DIALECT AND WORD MEANINGS

[Tizer]

When the Somerset Level floods started and the BBC made its first visit to Muchelney (much-el-ni) village the reporters persisted in calling it moo-hell-ni which caused much amusement locally. I suspect they asked a local how to pronounce it and he/she spun them a line just for fun! Incidentally, the -ey ending on place names in the Levels means `island', which is what the places were and may once again become.

[Stanley]

Naughty but nice! We all get a feeling of superiority when we hear these mistakes. I remember when Newton and me were recorded for TV. The director cut a lot of Newton's dialogue out because she said that viewers wouldn't be able to understand him. She was based in Manchester!

[Bodger]

Stanley i know you like words, a good link
http://wordsmith.org/words/today.html
a good laugh from Spike,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPKbg06eJ2M&feature=kp

[Stanley]

Two good links Bodge....

[Tizer]

Bodger, I liked the quote in your `cocker' link: "I have one share in corporate Earth, and I am nervous about the management." E.B. White, writer (1899-1985). It sums up my own feelings exactly! (Our next door neighbour had a cocker spaniel and he called it Jarvis.)

[Stanley]

I knew a woman who had a Parrot called Onan because it spilled its seed.....

[Stanley]

The rain siled down this morning.....

[Big Kev]

Just around the corner from me is Mosley Street and I've heard a few pronunciations. Is there a definitive? The most popular is Mozzley but, the plaque on the actual houses shows Mousely. Does anyone know why there's also a spelling difference?

[Stanley]

Kev, I don't think there is such a thing as a definitive spelling for a family name. Over the years clerks and officials mis-transcribe different spellings and they become a legal form.

[Stanley]

'Sken eyed'.....? And why 'wall eyed' for a dog with one white eye?

[Tripps]

Two Yorkshire lads on Dragons' Den at the moment with a dehydrated dog food product which the have given the brand name "PURE". They got two offers, but turned them down.

Those who have been paying attention on this site will know this is perhaps not the best name for a dog food. smile:

[Stanley]

You actually take notice and remember don't you....

[Tizer]

A food for dehydrated dogs would probably have been a success in recent weeks, though I think a bowl of water would be a cheaper solution.

[Tripps]

A food for dehydrated dogs would probably have been a success in recent weeks, though I think a bowl of water would be a cheaper solution.

I've mentioned before that writing is a great discipline - looks like I've fallen into the trap again.

[David Whipp]

Makes sense to me, or am I being an ignoramus?

Better with a semicolon?

[Tripps]

" with a dehydrated dog food product "

Perhaps brackets might have helped - to differentiate between (dehydrated dog) food product, and dehydrated (dog food) product.

[Stanley]

Stop worrying! We all knew what you meant!
I was thinking about hay timing last night and my mind went back 60 years to hay-time at Greenbank Farm on Gisburn old Track with Abel Taylor.



I thought of the language he spoke when talking about hay-making, much of it Old Norse origin I suspect. Grass was 'hurs', the scattering of thin stems on a well eaten pasture were "Nobbut raitings", a well mown meadow was 'snod'. The curved handle of a scythe was a 'snaith', half dry rows of hay were raked into 'foot cocks' overnight, the rows were 'swathes'. Add boskins, booses, baulks and byres and you had a different language.

[David Whipp]

I'd use 'swathes' in that context; all the other grass cutting ones are new to me. Thank you for passing this on.

[Stanley]

And thanks for using 'oining'!

[David Whipp]

Now, where does that come from?

[Tizer]

Tripps, don't take my over-editing too seriously, I'm always getting in trouble for twisting what folk say! And they get their own back on me often enough. You'd be surprised how many ambiguities I used to have to correct in scientific papers. The funny thing is that I'm nobbut a Lancashire working class lad at heart, never done Latin or Greek, but love words. I'm often described as being `too logical' but that's just how my mind works. ("It's not me guv, it's mi brain what does it".)

Oining? Is that what the Irish man does to his shirt before going to church?

[Tripps]

Tizer - I'm not in the least oined. I knew what I meant, and I knew that you did too. I was just trying to illustate the ambiguity to David.

Calluna used to use 'oined' quite a lot. I've never heard it except on here.

As usual Mr google knew - oined

[Pluggy]

Must be local dialect, I use oined and oining in regular speech.

[PanBiker]

I have know it all my life.

[David Whipp]

Hmm. Google has 'oined' as being 'to annoy'; this may be the outcome, but my sense of the meaning is more 'to pester' (where there may be no intention to annoy). So, when I consider myself to be 'oining' someone, I'm pestering them.