DIALECT AND WORD MEANINGS

[Stanley]

Sorry gents, old age strikes again! Glad you agree with me about that being a bit too clever. I sometimes suspect I am a bit of a Philistine.... (But I've read Marx and Bleak House!)

[Stanley]

Just used an old word, 'puthering' to describe heavy smoke emerging from a chimney.
My usual sources are very vague about puther but I get the sense it may be Norman French in origin.
On my way through the undergrowth I tripped over another old word I am familiar with, 'Skrike', to cry or scream.
From Old Norse skríkja (“to scream”) or Old English scric, literally "bird with a shrill call," referring to a thrush, possibly imitative of its call. Attested from c 1573.

[Tripps]

I sometimes suspect I am a bit of a Philistine...

That will do no harm -it just needs a bit of counter balance, and I think you have plenty of that.

PS I downloaded a copy of Munch's The Scream quite a while ago. I filed it as 'The Skrike' .

Little personal joke. Memories again of Aunty Josie who routinely used the word. I'm easily amused.

[Stanley]

I think skrike was almost universal in our parts of the country 70 years ago. Now you never hear it. Funny how words come and go.
What part of the country was Aunt Josie from ?

[Tripps]

What part of the country was Aunt Josie from ?

She was from Failsworth as were both my parents. Very good picture of the place in this entry I'd say.

One of the Poet's intellectual friends once asked me if I'd read Roberts' ' Classic Slum'.

My parents lived in it was my reply.

[Stanley]

That was a good response David, I'll bet it was a show-stopper!
It figures, same part of the country where I heard it first. Failsworth has much in common with Stockport.
As I got deeper into academia I realised how lucky I was to have grown up fully aware of the seamy side of life and often got the impression that some of my mentors envied me my life experience. One of them continuously hammered home his 'working class credentials' on the slim basis of a few week's work experience one summer in a shipyard at Barrow in Furness.
Occasionally I would come across evidence of the 'upper classes' misconceptions of some things in my reading. The one that has always struck me is the assumption that 'in those days' everybody smelt bad because they were unwashed, you'll find that quite often. The funny thing is that even in the worst circumstances that has never bothered me and I didn't notice it. We were either cleaner than they thought or had dialled body odour out of the list of things we noted in order to get on with life.
D'Israeli was right; 'Two Nations'.

[plaques]

Probably not helped by George Orwell's reference to the 'smell of boiling cabbage', the old dusts bins didn't help and neither did chimney smoke inversion dropping the smell of household waste being burn into the street. From what I remember the wash baths at the swimming pools were always in big demand.

[Tripps]

That was a good response David, I'll bet it was a show-stopper!

We were speaking of Lancashire accents to the same people last weekend, when he asked me in a light hearted way, if I had any difficulty in understanding his standard English. I assured him I didn't, and gently suggested that had I been of the BAME persuasion, his words would probably have been actionable

The subject of class differences has intrigued me for a long time. I often thought that the' officer class' had no idea about the psychology of the 'lower orders'. I'm sure you know what I'm talking about. Don't ask me to explain it - too much to type.

[Stanley]

Dead right Ken but then he was an Eton scholar....
I know exactly what you mean David. When I first went to university I was very conscious of my difference and mentioned it to a good man, my professor of linguistics. He said that it was all nonsense and I should forget it. He told me that I had been mentioned in a conversation with colleagues who taught the course in linguistics I did in my first year and they all agreed that the most striking thing about me as a pupil was the precision of my language and that the fog of my dialect was no hindrance. At the end of the year I had one of the highest marks in the department in the year end exams and they tried to persuade me to change my course from history to English generally and linguistics in particular. I told them no, they had made the mistake of assuming that because you were good at something you should base your career on that. I was doing history because I wanted to learn, not buff up the advantage I had. They agreed that the fact I had been taught Grammar in my early days was the root of my advantage. I didn't know 'til then that it was no longer taught as a separate subject.
The gulf between the classes is nowhere more evident today than in politics. Do you remember the apocryphal story about Mandelson? It was said that when he was first taken in a fish and chip shop he thought Mushy Peas were Guacamole. Doubtful if it was true but it did illustrate the gulf nicely. Look back at men Like Bevan and Bevin, their roots never held them back.
My first charge in the army was because I argued with an officer who told me to dig a drain from a gun pit and I pointed out that water didn't flow uphill. After that I learned to keep my gob shut.
[There's a word to ponder on, 'gob'.]

