"He has form" - "He has previous".

[Harrison Hill]

We Middle Class English kids found "The Sweeney" *very* cool and phrases such as "He has form" meaning "He has a bit of previous" are very much part of our colloquial language. I wonder if you Aussies and Americans use them? What other Working Class slang trips off your Middle Class tongue as a result of *very* cool programmes or films. Also:

Q1: Which dialects or patois pronounce "film" as "fillum"?
Q2: Which dialects or patois pronounce "film" as "flim"?

[Peter Young]

On 5 Oct 2013 Harrison Hill <harrison...@gmail.com> wrote:

> We Middle Class English kids found "The Sweeney" *very* cool and
> phrases such as "He has form" meaning "He has a bit of previous" are
> very much part of our colloquial language. I wonder if you Aussies and
> Americans use them? What other Working Class slang trips off your
> Middle Class tongue as a result of *very* cool programmes or films.
> Also:

> Q1: Which dialects or patois pronounce "film" as "fillum"?

Irish for one.

> Q2: Which dialects or patois pronounce "film" as "flim"?

No eye deer.

Peter.

--
Peter Young, (BrE, RP), Consultant Anaesthetist, 1975-2004.
(US equivalent: Certified Anesthesiologist)
Cheltenham and Gloucester, UK. Now happily retired.
http://pnyoung.orpheusweb.co.uk

[Tony Cooper]

On Sat, 5 Oct 2013 09:53:43 -0700 (PDT), Harrison Hill
<harrison...@gmail.com> wrote:

>We Middle Class English kids found "The Sweeney" *very* cool and phrases such as "He has form" meaning "He has a bit of previous"

"He has form", meaning "He has a record of arrests" would probably be
understood by most Americans. However, it's not something most
Americans would ever say unless they were in law enforcement or
connected with the criminal court system in some way. The rest of us
who know it know it from television and movie usage.

>are very much part of our colloquial language. I wonder if you Aussies and Americans use them?
>What other Working Class slang trips off your Middle Class tongue as a result of *very* cool programmes or films.
>Also:
>
>Q1: Which dialects or patois pronounce "film" as "fillum"?

As a photographer, I use and hear "film" quite a bit and it's never
pronounced as "fillum". The "film" that you are referring to is
probably the another word for "movie", though.

A movie is usually called a "film" when it's considered an "art film"
and not a movie with general appeal. Documentaries are called
"films". I don't know that any particular group pronounces it
"fillum" in that context, but some individuals do.

>Q2: Which dialects or patois pronounce "film" as "flim"?

Never heard it.

--
Tony Cooper - Orlando FL

[Harrison Hill]

On Saturday, 5 October 2013 18:01:59 UTC+1, Peter Young wrote:
> On 5 Oct 2013 Harrison Hill <harrison...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > We Middle Class English kids found "The Sweeney" *very* cool and
> > phrases such as "He has form" meaning "He has a bit of previous" are
> > very much part of our colloquial language. I wonder if you Aussies and
> > Americans use them? What other Working Class slang trips off your
> > Middle Class tongue as a result of *very* cool programmes or films.
> > Also:
>
> > Q1: Which dialects or patois pronounce "film" as "fillum"?
>
> Irish for one.

And Geordie and Glaswegian.

Then in 1975 a big hit from Jamaica across the world:

"It's just like a flim show
"To protect the humble we change the name"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6FYTL8ydERw

[Mike L]

Some youngsters use it filppantly (I probalby did myslef), but it
isn't ialdect. I sometimes did the same sort of thing as a father to
amuse the children - "I don't stink so" for "I don't think so", etc ad
taedium.

--
Mike.

[Harrison Hill]

<snip>

>
> Some youngsters use it filppantly (I probalby did myslef), but it
> isn't ialdect. I sometimes did the same sort of thing as a father to
> amuse the children - "I don't stink so" for "I don't think so", etc ad
> taedium.

It isn't dialect, it is patois; and if I "arksed" you a question, that would be the same patois; you can hear it all the time in BrE - on the street, on the BBC - Elizabethan in origin, so they say; so the way your ancestors spoke. Cue Pluto Shervington again for "flim show", around about the 1.35 minute mark:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6FYTL8ydERw

[Dr Nick]

I still do ("shall we watch a fillum tonight"). Irish is what I think
of and I remember a Channel 4 presenter who used to say it.

Here's a recent example of it even being used to make a better rhyme
(the official website gives it as "film" in the lyrics). There's a good
Irish "th" in the title of the song as well! The singer is Thomas Walsh
who comes from Dublin.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OEs5Bmc16YA

Film at about 1:45

[micky]

On Sat, 05 Oct 2013 15:13:51 -0400, Tony Cooper
<tonyco...@gmail.com> wrote:

>On Sat, 5 Oct 2013 09:53:43 -0700 (PDT), Harrison Hill
><harrison...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>>We Middle Class English kids found "The Sweeney" *very* cool and phrases such as "He has form" meaning "He has a bit of previous"
>
>"He has form", meaning "He has a record of arrests" would probably be
>understood by most Americans.

Not me, a bona fide American.

