group that just coincidentally happened to be men (five colleagues in a meeting, say).

    In the latter case, the sex of the people present is irrelevant, so I think I tend to use a generic form of address even if all the people happen to be the same sex. (This is perhaps the inverse of Mrs C's old French tutor, who insisted on using constructions like "each student should ensure he has handed in his homework before leaving the class" to a roomful of women, because she claimed that's how English worked.)

    I usually use "people", or sometimes "everyone". "Folks" doesn't have quite the right tone to me, although it's not horrible.
  • Gee DGee D Shipmate
    BroJames wrote: »
    I’m aware, however, that ‘Ladies’ is unacceptable to many and ‘Girls’ even more so. I’d probably try to avoid using any group term when addressing a group of women.

    Strangely enough, use of "Girls" here continues when used by a woman who will play tennis or cards with the Girls, or meet the Girls for lunch. A man can ask if a woman with whom he's in a domestic relationship is off to meet the Girls for tennis/lunch, but not otherwise.
  • Perhaps "guys" is only gender-neutral in the second person.
  • I thought the Washington Post's linkage of the term with Guy Fawkes - Guido Fawkes - of Gunpowder Plot fame was far-fetched, but it seems there is something in it, but at a few steps removed.

    It would seem that the first reference to an effigy of Fawkes as a 'Guy' comes from 1806. Those of us of a certain age here in the UK will remember taking a stuffed dummy made of rags and paper bags round streets and houses or outside shops and asking, 'Penny for the Guy'.

    The first record of it being applied to am individual or group of blokes (it was gender specific originally) comes from a English source from 1836, t'internet tells me, with the first US reference coming a decade later in 1847.

    Then, it meant someone dressed scruffily, rather like the 'guys' that were presumably even then burnt on bonfires on 5th November.

    I don't know how far back the tradition of burning a 'guy' goes, but an annual burning of an effigy of the Pope was a major fixture of the London calendar during the 1670s.

    Whatever the case, it's an interesting example as Nick Tamen points out of a term being exported to the US then forgotten about (other than in its original context of an effigy of Guy Fawkes) to the point that it sounded like a highly exotic import when it first found its way back over the Atlantic.

    'Guy' and 'guys' was a term we only used in reference to the dummies burnt on Bonfire Night when I was growing up. We heard it on US films and TV series of course but I don't remember it becoming current in reference to men until much later. At first, it sounded like an affectation but now it has become common currency with little ironic or self-conscious overtones - although it wouldn't be a term I'd use very often.

    Not that I object to it. I may say 'you guys' occasionally when addressing a group of people, whether single gender or mixed gender, but very rarely would I say something like, ' I saw this guy in town and ...'

    Or 'This guy I know...'

    That's a generational thing, I think. I'd be more likely to say 'bloke'.

    Back in the '80s and '90s I used to wince when preachers used the term as it sounded like a self-comscious attempt to be cool or to sound 'down-home' - to use another US expression - or casual.

    These days it has largely lost that sense of self-conscious posturing.

  • Then, it meant someone dressed scruffily, rather like the 'guys' that were presumably even then burnt on bonfires on 5th November.

    As indeed it still does in rural Staffordshire, where people of my grandparents generation (born 1920s) and occasionally my father's (born 1940s) will observe of someone scruffy 'he does look a guy'
  • Jonah the WhaleJonah the Whale Shipmate
    edited August 2021
    mousethief wrote: »
    Perhaps "guys" is only gender-neutral in the second person.

    I tend to agree. If I saw a mixed gender group of people I would never say "There are four or five guys over there", but I might address them as "you guys". In fact I think that for many English speakers "you guys" is rapidly becoming the pronoun for second person plural in a similar way to y'all in the southern US, or youse in parts of Ireland and Liverpool. It seems there is a lot of pressure on the English language to have a distinct plural form of "you". Usually it is clear by context whether "you" is meant as singular or not, but sometimes I have found myself asking for clarification "Do you mean 'you singular' or 'you plural?'".
  • mousethief wrote: »
    Perhaps "guys" is only gender-neutral in the second person.

    People?
  • MaryLouiseMaryLouise Shipmate, Host Emeritus
    mousethief wrote: »
    Perhaps "guys" is only gender-neutral in the second person.

    Really good point. I can't think of any South African examples where someone would talk about 'those guys' and mean women as well as men, or only women.
  • 0For men, 'Lads' or 'Fellers' (Fellows) would be the most acceptable to 'Guys' in the UK 'Chaps' is dated and rather condescending. 'You lot' a possibility, among friends.

  • Then, it meant someone dressed scruffily, rather like the 'guys' that were presumably even then burnt on bonfires on 5th November.

    As indeed it still does in rural Staffordshire, where people of my grandparents generation (born 1920s) and occasionally my father's (born 1940s) will observe of someone scruffy 'he does look a guy'
    That usage is also reflected in “I’ve Got a Little List” from The Mikado:

    “And the lady from the provinces, who dresses like a guy
    And who ‘doesn't think she dances, but would rather like to try . . . .’”

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