The Oxford dictionary notes a North American non-gendered (AFAICT) usage for a sleazy or unpleasant person, and a more general derogatory usage for a woman who has many casual sexual encounters or relationships.
Or did I misunderstand your question, and you were asking why it grates? That would be more a sociolinguistic thing, and I'm not sure the extent to which it's been analysed, but I do observe in general that people easily get irritated by word usages which are different from those they have learnt to use, particularly if those usages are associated with groups of people of which they are not part, and might look down on. Maybe a kind of possessiveness over the English language!
Yes - I wondered why ‘normalcy’ grates on me every time I hear it.
I’m a keen traveller and love picking up new ideas, words and phrases. I also love the US and have been there many times. My granddaughter is being brought up trilingual. I lived in South Africa until I was eleven.
So I can’t see it being about groups I’m not part of. I probably have more close RL friends, who I spend a lot of time with, from other countries than anyone here.
I wondered if there is a linguistic rule that it breaks?
Tank top. In the UK it is, or was in the 70s, a short sleeved jumper. My impression is that in the USA it's a short sleeved tshirt. Is it the same as a wife beater? (Which is a term I dislike deeply, for obvious reasons.)
Or did I misunderstand your question, and you were asking why it grates? That would be more a sociolinguistic thing, and I'm not sure the extent to which it's been analysed, but I do observe in general that people easily get irritated by word usages which are different from those they have learnt to use, particularly if those usages are associated with groups of people of which they are not part, and might look down on. Maybe a kind of possessiveness over the English language!
Yes - I wondered why ‘normalcy’ grates on me every time I hear it.
I’m a keen traveller and love picking up new ideas, words and phrases. I also love the US and have been there many times. My granddaughter is being brought up trilingual. I lived in South Africa until I was eleven.
So I can’t see it being about groups I’m not part of. I probably have more close RL friends, who I spend a lot of time with, from other countries than anyone here.
I wondered if there is a linguistic rule that it breaks?
Maybe it's the people you've heard using it? Politicians? If a term grates on me, it's the association of who is using it and/or how it's being used (eg. if it's being used in a snide way). Groups of people doesn't necessarily mean a nationality - it can be people in power, such as managers in business (business terms grate on a lot of people) or politicians. Or a group of people in your particular environment seen to be a clique, and seen to be not very nice, maybe bullies.
Or it could just be that 'normalcy' sounds wrong because it's so different from 'normality'. A lot of people say a word is wrong because they've never come across it and they know a different version of it, which they see as the correct version.
I don't think it breaks a rule as such - rules aren't really prescriptive anyway, but more based on observing how language is used. But if you're used to saying 'normality', which is four syllables, flowing easily with a vowel between each consonant sound, 'normalcy' might feel a bit truncated. It has friction at the end, with the 'l' being interrupted, as it were, by an 's', which is a fricative. It doesn't flow so smoothly. There are no frictatives in 'normality'. Personally, I prefer the sound of 'normality' to 'normalcy' - I like the flow.
Or if it's not any of those, maybe analyse your feelings and see what exactly grates on you. You're in a better position to analyse your own irritations than others are to analyse you!
Plates, cups, bowls are all regarded in the U.S. as "dishes," particularly in washing situations. We rarely use "dish" in the sense of "bowl" for that reason, though it is known. We're more likely to use it in the sense of "prepared food item, fancy thing my mother's cooking tonight".
This was a difference I noticed when I was in Canada. People there used the expression 'washing dishes', while I knew the expression 'washing up.' If I talked about washing up, they thought I meant washing myself. And they said 'dish washing detergent' while I said 'washing up liquid.'
I use 'dish' interchangeably with 'bowl.' It can mean a meal too, of course, but doesn't mean a plate or a cup. The whole lot is crockery - but I found the Canadians I knew didn't know that word. Mind you, I don't hear 'crockery' in the UK these days either - maybe we're veering more to the North American way now.
I think I would talk about washing dishes now, but I have no idea if that's from having lived in Canada, or if Brits in general say it now!
The Oxford dictionary notes a North American non-gendered (AFAICT) usage for a sleazy or unpleasant person, and a more general derogatory usage for a woman who has many casual sexual encounters or relationships.
The Oxford dictionary notes a North American non-gendered (AFAICT) usage for a sleazy or unpleasant person, and a more general derogatory usage for a woman who has many casual sexual encounters or relationships.
Not arguing with the Oxford, but I’ve never heard it used of a man. It’s a very gendered, and very derogatory, term in my experience.