> However, it's not something most
>Americans would ever say unless they were in law enforcement or
>connected with the criminal court system in some way. The rest of us
>who know it know it from television and movie usage.
>
>>are very much part of our colloquial language. I wonder if you Aussies and Americans use them?
>>What other Working Class slang trips off your Middle Class tongue as a result of *very* cool programmes or films.
>>Also:
>>
>>Q1: Which dialects or patois pronounce "film" as "fillum"?

I did, until I was about 8. Then I learned to say it like it's
written. There was one similar word I had trouble with, but I
forget which.

>
>As a photographer, I use and hear "film" quite a bit and it's never
>pronounced as "fillum". The "film" that you are referring to is
>probably the another word for "movie", though.
>
>A movie is usually called a "film" when it's considered an "art film"
>and not a movie with general appeal. Documentaries are called
>"films". I don't know that any particular group pronounces it
>"fillum" in that context, but some individuals do.
>
>>Q2: Which dialects or patois pronounce "film" as "flim"?
>
>Never heard it.

Me neither.

[Tony Cooper]

On Sun, 06 Oct 2013 22:41:09 -0400, micky <NONONO...@bigfoot.com>
wrote:

>On Sat, 05 Oct 2013 15:13:51 -0400, Tony Cooper
><tonyco...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>>On Sat, 5 Oct 2013 09:53:43 -0700 (PDT), Harrison Hill
>><harrison...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>>We Middle Class English kids found "The Sweeney" *very* cool and phrases such as "He has form" meaning "He has a bit of previous"
>>
>>"He has form", meaning "He has a record of arrests" would probably be
>>understood by most Americans.
>
>Not me, a bona fide American.

That's to your credit, Micky. It means you've never had a run-in with
the police and you don't watch certain television programs. Nothing
wrong with being uninformed about the world that television and movie
script writers create for us.

I can't think of an American television program using that piece of
dialog recently - but I'm sure it has been done - but just tonight I
was watching the British show "New Tricks" where someone said "He's
got form, Guv".

[Robert Bannister]

On 6/10/13 3:13 AM, Tony Cooper wrote:
> On Sat, 5 Oct 2013 09:53:43 -0700 (PDT), Harrison Hill
> <harrison...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> We Middle Class English kids found "The Sweeney" *very* cool and phrases such as "He has form" meaning "He has a bit of previous"
>
> "He has form", meaning "He has a record of arrests" would probably be
> understood by most Americans. However, it's not something most
> Americans would ever say unless they were in law enforcement or
> connected with the criminal court system in some way. The rest of us
> who know it know it from television and movie usage.
>
>> are very much part of our colloquial language. I wonder if you Aussies and Americans use them?
>> What other Working Class slang trips off your Middle Class tongue as a result of *very* cool programmes or films.
>> Also:
>>
>> Q1: Which dialects or patois pronounce "film" as "fillum"?
>
> As a photographer, I use and hear "film" quite a bit and it's never
> pronounced as "fillum". The "film" that you are referring to is
> probably the another word for "movie", though.

As has already been said, "fillum" is Irish and like a few other
Irishisms ("haitch") is part of many Australian dialects. We use "movie"
and to a lesser extent "picture" as well without any real differentiation.

--
Robert Bannister

[Peter T. Daniels]

So explain why that would make the expression "understood by most
Americans"?

Let alone "he has a bit of previous"?

[Tony Cooper]

On Tue, 8 Oct 2013 13:35:53 +0000 (UTC), Lewis
<g.k...@gmail.com.dontsendmecopies> wrote:

>In message <tdb459pcfl754le5d...@4ax.com>

> Tony Cooper <tonyco...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> On Sun, 06 Oct 2013 22:41:09 -0400, micky <NONONO...@bigfoot.com>
>> wrote:
>
>>>On Sat, 05 Oct 2013 15:13:51 -0400, Tony Cooper
>>><tonyco...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>
>>>>On Sat, 5 Oct 2013 09:53:43 -0700 (PDT), Harrison Hill
>>>><harrison...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>We Middle Class English kids found "The Sweeney" *very* cool and phrases such as "He has form" meaning "He has a bit of previous"
>>>>
>>>>"He has form", meaning "He has a record of arrests" would probably be
>>>>understood by most Americans.
>>>
>>>Not me, a bona fide American.
>
>> That's to your credit, Micky. It means you've never had a run-in with
>> the police and you don't watch certain television programs. Nothing
>> wrong with being uninformed about the world that television and movie
>> script writers create for us.
>
>> I can't think of an American television program using that piece of
>> dialog recently - but I'm sure it has been done - but just tonight I
>> was watching the British show "New Tricks" where someone said "He's
>> got form, Guv".
>

>I've heard it, but maybe only on UK TV. It doesn�t sound like something
>I would have heard on American TV.

Well, the American TV channels carry a lot of British shows. Not all
Americans have access to the same channels, though. The cable and
dish providers offer several different packages of access.

I think that all packages are required to include a PBS channel. If
so, every cable or dish subscriber has the ability to watch at least
one British show a week.

The current Masterpiece offering is "The Paradise" which is a
disappointment to me. Only one episode has aired so far, but it seems
to be a weak imitation of "Mr Selfridge".

No references to "form" so far.

