Bit of fun with Ameriglish versus Strine

Diwundrin

Well-known Member
Strine is the version of English spoken here. It's how we pronounce Australian. Academic types say Uh strine but only grammar nazis put an el in it. Even our previous Prime Minister referred to us as Ustayans. We're lazy talkers.

Stumbled on this amateur video that does a fair job of explaining the differences in terms. Only one f=bomb that I noticed but shouldn't bother anyone. This kid is a talent and it should be noted, he speaks particularly well, we don't all sound that good.

Watch both, if you weren't confused before you will be.

Last one is about the accent, nails it. The real one, not the Meryl Streep version. That's one thing we're better at, our actors 'do' American accnts far better than Americans 'do' Australian. They crack us up usually.
Most of us are pretty good accent mimics and it's just a bit of fun to us but some new arrivals take offence at us 'taking off' their accents instead of laughing along... and I guess that's why PCness was brought in. siiiigh.

Hope you get a smile from it all.



 
Those were really fun. My dearest friend is English. Her daughter came to visit her here years ago. We were checking her into to the local motel, when she told the desk clerk she wanted to be "knocked up at 7 in the morning". The look on the clerk's face was priceless, and I couldn't stop laughing. If anyone doesn't know, "knocked up" in England means awakened, here it means someone gets you pregnant. It still makes me laugh to remember the look on that clerk's face. :biggrin-new:
 
Now you know why I had such trouble on here yesterday!
po-faced, and AA spring to mind!
 
Those were really fun. My dearest friend is English. Her daughter came to visit her here years ago. We were checking her into to the local motel, when she told the desk clerk she wanted to be "knocked up at 7 in the morning". The look on the clerk's face was priceless, and I couldn't stop laughing. If anyone doesn't know, "knocked up" in England means awakened, here it means someone gets you pregnant. It still makes me laugh to remember the look on that clerk's face. :biggrin-new:

Sorry Judi, but in England 'knocked up' can mean getting someone pregnant.............waken them up in the morning (as per your friends daughter)..........or............'I am gong to knock up some cakes for the party' (meaning to bake some cakes).

Depending on what part of England a person comes from, different expressions can have different meanings.
 
A lady we knew came from Lancashire when she was 13 years old, spent the next 70 of them here and we could still barely understand her. She never lost her accent at all. Scots never lose it either, they just talk slower for we dummies.

We lose ours easily though, it's said we are lazy talkers but I found myself slipping into paaass instead of pahss quite often, I found it easier to say that way...
but... :dunno:
 
Sorry Judi, but in England 'knocked up' can mean getting someone pregnant.............waken them up in the morning (as per your friends daughter)..........or............'I am gong to knock up some cakes for the party' (meaning to bake some cakes).

Depending on what part of England a person comes from, different expressions can have different meanings.

Beat me to to it, Bee. I know all of those meanings and I would never ever ask anyone to 'knock me up' in the morning...... ;)
 
I'm sure I've mentioned this before but bears repeating here. Had a girlfriend from Australia living in New Zealand and she was telling me how annoying it was when men were attracted to her just because of her accent. Then, she turned to me and exclaimed, "I love your accent!"
 
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