The Words the UK Knows but Americans Don't (and vice versa)

[LoquiSordidaAdMe]

I ran across this article earlier today and thought it might be useful knowledge for any Americans who want to set a story in the UK, or any British, Irish, Scottish, or Welsh (did I miss anybody?) authors who might want to set a story in the colonies. It's about the words that most people in the UK know but Americans don't and vice versa.

https://link.springer.com/article/10.3758/s13428-018-1077-9/tables/1

So 81% of Americans know what ziti is, while only 8% of the UK does. But 82% of the UK knows what a quango is, while only 8% of Americans do. Huh.

The article itself is pretty dense, but the tables are straight-forward enough. Anyway, I thought this might be helpful to someone. Or at least mildly interesting, given all the threads about American vs UK culture, customs and language.

 

[windar]

I ran across this article earlier today and thought it might be useful knowledge for any Americans who want to set a story in the UK, or any British, Irish, Scottish, or Welsh (did I miss anybody?) authors who might want to set a story in the colonies. It's about the words that most people in the UK know but Americans don't and vice versa.

https://link.springer.com/article/10.3758/s13428-018-1077-9/tables/1

So 81% of Americans know what ziti is, while only 8% of the UK does. But 82% of the UK knows what a quango is, while only 8% of Americans do. Huh.

The article itself is pretty dense, but the tables are straight-forward enough. Anyway, I thought this might be helpful to someone. Or at least mildly interesting, given all the threads about American vs UK culture, customs and language.

Like your other thread with men vs women, I'm a bit sceptical. 74% of Americans know what albuterol is? I doubt that. Many might guess that it's a drug, but that isn't really knowing what it is. And acetominophen. I doubt 93% know that's the generic name for Tylenol...I bet if you asked 100 people when the War of 1812 was, at least 25% wouldn't have a clue...

 

[Kumquatqueen]

That is interesting, thank you.

For reference, the US words I didn't know were manicotti, hibachi, and abuterol - which I guessed were some Italian food, some Japanese food, and a drug like salbutamol, which were all correct. I wasn't sure if kabob is a word used nowadays as I'm only familiar with it from my 1950s Betty Crocker cookbook, so knew it was an alternative spelling for (shish) kebab.

Tipp-Ex is a brand name (Snowpake or Whiteout in the US), but words that surprise me about their American sample not knowing were biro (y'all say ballpoint pen or Bic?), chaffinch (turns out they only rarely migrate to NA), plaice, escalope (what do you call flattened breaded pork, veal or chicken?), judder (onomatopoeia surely), and chiropody (apparently 'podiatry is a 'more modern name' says the NHS).

Yob is from backslang which made up a fair bit of Polari (boy, but means a violent lout). Dodgems are bumper cars. Quangos haven't legally existed since Thatcher - they're 'Non-Departmental Public Bodies' now.

The US list having Mexican and SE Asian food vs UK Indian food makes sense, though interesting how US has adopted Italian food words whereas UK hasn't, probably because we already had most of the concepts via French already, like courgette and aubergine. Tilapia is getting more common here, provolone and kielbasa are available but I doubt anyone would consider them English words yet.

 

[SimonDoom]

Like your other thread with men vs women, I'm a bit sceptical. 74% of Americans know what albuterol is? I doubt that. Many might guess that it's a drug, but that isn't really knowing what it is. And acetominophen. I doubt 93% know that's the generic name for Tylenol...I bet if you asked 100 people when the War of 1812 was, at least 25% wouldn't have a clue...

It appears that the study asked people if they knew the word, but it didn't take any measures to confirm that they actually did know what the word meant.

It's of limited usefulness unless one is given some data regarding how often the word in question is used. The words for which the UK/US knowledge difference is most stark are likely to be obscure words, which are unlikely to be needed to tell a story, regardless where it is set. What would be useful to an American author like me, wanting to write a story with British characters, would be to have access to a list of the 1000 words that Brits are most likely to use that Americans aren't.

It is an interesting in its own right, though. I have no clue about many of those British words. I recognize all the American ones.

 

[Kumquatqueen]

Actually, pelmet surprises me, though come to think of it I don't think I've ever seen one in the US. They're a bit old-fashioned here too, a wooden box on the wall above a windo to hide the messy top of the curtains. Sometimes covered in matching fabric. Died out from the 50s which I guess was when the pencil-pleat curtain hook got invented.