[musika]

On 08/10/2013 15:35, Tony Cooper wrote:
>
>
> The current Masterpiece offering is "The Paradise" which is a
> disappointment to me. Only one episode has aired so far, but it seems
> to be a weak imitation of "Mr Selfridge".
>

Except that it aired before Mr Selfridge.


--
Ray
UK

[Tony Cooper]

On Tue, 08 Oct 2013 16:23:51 +0100, musika <mUs...@NOSPAMexcite.com>
wrote:

In this market? The US?

[John Briggs]

OK. "Except that it was produced before Mr Selfridge."
--
John Briggs

[musika]

On 08/10/2013 16:37, Tony Cooper wrote:

No, in the UK.

--
Ray
UK

[Tony Cooper]

We, the viewers here, don't usually know that. The information is
available, of course, but it's not something we'd automatically know.

However, I'll revise my comment. "Mr Selfridge" was an improvement on
"The Paradise". That, of course, is a personal opinion that I have no
expectation that others share.

It's a rare case, for me, where I consider an American actor's
performance to be better than a British (Scottish) actor's
performance. At first, I thought Jeremy Piven was totally miscast in
the role of Selfridge. As the series progressed, Piven either
improved or my view of his performance softened.

Still, I'll watch the full "The Paradise" series.

[Pat Durkin]

On Sunday, October 6, 2013 11:46:48 PM UTC-5, Robert Bannister wrote:
> On 6/10/13 3:13 AM, Tony Cooper wrote:
>
> > On Sat, 5 Oct 2013 09:53:43 -0700 (PDT), Harrison Hill
>
> > <harrison...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> >
>
> >
>
> >> are very much part of our colloquial language. I wonder if you Aussies and Americans use them?
>
> >> What other Working Class slang trips off your Middle Class tongue as a result of *very* cool programmes or films.
>
> >> Also:
>
> >>
>
> >> Q1: Which dialects or patois pronounce "film" as "fillum"?
>
> >
>
> > As a photographer, I use and hear "film" quite a bit and it's never
>
> > pronounced as "fillum". The "film" that you are referring to is
>
> > probably the another word for "movie", though.
>

Some snips achieved.


Hi, gang. It's been years. My mother. in the last year or two of her life, resurrected a few pronunciations.

One of them was "fillum", a second was "colyum" (both of which I had heard before) and a third was "broakyour" (for brochure). That last, I think, might have been a reinvention from an earlier age. She was probably the 4th generation born in the US, from 3 lines of Irish immigrants, but all of her ancestors appeared to have been most voluble.

Pat Durkin (posting from Google, and sorry I haven't a "signature" file.
>
> --
>
> Robert Bannister

[an...@alum.wpi.edi]

On Tue, 8 Oct 2013 17:37:16 -0700 (PDT), Pat Durkin <durk...@msn.com>
wrote:

>On Sunday, October 6, 2013 11:46:48 PM UTC-5, Robert Bannister wrote:
>> On 6/10/13 3:13 AM, Tony Cooper wrote:
>>
>> > On Sat, 5 Oct 2013 09:53:43 -0700 (PDT), Harrison Hill
>>
>> > <harrison...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> >
>>
>> >
>>
>> >> are very much part of our colloquial language. I wonder if you Aussies and Americans use them?
>>
>> >> What other Working Class slang trips off your Middle Class tongue as a result of *very* cool programmes or films.
>>
>> >> Also:
>>
>> >>
>>
>> >> Q1: Which dialects or patois pronounce "film" as "fillum"?
>>
>> >
>>
>> > As a photographer, I use and hear "film" quite a bit and it's never
>>
>> > pronounced as "fillum". The "film" that you are referring to is
>>
>> > probably the another word for "movie", though.
>>
>Some snips achieved.
>
>
>Hi, gang. It's been years. My mother. in the last year or two of her life, resurrected a few pronunciations.
>
>One of them was "fillum", a second was "colyum"

That one's...I dunno? Official? Canonical? Pronouncing it that way
is a shiboleth among many steelworkers, some architects and engineers,
and so forth. At least it was.

It also showed up in some variants of army-ese, Both USAnian and
Btrittic. Dunno about Canada.


ANMcC

[CDB]

On 08/10/2013 9:25 PM, an...@alum.wpi.edi wrote:
> Pat Durkin <durk...@msn.com> wrote:
>> Robert Bannister wrote:
>>> Tony Cooper wrote:

>>>> Harrison Hill <harrison...@gmail.com> wrote:

>>>>> Q1: Which dialects or patois pronounce "film" as "fillum"?

>>>> As a photographer, I use and hear "film" quite a bit and it's
>>>> never

>>>> pronounced as "fillum". The "film" that you are referring to
>>>> is

>>>> probably the another word for "movie", though.

>> Some snips achieved.

>> Hi, gang. It's been years. My mother. in the last year or two of
>> her life, resurrected a few pronunciations.

>> One of them was "fillum", a second was "colyum"

Welcome back. How did you stick it out so long without us?

> That one's...I dunno? Official? Canonical? Pronouncing it that
> way is a shiboleth among many steelworkers, some architects and
> engineers, and so forth. At least it was.

> It also showed up in some variants of army-ese, Both USAnian and
> Btrittic. Dunno about Canada.