Tank top. In the UK it is, or was in the 70s, a short sleeved jumper. My impression is that in the USA it's a short sleeved tshirt. Is it the same as a wife beater? (Which is a term I dislike deeply, for obvious reasons.)
A tank top is a sleeveless top in the US. A “wife beater” is a specific kind of tank top—white and intended as a man’s undershirt.
I agree with @Lamb Chopped that I'd think of dishes meaning crockery generally. However my husband's family (Yorkshire) say "washing the pots" which makes me think of cooking pans only.
My Irish grandmother would talk about 'renching (rinsing) the vessels'.
A tank top in Australia is sleeveless as it is in America. What Americans call a 'wifebeater' is a singlet here, and you might find that word being used for tank tops as well, though I would tend to use singlet for the undergarment and tank top for the kind of thing you wear on a hot summer's day all on its own.
When I was a gel (60s/70s) a tank top was short, sleeveless, knitted or crocheted (squares!) and always worn over something else (frequently a balloon-sleeved blouse), never on its own.
Now it seems to refer to something made of fabric which I would describe as either a sleeveless top/T-shirt or indeed vest - depending on how narrow the amount of material over the shoulders.
As I understand it a tank top is equivalent to a British "vest". An undergarment with oval neck-hole and sculpted armholes -- ends in straps, so to speak. A wife beater is like a t-shirt with the sleeves cut off. A crew neck, and shoulders completely covered.
A tank top is definitely not an undergarment here. It's something you wear to the gym, or the beach.
And most of the images that Google gives me for wife beater end in straps, rather than being the sleeveless t-shirt style. Though a few of them are the sleeveless t-shirt style. I'm only familiar with the term from foreign usage though, never here.
The term 'wife beater' is not used to describe a garment here. Its only meaning is a perpetrator of domestic violence. As that's a form of social abuse which is all too common, I would have thought it's unlikely to become an acceptable description of a garment. Apart from being offensive, no one would want to be associated with that sort of scumbag.
From what I have understood from American friends telling me about wife-beater tops, and pictures they have shown me, they seem to be what I would call a vest top. I have several such tops, and I wear them either as undergarments or as my main top. Though mine are all different colours, and the stereotypical wife-beater top seems to be white.
In the UK, Stella Artois beer is called wife beater, apparently - according to several of my Facebook friends, but I've never heard it outside of Facebook. But I don't drink it, or go out drinking, so I guess I've not had chance to hear it.
Apologies for bad quality photos but this is to illustrate what we Brits know as tank tops. These pics of myself and my sister's are from 1975 when tank tops were fashionable....a knitted sleeveless pullover with scooped neckline worn over a shirt or blouse. https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ptfrFukosKKTyKit8AxdZtOHyt03-apq/view?usp=drivesdk
Apologies for bad quality photos but this is to illustrate what we Brits know as tank tops. These pics of myself and my sister's are from 1975 when tank tops were fashionable....a knitted sleeveless pullover with scooped neckline worn over a shirt or blouse. https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ptfrFukosKKTyKit8AxdZtOHyt03-apq/view?usp=drivesdk
As a Brit, that is not at all what I know as tank top! When I was a teenager/young adult, in the 1990s, a tank top was a sleeveless top, often made of tee-shirt type material, worn with nothing underneath (other than a bra, for women). It differed from a vest in that it had a high neckline, even a sort of turtleneck. But these days, I find 'tank top' is used interchangeably with 'vest top' - it no longer has to include a high neckline.
@Gracious Rebel, that's exactly what I think of when I hear "tank top". However, I haven't since the 1970s.
@NicoleMR, the idea that "cutlery" only applies to knives is new to me. What do you call the rest of the utensils? (Given the way things work I expect to discover that this is the original Anglo-Saxon usage, preserved in pristine glory in the States. There will be specific terms for forks, spoons and all the rest.)
Apologies for bad quality photos but this is to illustrate what we Brits know as tank tops. These pics of myself and my sister's are from 1975 when tank tops were fashionable....a knitted sleeveless pullover with scooped neckline worn over a shirt or blouse. https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ptfrFukosKKTyKit8AxdZtOHyt03-apq/view?usp=drivesdk
@NicoleMR, the idea that "cutlery" only applies to knives is new to me. What do you call the rest of the utensils? (Given the way things work I expect to discover that this is the original Anglo-Saxon usage, preserved in pristine glory in the States. There will be specific terms for forks, spoons and all the rest.)
No specific terms for spoons and forks. Collectively, they’re “flatware” or “silverware,” regardless of whether they’re actually made of silver.
