Dialect meme

Apr 05, 2008 14:00


1. The space between two buildings containing a footpath: Alleys, but weren't common where I grew up. Alleys is what the Assembly was calling them when proposing gating them -- Alley gates kept making me think of a crocodile like lizards. I've heard many other terms.
2. A knitted item of clothing worn over a shirt, without buttons: jumper -- a sweater isn't made of wool. Pullover occassionally.
3. The act of not going to something that you're supposed to go to: skiving.
4. Playground game in which someone is "it" and has to touch someone else who then becomes "it.": tag
5. Playground truce term when you want a break from the above games: Can't remember
6. Playground term you say when you want to claim something: bagsie
7. Slip-on shoes worn for school sports in the days before trainers: pumps, or daps if I'm copying my father. plimsolls was the `correct' term.
8. Small round bread - roll is the one I've known longest, but also bap.
9. Sweet course that follows the main course: afters or pudding (for tea (the hot evening meal)), dessert if it's dinner (and therefore posh).
10. Scone: pronounced to rhyme with "gone" or with "moan": gone, definitely. moan is posh (despite the fact that that's how dad says it and he's from a Cardiff council estate).
11. Generic term for a bird: ... a bird
12. Round food stuff made with batter on a griddle, which is brown on the outside: Scotch pancake, but didn't have them much
13. A delicacy that you feel is particularly local to you: Depends on what you mean by local. Welsh cakes springs to mind, though growing up they were local to my dad's origins!
14. Term of endearment: Daft 'a'pa'th.
15. Someone who's soft and easily feels the cold: nesh (used a lot in our family. Often in contrast with having asbestos fingers)
16. Tourists: Touroids (but that's one I picked up from a friend in Cambridge)
17. A field boundary: hedge
18. You see a group of animals standing in a farm building. They have udders and go moo. Complete the following sentence: "Look at those ____ standing in that ____!" : cows, barn.
19. You haven't had anything to eat in a long time, and your stomach is letting you know about it. You would also like to be warmer. starving, for the first part
20. Your friends invite you to enter a haunted house: you demur. What do they call you, by way of a derisive taunt?: Scaredy-cat
21. A man who dresses flashily with lots of expensive jewellery is a ____: poseur. Medallion man? (actually that was a specific person who ran the sports shop)
22. What do you say in a shop when you are handed your change?: Diolch (if I'm in Wales!)
23. Generic friendly greeting: Hello. Hey there. Hi.
24. Slang term for a pair of trousers: ...
25. Slang term for left-handed: leftie
26. Pronunciation of Shrewsbury? Newcastle? Glasgow? Rhymes with "throws brie" (though occasionally as a small rodent), New - cas - le (with a short a and equalish stress), Glas go (again short a).
27. Two pieces of bread with a filling: Sandwich, or sarnie.
28. A playground way of saying someone is out of order: ?
29. Dialect terms for hands, ears, face - and, indeed, for any other body parts you care to name: lugholes for ears.
30. Terms for someone who looks miserable: miseryguts
31. Potatoes: spuds
32. Pale round food stuff with a brown base, lots of holes in it, which you serve hot with butter: crumpets

My dialect is quite weird in that it has been influenced by a range of places. I know people who reckon nesh is particularly Mercian which goes with where I was born, but other bits show influence of my parents. Short A before s etc is where I'm from and my dad -- mum has long As.

Another playground indicator would be marble names, which were very different in the two places I grew up in.

memememe

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