You hear "fillum" and the like in the Ottawa Valley, where there are
many people with Irish antecedents, and the accepted opinion here is
that the extra vowel comes from the Gaelic substrate of Irish English.
Maybe James can expand on that.

I've heard the other one, as well as "kewpon" and "theayter", but I
don't know if there is a national origin assigned to them.

[Robert Bannister]

On 8/10/13 10:35 PM, Tony Cooper wrote:
> On Tue, 8 Oct 2013 13:35:53 +0000 (UTC), Lewis
> <g.k...@gmail.com.dontsendmecopies> wrote:
>
>> In message <tdb459pcfl754le5d...@4ax.com>
>> Tony Cooper <tonyco...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>> On Sun, 06 Oct 2013 22:41:09 -0400, micky <NONONO...@bigfoot.com>
>>> wrote:
>>
>>>> On Sat, 05 Oct 2013 15:13:51 -0400, Tony Cooper
>>>> <tonyco...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>> On Sat, 5 Oct 2013 09:53:43 -0700 (PDT), Harrison Hill
>>>>> <harrison...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>>
>>>>>> We Middle Class English kids found "The Sweeney" *very* cool and phrases such as "He has form" meaning "He has a bit of previous"
>>>>>
>>>>> "He has form", meaning "He has a record of arrests" would probably be
>>>>> understood by most Americans.
>>>>
>>>> Not me, a bona fide American.
>>
>>> That's to your credit, Micky. It means you've never had a run-in with
>>> the police and you don't watch certain television programs. Nothing
>>> wrong with being uninformed about the world that television and movie
>>> script writers create for us.
>>
>>> I can't think of an American television program using that piece of
>>> dialog recently - but I'm sure it has been done - but just tonight I
>>> was watching the British show "New Tricks" where someone said "He's
>>> got form, Guv".
>>

>> I've heard it, but maybe only on UK TV. It doesn�t sound like something

>> I would have heard on American TV.
>
> Well, the American TV channels carry a lot of British shows. Not all
> Americans have access to the same channels, though. The cable and
> dish providers offer several different packages of access.
>
> I think that all packages are required to include a PBS channel. If
> so, every cable or dish subscriber has the ability to watch at least
> one British show a week.
>
> The current Masterpiece offering is "The Paradise" which is a
> disappointment to me. Only one episode has aired so far, but it seems
> to be a weak imitation of "Mr Selfridge".

Surely "The Paradise" came out before "Mr Selfridge". I haven't seen the
latter yet.
--
Robert Bannister

[Tony Cooper]

>>> I've heard it, but maybe only on UK TV. It doesn�t sound like something

>>> I would have heard on American TV.
>>
>> Well, the American TV channels carry a lot of British shows. Not all
>> Americans have access to the same channels, though. The cable and
>> dish providers offer several different packages of access.
>>
>> I think that all packages are required to include a PBS channel. If
>> so, every cable or dish subscriber has the ability to watch at least
>> one British show a week.
>>
>> The current Masterpiece offering is "The Paradise" which is a
>> disappointment to me. Only one episode has aired so far, but it seems
>> to be a weak imitation of "Mr Selfridge".
>
>Surely "The Paradise" came out before "Mr Selfridge". I haven't seen the
>latter yet.

It depends on where you are. "The Paradise" just "came out" here. "Mr
Selfridge" was shown on PBS several months ago.

It can get kind of confusing for us (at this house). We have a two
PBS outlets available with our cable package. One is showing the
current "Foyle's War", and the other is showing the older series. We
record both, and when we play one we don't know until it starts
whether it will be set during the war or after.

[Peter Moylan]

We in Australia have a different variant of the confusion. It often
happens that someone says to me "You should watch that new program xxx.
It's really good." When I say that I've already seen the whole series,
the other person is puzzled as to how I could have seen a series that
has just begun airing.

It happens because some of the very best programs are shown by our two
non-commercial networks, ABC and SBS. A series can be shown on ABC and
get a small but appreciative audience. A year or two later, one of the
commercial networks picks it up (it's probably a bargain by then) and
shows it to a much larger audience. That larger audience has no idea
that it's a re-run.

In many cases the show is a flop when first shown, and a huge success on
the re-run.

The main reason for this happening is that the ABC and SBS are seen as
highbrow by many people, so they get only a small audience. The
commercial stations show mostly rubbish, and the figures show that
rubbish is what that most people want.

--
Peter Moylan, Newcastle, NSW, Australia. http://www.pmoylan.org
For an e-mail address, see my web page.

[Peter Moylan]

On 09/10/13 13:33, CDB wrote:

> You hear "fillum" and the like in the Ottawa Valley, where there are
> many people with Irish antecedents, and the accepted opinion here is
> that the extra vowel comes from the Gaelic substrate of Irish English.
> Maybe James can expand on that.

I've just been searching some textbooks, but can't find the point
mentioned. It is true, though, that in Irish Gaelic an "l" before "m" is
given full value, creating the impression that "lm" is pronounced /l@m/.
I don't think the schwa is really there; what we're hearing is a
syllabic "l" creating an extra syllable.