But relevance to Lit is that the concept of just covering the top of something long also applies to very short skirts that just cover the arse or possibly stocking tops. I had male teachers looking for the chance to say "Nice pelmet!" and leer over a girl's legs.

 

[LoquiSordidaAdMe]

(y'all say ballpoint pen or Bic?)

"Pen". They're all just "pens" around here.

(what do you call flattened breaded pork, veal or chicken?)

Personally, I say "schnitzel" but that may just be my mid-western upbringing talking.

 

[Kumquatqueen]

What would be useful to an American author like me, wanting to write a story with British characters, would be to have access to a list of the 1000 words that Brits are most likely to use that Americans aren't.
.

And vice versa. Both words that Americans might understand but not use themselves, and ones they likely wouldn't get at all.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glossary_of_British_terms_not_widely_used_in_the_United_States
isn't bad.
Ditto https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glossary_of_American_terms_not_widely_used_in_the_United_Kingdom

I would guess that key Brit-only words for Lit would be shag, arse, fanny (meaning vulva and vagina area, ie politer way to say cunt), faff, cuppa, bloody hell, prick, bloke, chap, on the pull,
scored/pulled, cheeky, buggered, fancy (verb), skint, flat (as in apartment).

Also lad, lass, wee (small), aye, piss, pissed (drunk), pissed off, wank, wanker, wankered, anything ending in -ed to mean drunk, ladies/gents (public toilets), toilet (room containing one), term, half-term, uni, sixth form and anything to do with the education system. Knickers, pants (ie underpants/panties), vest, jumper, tights, leggings etc. Political system words (the council, council estate, council pop).

 

[windar]

It appears that the study asked people if they knew the word, but it didn't take any measures to confirm that they actually did know what the word meant.

It's of limited usefulness unless one is given some data regarding how often the word in question is used. The words for which the UK/US knowledge difference is most stark are likely to be obscure words, which are unlikely to be needed to tell a story, regardless where it is set. What would be useful to an American author like me, wanting to write a story with British characters, would be to have access to a list of the 1000 words that Brits are most likely to use that Americans aren't.

It is an interesting in its own right, though. I have no clue about many of those British words. I recognize all the American ones.

Asking people if they know a word without confirming that somehow is not that meaningful, since many people will say yes so as not to look or feel ignorant.

Some common words are different. Many car terms-boot vs trunk; bonnet vs hood; petrol vs gas

Brand names and such will be very useful as well. Like Sainbury's and Tesco vs Kroger or Safeway. But I don't think setting a story in the UK requires using the British term for everything, only in dialog. And there you have accents and dialects,

 

[PennameWombat]

<snip>
Personally, I say "schnitzel" but that may just be my mid-western upbringing talking.

<snip>
Tipp-Ex is a brand name (Snowpake or Whiteout in the US), but words that surprise me about their American sample not knowing were biro (y'all say ballpoint pen or Bic?), chaffinch (turns out they only rarely migrate to NA), plaice, escalope (what do you call flattened breaded pork, veal or chicken?), judder (onomatopoeia surely), and chiropody (apparently 'podiatry is a 'more modern name' says the NHS).
<snip>

In the US, I always knew them as 'schnitzel,' so not just mid-western (well, bit further west for me.) Where I grew up, chicken was most common, followed by veal. Pork schnitzel was rare.

My Australian wife also calls them 'schnitzel', as do restaurants, etc., here. I'm not sure most Aussies would know what 'escalope' means. My wife just stared at me like I was... well, like she usually does, before shaking her head and walking away.

And in Japan they're 'tonkatsu,' ("豚") and always pork. Quite yummy. My go-to option when I was looking for food on various business trips there.

'Chiropodist' was actually used in a Seinfeld episode, George Costanza said in one episode, "I had to drive my mother to the chiropodist." I've never heard that word used anywhere else.

 

[Bramblethorn]

Like your other thread with men vs women, I'm a bit sceptical. 74% of Americans know what albuterol is? I doubt that. Many might guess that it's a drug, but that isn't really knowing what it is. And acetominophen. I doubt 93% know that's the generic name for Tylenol...I bet if you asked 100 people when the War of 1812 was, at least 25% wouldn't have a clue...