“Cutlery” as I hear it used generally refers more to knives for preparing and cooking food then the knives one eats with, though it doesn’t necessarily exclude the knives one eats with either.
@Gracious Rebel, here we’d call what you posted pictures of a sleeveless sweater. These would be tank tops. And this is the kind of tank top that might be called a “wife beater.” Per the Wiki: “ The term wifebeater reportedly became synonymous for an undershirt after a criminal case in 1947. A Detroit native named James Hartford Jr. was arrested for beating his wife to death. News outlets printed a photo of Hartford in a stained undershirt and referred to him as ‘the wife beater.’”
Now that I know it breaks no (assumed) rules I will consider why ‘normalcy’ grates. I will also try using it, with a straight face, (not easy for me!) once or twice and see how the listener reacts.
You can learn lot around here. I had always thought 'tank top' was derived from something worn by army tank crew who needed to be agile in a hot confined space, but nothing like that showed up on Google. I had never heard of 'wife beater' until I read it here, and wish I hadn't - what an ugly phrase it is.
You can learn lot around here. I had always thought 'tank top' was derived from something worn by army tank crew who needed to be agile in a hot confined space, but nothing like that showed up on Google.
My understanding is that it comes from tank suits for swimming in pools (or “tanks”).
As for “wife beater,” I usually hear it used in a way that can be taken as somewhat derogatory. That is to say, if you say a man is wearing a “wife beater” rather than a “tank top” (or “muscle shirt”), you’re probably saying as much about how you perceive him as about his shirt.
Now that I know it breaks no (assumed) rules I will consider why ‘normalcy’ grates. I will also try using it, with a straight face, (not easy for me!) once or twice and see how the listener reacts.
I just did a search for words ending in -cy. Here are the results. The vast majority are from adjectives that end with -t or -te. So I guess normalcy is unusual from that perspective. There are only four words - here - that end with -lcy, and the three others are taken not from adjectives, but from military ranks. So I guess normalcy is an exception to the usual. Maybe that is what you might mean by breaking a rule? With many other two-syllable adjectives ending with -al, such as fatal, regal, equal, frugal, plural, etc., -ity is added for the noun. Maybe that is the kind of thing you mean? Some have -ness, such as dismal, though that has both dismalness and dismality. No dismalcy though. You could look them all up and explore them. I am just giving some examples here, not exploring comprehensively,
Also, with normal, there was already a noun with norm, so initially an adjective (normal) was made from the noun, and then the adjective was changed into another noun (normality) and then another one (normalcy). The English language has a lot of examples of this sort of thing.
@Robert Armin , yes, what @Nick Tamen said. The stuff you set the table with is "silverware", no matter what it's made of. The knives you prepare the food with is "the cutlery".
When I were a lass, 60s, 70s maybe, a tank top was a multicoloured knitted thing, sleeveless, possibly V-necked, close fitting, worn over other stuff. Unisex - Frank Spencer in "Some Mothers Do Have Them" might be wearing one. UK usage. Sort of external vest. Knitted waistcoat with no front opening.
flatware (n.)
1851, from flat (adj.), which was used from late 14c. of plates, dishes, saucers in a sense "shallow; smooth-surfaced" + ware (n.). Originally as distinguished from hollow ware; U.S. sense of "domestic cutlery" recorded by 1895.
And fwiw, I have heard people talk about “plastic silverware.”
I have no idea how anything might sound in Saskatoon, but did see Michael Portillo got here by train on the telly once. Whether it ever received any other visitors, I have no idea. Timbuktu does, so I imagine Saskatoon must as well.
A brief tangent that I only mention because of the near-concidence of date: I once spent a few minutes on the platform at the railway station in Saskatoon, exactly 30 years ago last Thursday (it doesn't seem that long ago). I wasn't there for long enough to notice anyone's accent.
The fact that I call it a 'railway station' ought to make it of greater relevance to this thread, but that discussion seems to be happening on the 'words we could do without' thread instead.
Interesting. I get the impression that only about 12 people live in Saskatoon and they all go down to the river at 4am, break the ice and plunge into the freezing waters for an early morning swim then wrestle grizzlies with their bare hands before going home for a breakfast consisting of beer mixed with things it shouldn't be. Other than that, it's pretty much like everywhere else ...
Interesting. I get the impression that only about 12 people live in Saskatoon and they all go down to the river at 4am, break the ice and plunge into the freezing waters for an early morning swim then wrestle grizzlies with their bare hands before going home for a breakfast consisting of beer mixed with things it shouldn't be. Other than that, it's pretty much like everywhere else ...