Not many Irish people today are fluent in the Irish language, I gather.
Still, their pronunciation of English is affected by Irish, because it's
not all that many generations since English was a foreign language in
Ireland.

[James Hogg]

Peter Moylan wrote:
> On 09/10/13 13:33, CDB wrote:
>
>> You hear "fillum" and the like in the Ottawa Valley, where there
>> are many people with Irish antecedents, and the accepted opinion
>> here is that the extra vowel comes from the Gaelic substrate of
>> Irish English. Maybe James can expand on that.
>
> I've just been searching some textbooks, but can't find the point
> mentioned. It is true, though, that in Irish Gaelic an "l" before "m"
> is given full value, creating the impression that "lm" is pronounced
> /l@m/. I don't think the schwa is really there; what we're hearing
> is a syllabic "l" creating an extra syllable.
>
> Not many Irish people today are fluent in the Irish language, I
> gather. Still, their pronunciation of English is affected by Irish,
> because it's not all that many generations since English was a
> foreign language in Ireland.

I just saw CDB's post through your reply. The "fillum" pronunciation in
Ireland has two roots. It's Elizabethan English (Shakespeare's
"philome") and it's reinforced by the practice of inserting extra vowels
in Irish, which has also spread to words like "warrum" (warm).* The
extra vowel is inserted in more circumstances in Gaelic than in
Hiberno-English, though. Names like Donncha and Sorcha have a schwa
before the "ch".

I knew a boy at school who declines the plural of Latin "mensa" thus:

men's eye
men's other eye
men's ass
men's arum

--
James

[Nick Spalding]

Peter Moylan wrote, in <52552791$1...@dnews.tpgi.com.au>
on Wed, 09 Oct 2013 20:53:19 +1100:

> On 09/10/13 13:33, CDB wrote:
>
> > You hear "fillum" and the like in the Ottawa Valley, where there are
> > many people with Irish antecedents, and the accepted opinion here is
> > that the extra vowel comes from the Gaelic substrate of Irish English.
> > Maybe James can expand on that.
>
> I've just been searching some textbooks, but can't find the point
> mentioned. It is true, though, that in Irish Gaelic an "l" before "m" is
> given full value, creating the impression that "lm" is pronounced /l@m/.
> I don't think the schwa is really there; what we're hearing is a
> syllabic "l" creating an extra syllable.
>
> Not many Irish people today are fluent in the Irish language, I gather.
> Still, their pronunciation of English is affected by Irish, because it's
> not all that many generations since English was a foreign language in
> Ireland.

Apart from "fillum" the most common occurrence of this is the name Colm
which is pronounced "Collum".
--
Nick Spalding
BrE/IrE

[CDB]

On 09/10/2013 6:12 AM, James Hogg wrote:

> Peter Moylan wrote:
>> CDB wrote:

>>> You hear "fillum" and the like in the Ottawa Valley, where there are
>>> many people with Irish antecedents, and the accepted opinion here is
>>> that the extra vowel comes from the Gaelic substrate of Irish
>>> English. Maybe James can expand on that.

>> I've just been searching some textbooks, but can't find the point
>> mentioned. It is true, though, that in Irish Gaelic an "l" before "m"
>> is given full value, creating the impression that "lm" is pronounced
>> /l@m/. I don't think the schwa is really there; what we're hearing is
>> a syllabic "l" creating an extra syllable.

Makes sense. The subtlety would hardly make it through to English ears.
(But James has examples below with other consonants.)

>> Not many Irish people today are fluent in the Irish language, I
>> gather. Still, their pronunciation of English is affected by Irish,
>> because it's not all that many generations since English was a foreign
>> language in Ireland.

Stage Irish* is full of the front-back (broad-slender) distinction,
which must have been automatic to a Gaelic speaker. Maybe "pisher" is
an example of that, not just a minced word.

*"Write what you know."

> I just saw CDB's post through your reply. The "fillum" pronunciation in
> Ireland has two roots. It's Elizabethan English (Shakespeare's
> "philome") and it's reinforced by the practice of inserting extra vowels
> in Irish, which has also spread to words like "warrum" (warm).* The
> extra vowel is inserted in more circumstances in Gaelic than in
> Hiberno-English, though. Names like Donncha and Sorcha have a schwa
> before the "ch".

Thanks, that's the kind of thing I had in mind. An aioeer, are you?

> I knew a boy at school who declines the plural of Latin "mensa" thus:

> men's eye
> men's other eye
> men's ass
> men's arum

He forgot "men's Sis".

[Peter T. Daniels]

On Wednesday, October 9, 2013 5:53:19 AM UTC-4, Peter Moylan wrote:
> On 09/10/13 13:33, CDB wrote:
>
> > You hear "fillum" and the like in the Ottawa Valley, where there are
> > many people with Irish antecedents, and the accepted opinion here is
> > that the extra vowel comes from the Gaelic substrate of Irish English.
> > Maybe James can expand on that.
>
> I've just been searching some textbooks, but can't find the point
> mentioned. It is true, though, that in Irish Gaelic an "l" before "m" is
> given full value, creating the impression that "lm" is pronounced /l@m/.
> I don't think the schwa is really there; what we're hearing is a
> syllabic "l" creating an extra syllable.