[Wendyf]

Why were grammar schools called that? Never thought about that before.

[Stanley]

My understanding is that when they were founded that was their main remit, to teach anything to do with rhetoric and language Wendy. In the 15th century when many were started (Like Stockport, 1487) those were seen as the main attributes of an educated person.

[Tripps]

those were seen as the main attributes of an educated person.

Still are for me. . . .

I think that in 'the olden days' a means was needed to separate the very clever; and in the absence of other topics yet to be invented, rhetoric was made as complex as possible to do the job.

I still have my late mother in law's English school grammar book. It still scares me even now. If you want to score points off someone, ask them to explain the difference between a gerund and a participle. Most will not know what you are even talking about.

[PanBiker]

Ha, I have an inclining of the participle and I didn't go anywhere near a grammar school. Apart from giving and arm full of blood at such a venue earlier this year.

[Tripps]

Ha, I have an inclining of the participle

I rest my case M'lud.

[PanBiker]

Just seen the typo.

[Stanley]

To be brutally honest I couldn't tell you the difference between a gerund and a participle but I could look it up in my 'Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language' by Quirk, Greenbaum, Leech and Svartvick. Geoffrey Leech taught me Linguistics at Lancaster and was the most boring man I have ever met. I was once enduring one of his hour long lectures and turned to the German lady sat next to me and told her I was losing the will to live, she said she agreed and then startled me by saying "We go for a coffee" gathering her books up and getting up. Honour dictated I should follow and ten minutes later half the audience had followed our example. It was the talk of the university for days afterwards and his lectures improved. The lady in W H Smith's at Ilkley was vastly impressed when I ordered the Comprehensive Grammar (Before the days of online buying) as it was a £50 textbook. Never regretted it.
Going back to the Gormless. One of the things that struck me about them (there were many erected for the Jubilee) was that so many of them were planted in the middle of the road and were an obstacle to traffic. Gargrave had one that was the same. I think that was where the by-name 'Gormless' originated, as they were regarded as a daft nuisance so often and with no useful function. I have no proof, that's always been my impression.



The Gargrave gormless.

[Tripps]

In truth neither can I, but at least I am aware that there is a difference. . Look at this gerund participle
Simples innit?

Not difficult to see how the study of rhetoric was used to sort out the really clever ones. I doubt many current English teachers could even explain it all - or would consider that it mattered.

[Stanley]

"I doubt many current English teachers could even explain it all - or would consider that it mattered."
I had a look in Quirk... I still haven't fully grasped it!
David, spooky has struck again. I told you the story about my linguistic prof. telling me my speech was very precise on Saturday, I got an email yesterday to say that he, John Mowat, died in April aged 82. Funny thing is that I didn't realise I was older than him.

[plaques]

Gerund. Something from the dark and very distant past is saying a gerund is a noun clause were a verb is made the noun by adding 'ing' to it. I think
The subjunctive mood, If I were clever enough I think I could handle this.

[chinatyke]

Gerund. Something from the dark and very distant past is saying a gerund is a noun clause where a verb is made the noun by adding 'ing' to it. I think
The subjunctive mood, If I were clever enough I think I could handle this.

Try explaining these things to Chinese students like I have to do! Why they need to know such intricacies of grammar whilst learning English as a second language is beyond me, but it is part of their coursework, especially as most English people have no idea what a gerund is! Funnily enough they understood the subjunctive mood easily.

[Gloria]

Gerunder dog, I remember people saying that.

[chinatyke]

[Stanley]

That's about my level Gloria but it doesn't appear to have damaged my ability to write...

[Tizer]

Has Tripps got the word `optics' on his list I wonder? It keeps popping up in ways that irritate me and I'm still unsure what these people intend it to mean when they are not talking about optical devices or eyes.

[Tripps]

Has Tripps got the word `optics' on his list I wonder

Just checked - with the thought that if it isn't, it soon will be.

It was already on there.