In the UK, Stella Artois beer is called wife beater, apparently - according to several of my Facebook friends, but I've never heard it outside of Facebook. But I don't drink it, or go out drinking, so I guess I've not had chance to hear it.
Correct. It certainly was when I drank it, although said with a grimace. I think it was because Stella was strong, it could make you nasty things. I wonder if it's died out.
flatware (n.)
1851, from flat (adj.), which was used from late 14c. of plates, dishes, saucers in a sense "shallow; smooth-surfaced" + ware (n.). Originally as distinguished from hollow ware; U.S. sense of "domestic cutlery" recorded by 1895.
And fwiw, I have heard people talk about “plastic silverware.”
Just back after an intensely multicultural dinner with my wife, who is American. She says that according to her mother and her pioneer mid-western traditions in Nebraska, it's always silverware. I picked up a fork, upon which was engraved, among other things, the words 'cutlery' and 'Japan'. (The set was given to us by the other Grandma in Montana). I insist that it's cutlery anyway because it was made by a cutler and the cutlers all used to live in Sheffield before they moved to Japan. They made things for cutting, after all. And many who, as small male type persons, watched trains back in the 50s and 60s remember seeing the 'Master Cutler' Pullman train that ran from King's Cross to Sheffield, which, I feel, should be sufficient proof for anyone.
We always called it "silverware" even though it was clearly stainless steel. "Cutlery" wasn't much used in my family's circles, and I probably would have imagined some sort of cowboy equipment if I'd heard it, sharp stuff, you know...
"Silverware" is what I'm most used to, and "cutlery" is knives. "Utensils" can also be used generically, and is on the label for plastic silverware. So "plastic utensils".
As I understand it a tank top is equivalent to a British "vest". An undergarment with oval neck-hole and sculpted armholes -- ends in straps, so to speak. A wife beater is like a t-shirt with the sleeves cut off. A crew neck, and shoulders completely covered.
As I understand it a tank top is equivalent to a British "vest". An undergarment with oval neck-hole and sculpted armholes -- ends in straps, so to speak. A wife beater is like a t-shirt with the sleeves cut off. A crew neck, and shoulders completely covered.
Comments
Yes - I wondered why ‘normalcy’ grates on me every time I hear it.
I’m a keen traveller and love picking up new ideas, words and phrases. I also love the US and have been there many times. My granddaughter is being brought up trilingual. I lived in South Africa until I was eleven.
So I can’t see it being about groups I’m not part of. I probably have more close RL friends, who I spend a lot of time with, from other countries than anyone here.
I wondered if there is a linguistic rule that it breaks?
Maybe it's the people you've heard using it? Politicians? If a term grates on me, it's the association of who is using it and/or how it's being used (eg. if it's being used in a snide way). Groups of people doesn't necessarily mean a nationality - it can be people in power, such as managers in business (business terms grate on a lot of people) or politicians. Or a group of people in your particular environment seen to be a clique, and seen to be not very nice, maybe bullies.
Or it could just be that 'normalcy' sounds wrong because it's so different from 'normality'. A lot of people say a word is wrong because they've never come across it and they know a different version of it, which they see as the correct version.
I don't think it breaks a rule as such - rules aren't really prescriptive anyway, but more based on observing how language is used. But if you're used to saying 'normality', which is four syllables, flowing easily with a vowel between each consonant sound, 'normalcy' might feel a bit truncated. It has friction at the end, with the 'l' being interrupted, as it were, by an 's', which is a fricative. It doesn't flow so smoothly. There are no frictatives in 'normality'. Personally, I prefer the sound of 'normality' to 'normalcy' - I like the flow.
Or if it's not any of those, maybe analyse your feelings and see what exactly grates on you. You're in a better position to analyse your own irritations than others are to analyse you!
This was a difference I noticed when I was in Canada. People there used the expression 'washing dishes', while I knew the expression 'washing up.' If I talked about washing up, they thought I meant washing myself. And they said 'dish washing detergent' while I said 'washing up liquid.'
I use 'dish' interchangeably with 'bowl.' It can mean a meal too, of course, but doesn't mean a plate or a cup. The whole lot is crockery - but I found the Canadians I knew didn't know that word. Mind you, I don't hear 'crockery' in the UK these days either - maybe we're veering more to the North American way now.
I think I would talk about washing dishes now, but I have no idea if that's from having lived in Canada, or if Brits in general say it now!
Such as 5 children by 3 different fathers?
A tank top is a sleeveless top in the US. A “wife beater” is a specific kind of tank top—white and intended as a man’s undershirt.
My Irish grandmother would talk about 'renching (rinsing) the vessels'.