What do "given full value" and "n't ... really there" mean?

A "syllabic l" would create something like [fI@lm], not possible after
a vowel.

> Not many Irish people today are fluent in the Irish language, I gather.
> Still, their pronunciation of English is affected by Irish, because it's
> not all that many generations since English was a foreign language in
> Ireland.

Different regions needn't have substrata for there to be different accents.

[charles...@gmail.com]

On Saturday, October 5, 2013 12:53:43 PM UTC-4, Harrison Hill wrote:
> We Middle Class English kids found "The Sweeney" *very* cool and phrases such as "He has form" meaning "He has a bit of previous" are very much part of our colloquial language. I wonder if you Aussies and Americans use them? What other Working Class slang trips off your Middle Class tongue as a result of *very* cool programmes or films. Also:

>
>
>
> Q1: Which dialects or patois pronounce "film" as "fillum"?
>

> Q2: Which dialects or patois pronounce "film" as "flim"?

I think in American 'tec novels I have seen "priors" used in the context of "form". And the word "record" just by itself as well.

[Mike L]

Perhaps it's a case of as long as they _think_ it's the kind of
rubbish they want, they'll like it - "It's on the channels I watch, so
it must be my kind of show". Look how that works the other way round:
"This sculpture, poetry, architecture, music, etc is for the élite, so
it must be the kind of thing _I_ like."

--
Mike.

[Robert Bannister]

What amazes me is that the show was only forty minutes long when it was
on ABC, but on Channel 10 it's an hour and a half because of the ads.

There is also the case of the "box set" - sometimes, the complete series
is for sale on DVD before the it has been shown on TV.
--
Robert Bannister

[Peter T. Daniels]

On Wednesday, October 9, 2013 10:32:12 PM UTC-4, Robert Bannister wrote:
>
> What amazes me is that the show was only forty minutes long when it was
> on ABC, but on Channel 10 it's an hour and a half because of the ads.

Phew. We think we've got it bad because our hour-long prime time shows are
44 minutes.

[Pat Durkin]

On Tuesday, October 8, 2013 9:33:03 PM UTC-5, CDB wrote:
> On 08/10/2013 9:25 PM, an...@alum.wpi.edi wrote:
>
> > Pat Durkin <durk...@msn.com> wrote:
>
> >> Robert Bannister wrote:
>
> >>> Tony Cooper wrote:
>
> >>>> Harrison Hill <harrison...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>
>
> >>>>> Q1: Which dialects or patois pronounce "film" as "fillum"?
>
>
>
> >>>> As a photographer, I use and hear "film" quite a bit and it's
>
> >>>> never
>
>
>
> >>>> pronounced as "fillum". The "film" that you are referring to
>
> >>>> is
>
>
>
> >>>> probably the another word for "movie", though.
>
>
>
> >> Some snips achieved.
>
>
>
> >> Hi, gang. It's been years. My mother. in the last year or two of
>
> >> her life, resurrected a few pronunciations.
>
>
>
> >> One of them was "fillum", a second was "colyum"
>
>
>
> Welcome back. How did you stick it out so long without us?

Lost along the way, spending too much time on politics in Facebook. Ha Ha. where existence is feudal.

>
>
>
> > That one's...I dunno? Official? Canonical? Pronouncing it that
>
> > way is a shiboleth among many steelworkers, some architects and
>
> > engineers, and so forth. At least it was.
>
>
>
> > It also showed up in some variants of army-ese, Both USAnian and
>
> > Btrittic. Dunno about Canada.
>
>
>
> You hear "fillum" and the like in the Ottawa Valley, where there are
>
> many people with Irish antecedents, and the accepted opinion here is
>
> that the extra vowel comes from the Gaelic substrate of Irish English.
>
> Maybe James can expand on that.
>
>
>
> I've heard the other one, as well as "kewpon" and "theayter", but I
>
> don't know if there is a national origin assigned to them.

My standard usage is to say "kewpon", but at times I slip into "coopon". As for your second one, I say "theuhter", but have heard "theayter" among country folk, or people being whimsical. (Country folk being rural Wisconsinites, born probably some time before WWII.)

--
Pat

[Robin Bignall]

On Thu, 10 Oct 2013 12:34:40 -0700 (PDT), Pat Durkin <durk...@msn.com>
wrote:

>On Tuesday, October 8, 2013 9:33:03 PM UTC-5, CDB wrote:
>> On 08/10/2013 9:25 PM, an...@alum.wpi.edi wrote:
>>
>> > Pat Durkin <durk...@msn.com> wrote:
>>
>> >> Robert Bannister wrote:
>>
>> >>> Tony Cooper wrote:
>>
>> >>>> Harrison Hill <harrison...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>>
>>
>> >>>>> Q1: Which dialects or patois pronounce "film" as "fillum"?
>>
>>
>>
>> >>>> As a photographer, I use and hear "film" quite a bit and it's
>>
>> >>>> never
>>
>>
>>
>> >>>> pronounced as "fillum". The "film" that you are referring to
>>
>> >>>> is
>>
>>
>>
>> >>>> probably the another word for "movie", though.
>>
>>
>>
>> >> Some snips achieved.
>>
>>
>>
>> >> Hi, gang. It's been years. My mother. in the last year or two of
>>
>> >> her life, resurrected a few pronunciations.
>>
>>
>>
>> >> One of them was "fillum", a second was "colyum"
>>
>>
>>
>> Welcome back. How did you stick it out so long without us?
>
>Lost along the way, spending too much time on politics in Facebook. Ha Ha. where existence is feudal.
>>

Or futile? A dangerous place, FB. It can swallow up all of one's time
all too easily, and then some.

