Questions for Britishers

I'm listening to a books-on-tape (CD's, actually) by a British author, and the narrator is British. Do Britishers really pronounce "temporally" and "temporarily" the exact same way? And is there really such a word as "nackers", and if so, what does it mean?--Percy

Britishers? And you complain about us using non-words! Some do, yes. Yup, it's venacular for testicles - although I believe it actually has a silent 'k', as in 'knackers'. You could also be refering to a 'knackers' yard' which is a place old horses would be 'retired' to (i.e. sent off to be processed into glue and other horse derivatives). Knackered on the other hand originally meant 'sexually tired' but has changed into a more general meaning of 'tired'.That help?

Oops, sorry. United Kingdomisherites! About knackers, the context was something like, "The computer's gone knackers." It got the general idea across, but I wasn't sure if the computer was simply misbehaving, had gone completely crazy, was dead, or had already been shipped out to the computer graveyard.Saying "temporally" for "temporarily" really had me going for a bit. This isn't the only confusing pronunciation, but it's the one I encountered today and still remember.None of this is as bad as a lecturer from India I had when an undergrad. He used a lot of 4 and 5 syllable words, but always put the accent in the least expected place and ran his words together so you never knew how to divide the syllables up into words. The word I remember him most often using was com-pli-cat'-ed, but nonetheless he got me on it almost every time. You would sort of keep a running tape in your mind of what he'd just said and postprocess it to translate. Of course, it wasn't anywhere near so difficult as a Canterbury Tales books-on-tape in old-English I once attempted - attempting to make sense of it while driving was dangerous to all around me, and I fortunately gave it up before causing too much havoc. This British narrator is far easier to understand than either by comparison, but still she sometimes leaves me bewildered.--Percy

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...A Canterbury Tales books-on-tape in old-English I once attempted....

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Middle English, actually. Unless someone translated Chaucer into the language of Beowulf.This message has been edited by Chiroptera, 08-31-2004 01:55 PM

I thought "knackered" meant exhausted...or maybe the guy I met from Scotland was talking about his testicles or his retired horse

More British oddities from my Books-on-CD's:Do the British really pronounce "comradely" with a long A?" Actually, I guess I just answered this one myself. Checking the on-line Merriam-Webster dictionary, it says Britisher's pronounce "comrade" with a long A.What are "ponces"? Neglectful people? Dunces? Ne'er-do-wells?Is the instruction, "Backs to the walls, mates!", really a homosexual reference?--Percy

Roughly equivalent to fag, queer etc, often with the connotations of pederasty... depends on context but I'm guessing yes in this case...

By long A, do you mean pronounced comraad instead of comrayd? Its a new one on me and I've lived here all my life.I guess your certain that "comradely" wasn't "camaraderie"?I disagree that ponce necessarily means homosexual - where I come from it means someone who does things in a stupid, irritating and altogether overly ostentatious way (e.g the Fonz).PE

To me, long A means A as in ace. So I think maybe your "comrayd" is the same pronunciation of A?--Percy

oh.What's the other ("proper") way of pronouncing it again?PE

Yes, well, I'm glad you recognize that you British let your pronunciation go all to hell after colonizing America. The proper pronunciation of "comradely" pronounces the a the same as in cap.I "read" Bridget Jones's Diary in Books-on-Tape form narrated in a British accent a couple years ago, but it contained nothing that had me going, "What the heck did she just say?" The dialect in this more recent book seems more "pubbish", Liverpoolish now that I think how Paul McCartney and John Lennon spoke, if that makes sense.--Percy

Apparently, I use the "proper" pronunciation for this word Too often overlooked (probably due to Hollywood), is that there are many regional dialects in Britain. "British" is also way too broad a description for an accent since it encompasses English, Scottish and Welsh variations. Yes, this is a pet peeve of mine . Elongated vowels are common in many English dialects, eg. barth and parth (bath and path). That would be "Liverpudlian" or "Scouse". A "Scouser" is a resident of, or hails from Liverpool. You can translate into Scouse (and other UK dialects) from: whoohoo.co.uk - The British Dialect Translator. This is amusing, yet also fairly accurate for the extremity of the dialect.Cheers.{edit: bad English }This message has been edited by Lindum, 09-01-2004 04:51 PM Fix link. --AdminThis message has been edited by Admin, 09-01-2004 04:54 PM

Re British influences on speech: Younger Daughter spent last school year at University College London, and picked up a couple of Briticisms while she was there. She nearly embarassed herself terminally with one - back here in small-town Texas, she went into the bank and found a little knot of people sort of in front of the teller. Not wanting to cut in line, she asked, "Are y'all in queue?"

Tar fe de link, comrad! now 'opefully all de ponces will cotton ed me without gett'n their backs up against de wall. temporarily, anyroad. I wonder if there's a translator to the US southern accent? Or the hills of West Virginny accent?--Percy