Yes, or sometimes "silverware," even if made of steel or other materials, even occasionally plastic.
Now it seems to refer to something made of fabric which I would describe as either a sleeveless top/T-shirt or indeed vest - depending on how narrow the amount of material over the shoulders.
And most of the images that Google gives me for wife beater end in straps, rather than being the sleeveless t-shirt style. Though a few of them are the sleeveless t-shirt style. I'm only familiar with the term from foreign usage though, never here.
As a Brit, that is not at all what I know as tank top! When I was a teenager/young adult, in the 1990s, a tank top was a sleeveless top, often made of tee-shirt type material, worn with nothing underneath (other than a bra, for women). It differed from a vest in that it had a high neckline, even a sort of turtleneck. But these days, I find 'tank top' is used interchangeably with 'vest top' - it no longer has to include a high neckline.
@NicoleMR, the idea that "cutlery" only applies to knives is new to me. What do you call the rest of the utensils? (Given the way things work I expect to discover that this is the original Anglo-Saxon usage, preserved in pristine glory in the States. There will be specific terms for forks, spoons and all the rest.)
MMM
That screams 'vest' to me.
“Cutlery” as I hear it used generally refers more to knives for preparing and cooking food then the knives one eats with, though it doesn’t necessarily exclude the knives one eats with either.
@Gracious Rebel, here we’d call what you posted pictures of a sleeveless sweater. These would be tank tops. And this is the kind of tank top that might be called a “wife beater.” Per the Wiki: “ The term wifebeater reportedly became synonymous for an undershirt after a criminal case in 1947. A Detroit native named James Hartford Jr. was arrested for beating his wife to death. News outlets printed a photo of Hartford in a stained undershirt and referred to him as ‘the wife beater.’”
Now that I know it breaks no (assumed) rules I will consider why ‘normalcy’ grates. I will also try using it, with a straight face, (not easy for me!) once or twice and see how the listener reacts.
As for “wife beater,” I usually hear it used in a way that can be taken as somewhat derogatory. That is to say, if you say a man is wearing a “wife beater” rather than a “tank top” (or “muscle shirt”), you’re probably saying as much about how you perceive him as about his shirt.
I just did a search for words ending in -cy. Here are the results. The vast majority are from adjectives that end with -t or -te. So I guess normalcy is unusual from that perspective. There are only four words - here - that end with -lcy, and the three others are taken not from adjectives, but from military ranks. So I guess normalcy is an exception to the usual. Maybe that is what you might mean by breaking a rule? With many other two-syllable adjectives ending with -al, such as fatal, regal, equal, frugal, plural, etc., -ity is added for the noun. Maybe that is the kind of thing you mean? Some have -ness, such as dismal, though that has both dismalness and dismality. No dismalcy though. You could look them all up and explore them. I am just giving some examples here, not exploring comprehensively,
Also, with normal, there was already a noun with norm, so initially an adjective (normal) was made from the noun, and then the adjective was changed into another noun (normality) and then another one (normalcy). The English language has a lot of examples of this sort of thing.
muscle shirt = male garment
same type of shirt.
Flatware - not heard of it. Silverware or cutlery - same thing. We sometimes say "eating weapons".
My parents would say "eating irons".
A brief tangent that I only mention because of the near-concidence of date: I once spent a few minutes on the platform at the railway station in Saskatoon, exactly 30 years ago last Thursday (it doesn't seem that long ago). I wasn't there for long enough to notice anyone's accent.
The fact that I call it a 'railway station' ought to make it of greater relevance to this thread, but that discussion seems to be happening on the 'words we could do without' thread instead.
This is offensive.
Correct. It certainly was when I drank it, although said with a grimace. I think it was because Stella was strong, it could make you nasty things. I wonder if it's died out.
Just back after an intensely multicultural dinner with my wife, who is American. She says that according to her mother and her pioneer mid-western traditions in Nebraska, it's always silverware. I picked up a fork, upon which was engraved, among other things, the words 'cutlery' and 'Japan'. (The set was given to us by the other Grandma in Montana). I insist that it's cutlery anyway because it was made by a cutler and the cutlers all used to live in Sheffield before they moved to Japan. They made things for cutting, after all. And many who, as small male type persons, watched trains back in the 50s and 60s remember seeing the 'Master Cutler' Pullman train that ran from King's Cross to Sheffield, which, I feel, should be sufficient proof for anyone.
Hm. That sounds like what we used to call "muscle shirts". Like this http://starteeapparel.com/2150-mens-cotton-muscle-tee/
Yeah, that's a wife-beater.
That certainly is the usage here.