>>
>>
>> > That one's...I dunno? Official? Canonical? Pronouncing it that
>>
>> > way is a shiboleth among many steelworkers, some architects and
>>
>> > engineers, and so forth. At least it was.
>>
>>
>>
>> > It also showed up in some variants of army-ese, Both USAnian and
>>
>> > Btrittic. Dunno about Canada.
>>
>>
>>
>> You hear "fillum" and the like in the Ottawa Valley, where there are
>>
>> many people with Irish antecedents, and the accepted opinion here is
>>
>> that the extra vowel comes from the Gaelic substrate of Irish English.
>>
>> Maybe James can expand on that.
>>
>>
>>
>> I've heard the other one, as well as "kewpon" and "theayter", but I
>>
>> don't know if there is a national origin assigned to them.
>
>My standard usage is to say "kewpon", but at times I slip into "coopon". As for your second one, I say "theuhter", but have heard "theayter" among country folk, or people being whimsical. (Country folk being rural Wisconsinites, born probably some time before WWII.)

Accent and dialect quite regardless, many welcomes back.
--
Robin Bignall
Herts, England (BrE)

[Mark Brader]

Peter Moylan:

> We in Australia have a different variant of the confusion. It often
> happens that someone says to me "You should watch that new program xxx.
> It's really good." When I say that I've already seen the whole series,
> the other person is puzzled as to how I could have seen a series that
> has just begun airing.

I am reminded of the scene in "Back to the Future" where they watch an
episode of "The Honeymooners". Marty says he remembers the episode,
and the dialogue continues something like this:

"What do you mean, you remember it? It's on NOW."
"Well, I saw a rerun."
"What's a rerun?"
"It's-- it's-- ahh, you'll find out."

--
Mark Brader | "...what can be asserted without evidence
Toronto | can also be dismissed without evidence."
m...@vex.net | --Christopher Hitchens

My text in this article is in the public domain.

[Robert Bannister]

When I first came to Australia, I was really impressed with commercial
television here compared with what we had at that time in the UK. As the
years passed, though, the Australian commercial channels have taken more
and more liberties. I am convinced that this is at least half the reason
why most young people today have an attention span of about seven
minutes, the average length of time between ads on some channels.

--
Robert Bannister

[Peter Young]

On 10 Oct 2013 Pat Durkin <durk...@msn.com> wrote:

> On Tuesday, October 8, 2013 9:33:03 PM UTC-5, CDB wrote:
>> On 08/10/2013 9:25 PM, an...@alum.wpi.edi wrote:

>>> Pat Durkin <durk...@msn.com> wrote:

>>>> Robert Bannister wrote:

>>>>> Tony Cooper wrote:

>>>>>> Harrison Hill <harrison...@gmail.com> wrote:

>>>>>>> Q1: Which dialects or patois pronounce "film" as "fillum"?

[snip]

(I hope I've done the snipping correctly; this message got badly
formatted here.)

I was at a fascinating talk yesterday by David and Ben Crystal about
how Shakespeare's works may have been pronounced in his day. One of
the parts of evidence is in the way words are spelled in, for
instance, in the First Folio. In the Queen Mab speech in Romeo and
Juliet, when Mab is described as driving her chariot with "reins of
film", the First Folio spells that last word as "philoem", so there's
your "fillum" nearly 400 years ago.

Since my wife died I've been keeping innocent company with a widowed
colleague who was brought up in Northern Ireland; she speaks pretty
much RP BrE, but always says "fillum". Yesterday I was telling her
about this sub-thread, and teasing her about this pronunciation, and
she said, "Well it's correct!" She didn't come to the talk in the
evening, which is a pity, but I'll be seeing her later today, and will
have to admit that she's right, or would have been in Shakespeare's
time, anyway.

Peter.

--
Peter Young, (BrE, RP), Consultant Anaesthetist, 1975-2004.
(US equivalent: Certified Anesthesiologist)
Cheltenham and Gloucester, UK. Now happily retired.
http://pnyoung.orpheusweb.co.uk

[Peter Moylan]

The problem, I suspect, is self-regulation. There are rules about how
much advertising is allowed per hour, but nobody seems to be enforcing them.

I'm greatly puzzled as to how the "infomercial" channels, with 60
minutes of advertising per hour, are deemed to be obeying these rules.
Perhaps they get an exemption on the grounds that modern TV sets make it
very easy to set up the tuning such that one never gets to see those
channels.

[Peter Duncanson [BrE]]

There are probably separate rules for those channels.

In the UK the TV regulator, Ofcom, licenses three types of TV service:

1. An _editorial service_ is a "normal" programme service, with
conventional programme material and scheduled advertising breaks.
....

