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Language Tips | |||||
| At
the moment UnderGoos Website is available only in UK English. We will be
translating the site into US English and other languages if we can be
arsed* at some later point. In the meantime here's a handy translator
for those of you who don't speak proper like wot we do. |
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| Clothing
Items box n. This is the item that fits down the front of a bloke's underwear and, in the words of my school cricket master, "protects the crown jewels". Americans will know it as a "cup". Of course, I suspect they're also less bothered about protecting our crown jewels. braces n. Suspenders. The device used to pull your teeth around the place is called a brace (singular) in the UK. Beware of the cross-definition, though - in the UK, suspenders are something else entirely. dressing gown n. A dressing gown is what Americans call a bathrobe. The outfit that you wear when you've come out of the bath to answer the door like attractive young ladies tend to do in coffee advertisements. kecks n. Pants. Not sure why, if anyone wishes to tell me I'd be delighted. knickers n. Knickers are underpants, specifically women's underpants. In old-fashioned English and American English, knickers (an abbreviation of the Dutch-derived word "knickerbockers") are knee-length trousers most often seen nowadays on golfers. pants n. Be exceedingly careful again. Pants as far as us Brits are concerned are underpants, not trousers at all. This word will cause similar misunderstandings to knickers. Interesting though I've received mail both from people in the US saying their family had always employed the British meaning, and mail from Brits saying that in their area everone used the US meaning. Pants can also be used as a general "derogatory word" in a similar but more polite way to crap. plus-fours n. This is an awful item of clothing which consists of sort-of-dungarees which stop at the knee. Whilst popular in pre-World-War Britain, plus-fours these days are firmly in the realms of brightly-colours golfers or inbreds. suspenders n. In the UK, suspenders are things used by women to hold up their stockings - referred to in the US as "garters". They are not used by men to hold up their trousers (we call those devices "braces") or their socks (we call those things, umm, "garters"). tights n. I'm getting rather out of my depth here but I understand (from other people!) that what we call tights Americans generally call pantyhose. They are opaque, very thin and generally skin-coloured or black. Apparently tights in the US are generally coloured, thicker, more like leggings and rarely worn. Makes little difference to me because the only reason I'd ever think about buying either would be if I was considering a career in armed robbery. vest n. The vest is worn under your shirt, hence the somewhat sensible American name undershirt. In the US, a vest is what we in the UK call a waistcoat. Confused? So am I... I'm sure I got at least one of those definitions muddled up. Y-fronts n. The more form-fitting old-fashioned equivalent of boxer shorts - Americans call them "tighty whities". The name derives from the upside-down 'Y' shape on the front, through the convergence of which you extract your old man in order to pee. |
Relevant
Body Parts arse n. What you sit on; very close in meaning to the American ass. The only real way in which they differ is that you could call someone an "arse" without any adjective and without implying that you thought s/he was a donkey of some sort. We also say "can't be arsed" meaning much the same as "can't be bothered", and nowadays just "arse" in a similar way to "bollocks!". bum n. This is the British version of butt. What the Americans call bums we call tramps. fanny n. This is another word which could leave you abroad and in dire straits. In the US, your fanny is your posterior and a fanny pack translates directly to what we Brits call a bum bag. In the UK, however, your fanny is - well, let's just say you only have a fanny if you're a girl; this is a family dictionary. Which does beg the question: what is a fanny pack? John Thomas n. "John Thomas" is slang in the UK for one's penis. The term derives from the name the leading man in D.H. Lawrence's novel Lady Chatterley's Lover gave to his own appendage. The book was made famous by the obscenity trial it landed Penguin Books in during the 1950s. minge n. This is a rather derogatory word for a lady's front bottom. No idea as to the etymology, perhaps someone can help. nob n., v. Your nob (presuming that you're male, of course) is... how could I best describe this... your one-eyed trouser snake. Comprenez? Consequently, to describe someone as a nob is not overly flattering. Using the word as a verb implies active use of said penis and could be be equated to the American slang "bone" or British shag. Amusingly, nob is also used to describe members of the aristocracy or people of importance (a contraction of "nobility"). I'm not making this up. Just in case you thought this word was in use in the 'States, a contributor sent me this photograph of a sign outside an appartment block in Dallas, Texas. There is a Nob Hill in San Francisco; a Bald Knob in Arkansas and even worse, perhaps, is the fact that there is a town sixty miles south of St. Louis, Missouri, called Knob Lick. pecker n. A common misconception is that, to Brits, your pecker is your chin - hence the phrase "keep your pecker up". Sorry folks, but over here pecker means exactly the same thing as it does in the US. The phrase "keep your pecker up" is derived, I am told, from a time when pecker was simply a reference to a bird's beak and encouraged keeping your head held high. I understand that the word became a euphamism for "penis" after the poet Catullus used it to refer to his love Lesbia's pet sparrow in a rather suggestive poem which drew some fairly blatant parallels. todger n. Yep, another euphemism for "penis". The derivatives "tadger", "todge" and "tadge" have been known to slip in too. As it were. willie n. In the UK, willie is a rather childlike word for penis. The film Free Willie no doubt attracted large optimistic female audiences when it was released over here. Possibly not as many, though, as the 1980s US film "Goonies", which a contributor tells me concerned a group of children who found a secret pirate-ship, commanded by a fearsome pirate named One-Eyed-Willie. |
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| *meaning much the same as "can't be bothered" most translations supplied by the very wonderful English-to-American Dictionary |
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This parody has been brought to you by the letters s,e,a,r,c,h,g,u,i,l,d and the number 666. |
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