I agree those percentages seem implausibly high, and looking at the methods shows why that might be.

https://link.springer.com/article/10.3758/s13428-018-1077-9

The measure was obtained on the basis of an online crowdsourcing study involving over 220,000 people... The test was made available on a dedicated website (http://vocabulary.ugent.be/). Access to the test was unlimited. Participants were asked whether English was their native language, what their age and gender were, which country they came from, and their level of education (see also Brysbaert, Stevens, Mandera, & Keuleers, 2016a; Keuleers et al., 2015). For the present purposes, we limited the analyses to the first three tests taken by native speakers of English from the USA and the UK.

Online, which is going to skew the sample towards people who have internet access and who are literate. Self-selected, which will skew it towards people who have the spare time to do a survey (likely to correlate with wealth/education/etc.) and towards people who are interested in the topic, which probably means people with larger than average vocabularies. Although they collected info on level of education, they don't mention how those results compared to the general population and there's no indication that they tried to correct for those selection effects.

Probably more useful for identifying words that are better known in UK than USA or vice versa, than for measuring the true recognition percentage.

 

[TheRedChamber]

Thanks, that certainly does add some local colour.

He pulled her name at the sex tombola. He found her, a little chaffinch of a woman sitting on the kerbside. She already had some bolshy yob’s chipolata in her hands, but, David abseiled in and gazumped him with his enormous brolly of a cock. They kissed. She was as spicy as korma. He grabbed a foot and started to perform tongue chiropody on her. He moved up toward her escalope and ran his hand through the pelmet at the of her beef curtains. She tasted of plaice. Their bodies bumped together like dodgems as they formed the quango with two backs. With a sudden judder, his cum spurted like tippex from his oversized biro.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Thanks, that certainly does add some local colour.

He pulled her name at the sex tombola. He found her, a little chaffinch of a woman sitting on the kerbside. She already had some bolshy yob’s chipolata in her hands, but, David abseiled in and gazumped him with his enormous brolly of a cock. They kissed. She was as spicy as korma. He grabbed a foot and started to perform tongue chiropody on her. He moved up toward her escalope and ran his hand through the pelmet at the of her beef curtains. She tasted of plaice. Their bodies bumped together like dodgems as they formed the quango with two backs. With a sudden judder, his cum spurted like tippex from his oversized biro.

And that makes perfect sense - and if someone didn't know the meaning of each word, surely they'd get the drift? Not exactly "elegant" though - beef curtains? Whoa!

 

[Bramblethorn]

And that makes perfect sense - and if someone didn't know the meaning of each word, surely they'd get the drift? Not exactly "elegant" though - beef curtains? Whoa!

I remember somebody describing sex as "parking the purple Pajero". That image has stuck with me for decades.

 

[TheRedChamber]

And that makes perfect sense - and if someone didn't know the meaning of each word, surely they'd get the drift? Not exactly "elegant" though - beef curtains? Whoa!

Pelmet was the one word I had to look up on the list, not being much of an interior designer. I may have felt the need to give the word a bit too much extra context.

It might be another regional difference as the phrase is very much a common laddish euphamism in the UK.

 

[Rustyoznail]

Actually, pelmet surprises me, though come to think of it I don't think I've ever seen one in the US. They're a bit old-fashioned here too, a wooden box on the wall above a windo to hide the messy top of the curtains. Sometimes covered in matching fabric. Died out from the 50s which I guess was when the pencil-pleat curtain hook got invented.

But relevance to Lit is that the concept of just covering the top of something long also applies to very short skirts that just cover the arse or possibly stocking tops. I had male teachers looking for the chance to say "Nice pelmet!" and leer over a girl's legs.

FWIW, I was told by my mum that pelmet boxes were used to prevent cold draughts that came through window gaps from getting into the room.

 

[Bramblethorn]

FWIW, I was told by my mum that pelmet boxes were used to prevent cold draughts that came through window gaps from getting into the room.

Even without gaps, windows lose heat more easily than solid walls. The air just on the inside of the window cools, it descends, that sucks in warm air at the top, the warm air comes into contact with the window and cools, so it creates a circulation that exchanges heat between your room and the outside.

As I understand it, a pelmet makes it harder for that circulation to form, so the cold air just inside the window doesn't get out into the rest of the room as easily. That reduces your heat loss, effectively improving insulation.

(In hot weather, things go in the opposite direction, and again the pelmet disrupts that circulation so it improves your insulation.)

 

[Kumquatqueen]

Even without gaps, windows lose heat more easily than solid walls.
... a pelmet makes it harder for that circulation to form, so the cold air just inside the window doesn't get out into the rest of the room as easily. That reduces your heat loss, effectively improving insulation.