2. A _teleshopping service_ is a service which consists of
teleshopping. Teleshopping (also known as home shopping,
advertorials, infomercials, etc) is a particular form of advertising
involving the broadcast of direct offers to the public with a view
to the supply of goods or services in return for payment.
....

3. A _self-promotional service_ is a service which consists of
self-promotional material. Self-promotional material is a particular
kind of advertising in which the broadcaster promotes its own
products, services or channels.
....

From http://licensing.ofcom.org.uk/binaries/tv/tlcs_guidance.pdf

--
Peter Duncanson, UK
(in alt.usage.english)

[Robert Bannister]

These seem to have started up very recently. I was equally puzzled to
find them.
--
Robert Bannister

[Tony Cooper]

I don't know if you have them, but here in the US we have religious
programming that is nothing but preaching. Is that an infomercial for
God?

[Steve Hayes]

On Fri, 11 Oct 2013 22:26:24 -0400, Tony Cooper <tonyco...@gmail.com>
wrote:

Having been without Internet access for nearly a fortnight I come to this
thread completely new, and wonder about the previous form of infomercials.


--
Steve Hayes from Tshwane, South Africa
Web: http://www.khanya.org.za/stevesig.htm
Blog: http://khanya.wordpress.com
E-mail - see web page, or parse: shayes at dunelm full stop org full stop uk

[Peter Duncanson [BrE]]

In the UK some channels are licensed for an "editorial" service during
certain hours of the day and are licensed for a "teleshopping" service
at other times.

[R H Draney]

Tony Cooper filted:

>
>I don't know if you have them, but here in the US we have religious
>programming that is nothing but preaching. Is that an infomercial for
>God?

In His guise as a wholly-owned subsidiary of God & Mammon, Inc....r


--
Me? Sarcastic?
Yeah, right.

[Mike L]

We get the God ones on satellite TV. The ones I've seen all seem to be
misinfomercials for the financial benefit of the preachers. There's
one who sweats profusely into his suit and touches people who then
faint.

--
Mikie.

[John Briggs]

Hardly surprising, I would have thought. I rather hope that I would too.
--
John Briggs

[Tony Cooper]

One, Benny Hinn, used to smack people on the forehead and they'd fall
back into an aide's arms. It's a wonder he never got sued for
aggravated assault.

[Mike L]

On Sat, 12 Oct 2013 22:47:41 +0100, John Briggs
<john.b...@ntlworld.com> wrote:

>On 12/10/2013 22:35, Mike L wrote:
>> On Fri, 11 Oct 2013 22:26:24 -0400, Tony Cooper
>> <tonyco...@gmail.com> wrote:

[...]

>>>
>>> I don't know if you have them, but here in the US we have religious
>>> programming that is nothing but preaching. Is that an infomercial for
>>> God?
>>
>> We get the God ones on satellite TV. The ones I've seen all seem to be
>> misinfomercials for the financial benefit of the preachers. There's
>> one who sweats profusely into his suit and touches people who then
>> faint.
>
>Hardly surprising, I would have thought. I rather hope that I would too.

Good point, which I hadn't considered. But his henchmen come round
with blankets and cover up the ecstatics: the whole thing is so sordid
that I wouldn't be astonished to learn that pockets are picked during
the cover-up.

--
Mike.

[Dr Nick]

Lewis <g.k...@gmail.com.dontsendmecopies> writes:

> In message <tdb459pcfl754le5d...@4ax.com>
> Tony Cooper <tonyco...@gmail.com> wrote:
>> On Sun, 06 Oct 2013 22:41:09 -0400, micky <NONONO...@bigfoot.com>
>> wrote:
>
>>>On Sat, 05 Oct 2013 15:13:51 -0400, Tony Cooper
>>><tonyco...@gmail.com> wrote:

>>>
>>>>On Sat, 5 Oct 2013 09:53:43 -0700 (PDT), Harrison Hill
>>>><harrison...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>We Middle Class English kids found "The Sweeney" *very* cool and phrases such as "He has form" meaning "He has a bit of previous"
>>>>

>>>>"He has form", meaning "He has a record of arrests" would probably be
>>>>understood by most Americans.
>>>
>>>Not me, a bona fide American.
>
>> That's to your credit, Micky. It means you've never had a run-in with
>> the police and you don't watch certain television programs. Nothing
>> wrong with being uninformed about the world that television and movie
>> script writers create for us.
>
>> I can't think of an American television program using that piece of
>> dialog recently - but I'm sure it has been done - but just tonight I
>> was watching the British show "New Tricks" where someone said "He's
>> got form, Guv".
>
> I've heard it, but maybe only on UK TV. It doesn’t sound like something
> I would have heard on American TV.

It goes a lot further than cop shows. Yesterday I was chatting about a
politician with a friend and said "I wouldn't be surprised if he
did...". His response: "Well, he's got form; he did ...".

Stuff elided, as I'm sure the US contingent find endless debates about
UK politics as tedious as the reciprocal.

[Iain Archer]

Mike L wrote on Sat, 12 Oct 2013 at 22:35:41 GMT

I'm deprived. They use an up-market High Definition channel which my TV
and Freeview box aren't capable of decoding. I'd never thought before
of God as lacking the common touch.
--
Iain Archer