Secondary glazing and double glazing probably negated the need for it. My living room has a huge Victorian bay window. One of the first home improvements was secondary glazing for it (replacing the original glass would have cost about 12 grand rather than 2). The temperature instantly rose three degrees (C, about 5 degrees F)

Plaice are flatfish, known as dabs when they are small, but I think as they are found from Labrador down to RI maybe they are known as dabs in America even when big enough to eat?

I'm sure I picked up 'beef curtains' from some American thriller, likely Sidney Sheldon or Arthur Hailey. It's a really quite horrible phrase.

I think the individual words are generally less of a problem for communication than Brit understatement (management guides exist online, eg 'I have just one small concern about your plan" = your plan is the most stupid idea since I last watched Baldrick on Blackadder', and the obligatory undercurrent of humour making everything into wordplay, which you're expected to work at comprehending and building upon. Especially rhyming slang which just seems to baffle Americans while Europeans master it as quickly as other English.

Like I saw my neighbour for the first.time after lockdown:
All right, mate?
Eh, a'right, love. But the wife's had the Miley's and they've cancelled all the trains to town,.it's beyond a diet Coke!

Me, instantly comprehending, 'Innit, they're having a giraffe! How's Sally, though?'

Never heard Miley (virus) or diet (joke) before in my life, but it's not hard to work out *if you expect* that kind of wordplay every time anyone opens their mouth.

Like at work an older man went "the Alan's buggered" and clearly this was some device rhyming with the surname of a famous Alan. So I went Alan who? Fretwork? and was informed of the existence of Alan Minter. Broken printer, not network.

 

[ElectricBlue]

I think the individual words are generally less of a problem for communication than Brit understatement (management guides exist online, eg 'I have just one small concern about your plan" = your plan is the most stupid idea since I last watched Baldrick on Blackadder', and the obligatory undercurrent of humour making everything into wordplay, which you're expected to work at comprehending and building upon.

Also, I get the impression (both from knowing a bunch I've worked with over the years, and those around here), your typical Yank appears to take most things on face value, with a literalness that astonishes me, while your Brit and your Australian continually take the piss, indulge in satire and irony, and more is said between the lines than in the actual lines themselves; all of which leaves Americans confused with other forms of English.

Also also, Drop Bears and critters that kill people .

 

[PennameWombat]

<snip>
Plaice are flatfish, known as dabs when they are small, but I think as they are found from Labrador down to RI maybe they are known as dabs in America even when big enough to eat?
<snip>

I rarely remember seeing ‘plaice’ in the US, although, yes, the species is common along the Canadian and New England coasts. I think the first time I saw the name, I was in my 30s. If it’s served, and it is, likely often listed under “flounder” (along with the various species of flounders.) Never saw “dabs” listed either. A native New Englander might be of more help here .

Sole and halibut will be separated out from the other flatfishes and usually sold for higher prices. I had a job decades ago where I delivered fish, mostly frozen, but we did get a batch of fresh, whole halibut that were flown in (we were over a thousand miles from an ocean). Those were fun (about 25 kg (60 lbs) and up). But many others just seem to get lumped under the “flounder” name.

 

[PennameWombat]

Also, I get the impression (both from knowing a bunch I've worked with over the years, and those around here), your typical Yank appears to take most things on face value, with a literalness that astonishes me, while your Brit and your Australian continually take the piss, indulge in satire and irony, and more is said between the lines than in the actual lines themselves; all of which leaves Americans confused with other forms of English.

Also also, Drop Bears and critters that kill people .

Dedicated viewing in my teens and twenties of Blackadder, Fawlty Towers, Monty Python and Red Dwarf helped in attuning me slightly to British English idioms and usage. I learned to be VERY circumspect in recommending these shows to other Americans, after discovering most of my high school classmates absolutely did not grok Monty Python and the Holy Grail.

Playing soccer in the late 1970s and 1980s in the US, I also had little choice but to associate with lots of British ex-pats, so that helped as well.

Americans almost handle satire, sometimes, but irony? Rare. In fact, I still have to keep myself ‘tuned’ to British/Australian English usage. And, sometimes, it gets a bit tiresome, needing to dig through buried meanings because it’s not always natural.

But I did have a tour guide on Kangaroo Island quite upset at me a quarter-century ago. We were having afternoon tea, parked next to a koala preserve, and an unseen male koala let out a roar somewhere in the preserve. The tour was mostly Americans, a few random Europeans. I quickly said “oh oh, a drop bear just made a kill!” Then went off on talking about drop bears to the astonishment of my fellow tourists. Told them the Australian government paid off a few tourists families every year after their relatives were devoured by drop bears, to keep them quiet. The tour guide wasn’t happy, I’d taken his schtick .

 

[oggbashan]

Abseil not being understood by Americans puzzled me.

I did a lot of abseiling in my twenties - jumping off a cliff with a bare rope wrapped around me.

Now it is much more technical with harnesses, hard hats, abseil hooks etc.

But British (and US) special forces still do it the old fashioned way with a bare rope.

What is the US equivalent?

 

[Kumquatqueen]

Abseil not being understood by Americans puzzled me.
What is the US equivalent?

Rappeling. I thought abseil was used as well, by rock climbers, but maybe not.

The text upthread suggests korma is spicy, which as every Brit knows is a lie - it's a creamy almost unspicy curry, about as hot as coronation chicken, ie not.

I always thought flounders were about 3 feet across, but could well be wrong. Plaice are about the size to fit on your dinner plate while still leaving space for the chips and peas.

 

[Lori_the_Hoosier]

Secondary glazing and double glazing probably negated the need for it. My living room has a huge Victorian bay window. One of the first home improvements was secondary glazing for it (replacing the original glass would have cost about 12 grand rather than 2). The temperature instantly rose three degrees (C, about 5 degrees F)

Plaice are flatfish, known as dabs when they are small, but I think as they are found from Labrador down to RI maybe they are known as dabs in America even when big enough to eat?

I'm sure I picked up 'beef curtains' from some American thriller, likely Sidney Sheldon or Arthur Hailey. It's a really quite horrible phrase.

I think the individual words are generally less of a problem for communication than Brit understatement (management guides exist online, eg 'I have just one small concern about your plan" = your plan is the most stupid idea since I last watched Baldrick on Blackadder', and the obligatory undercurrent of humour making everything into wordplay, which you're expected to work at comprehending and building upon. Especially rhyming slang which just seems to baffle Americans while Europeans master it as quickly as other English.

Like I saw my neighbour for the first.time after lockdown:
All right, mate?
Eh, a'right, love. But the wife's had the Miley's and they've cancelled all the trains to town,.it's beyond a diet Coke!

Me, instantly comprehending, 'Innit, they're having a giraffe! How's Sally, though?'

Never heard Miley (virus) or diet (joke) before in my life, but it's not hard to work out *if you expect* that kind of wordplay every time anyone opens their mouth.

Like at work an older man went "the Alan's buggered" and clearly this was some device rhyming with the surname of a famous Alan. So I went Alan who? Fretwork? and was informed of the existence of Alan Minter. Broken printer, not network.

Hubby does that to me a lot, and I know it's just to piss me off; I don't think he even believes half the rhyming slang is real, it's just made up on the spot and he knows it annoys me, so he does it.

One thing he does have is that oh so British talent for ironic understatement; none of my family get it, but it seems to be ground-in at bone level with him and his friends and relatives, public school and Oxbridge refugees all.

Hubby loves Blackadder, Red Dwarf, The Hitch-Hiker's Guide To The Galaxy, The Young Ones, The Comic Strip Presents, and Ripping Yarns. Baldric, the idiot servant in Blackadder is easily his favorite comedic character, and his favorite episode is 'Beer' and the running 'oo-er, sounds a bit rude, sounds like...bum!' gag.

I love Monty Python, Will says it's juvenile, but he loves what the Python team did in 'Ripping Yarns'. As I never read any of the stiff upper lip, Boys Own books they rip apart, I don't get the references or the way they twisted the storylines, but he loves them, because he knows all the stories they were parodying.

 

[SamScribble]

Some years ago, I was conducting a seminar in Florida and none of the participants were familiar with the term 'rumpy-pumpy'. Given that they were all writers, that surprised me somewhat.

 

[TheRedChamber]

The text upthread suggests korma is spicy, which as every Brit knows is a lie - it's a creamy almost unspicy curry, about as hot as coronation chicken, ie not.

Yeah, okay, you got me. In my defence 1) I was writing quickly before going to work 2) Corona has meant I've not been back to England for a curry for years 3) I was actively trying to avoid smearing both tippex and curry on her at the same time.