21 Americanisms That British People Use All the Time

and that's because humans finally decided to create a word to describe the appalling after effects of an all-night binge [Music] hello i'm laurence and i'm on a quest to uncover all of the memos that britain and america lost in the pond and one of those memos pertains to americanisms specifically americanisms that have made their way to britain now you might have come across this video and seen the word hangover on the thumbnail and thought hangover is not an americanism it's just an english word and that's true today but at one point in time that word along with others in this video entered the english language not in britain but the united states of america for me this is a fascinating subject because growing up in britain i'd often read newspaper headlines like is our language becoming americanized and the truth whether you like it or not is that english has been getting the american treatment not for decades but centuries and you know you're probably thinking well of course america added to the english language it came up with words like yee haw and yes it did but that's not what i'm talking about i'm talking about words that originated in the united states and are still in wide use today not just there but in the rest of the english-speaking world first up staycation i talked about this in a recent video it is of course a blending of the word stay and vacation instead of going on far-flung vacations to another country or you know two states away many americans are choosing to save money by going on vacation in their home city of course even in the absence of the word vacation in britain the word staycation has made its way over there and in both countries has become a popular word again drawing the pandemic except in britain of course it has a slightly different meaning there a staycation is a holiday that takes place anywhere in britain next up facebook and you might be thinking of course that's an americanism mark zuckerberg came up with it all but he didn't come up with the word facebook from the early 80s a facebook was a directory of names and headshots that was used almost exclusively among us college students intriguingly this is how life began for the social network of the same name as recently as the late 1960s the word aerobics didn't exist before then it was known more formally as aerobic exercise and it took the influential u.s physician kenneth h cooper to shorten it to aerobics and while we have him to thank for that word i should add the disclaimer that he takes no responsibility for ate his gym wear i was surprised to find during research for this video that the word scam has only been around since the early 60s and while the precise reasons for its origin are unclear its first usages are traced back to the united states i'm sure americans everywhere will be mighty proud but not so fast because britain might have had a hand in this nefarious origin story you see some linguists theorize that the word scam might have derived from the british slang word scamp skinhead weirdly this word is perhaps used today more in britain than it is in the united states since the late 1960s it's been used in a slightly derogatory sense to describe a person with a shaved head who's also part of a gang those days are well and truly behind me but the word was in use much earlier in the united states where it was used from the early 1950s to describe military personnel that had crew cuts who needs the hassle of long hair anyway oh and speaking of the word hassle that word to mean fuss or trouble was first attributed to the american magazine downbeat in 1945. once again its exact origins are slightly unclear one theory posits that it might have derived from a u.s southern dialectal term meaning to pant or breathe noisily we do not have b-roll for that radar is a good word not only is it an acronym but it's also a palindrome that is the same forward as backward and as a product of world war ii radar and the naming of it was apparently left to both britain and america and america's choice of radar won out over the british word radiolocation radio location i don't know how you pronounce it snazzy as in that's a snazzy jumper you're wearing is that a gingerbread man with a lightsaber oh yes it is but when it first entered the english language in the early 1930s the word snazzy would not have been used as an adjective to the word jumper but perhaps sweater and that's because originally it was an americanism perhaps coined as a blending of snappy and jazzy oh yes blind date and where i come from this was the name of a tv show hosted by cilla black but of course in both countries blind date has been used to mean a date between two people who've never met before and in the age of tinder that would seem to be most dates of course this wasn't the case a hundred years ago when the word fell into use once again as u.s college slang of course back then american students had to make their own fun especially since prohibition was in full swing but just a couple of decades before the early 20s drinking was apparently all the rage and that's because humans finally decided to create a word to describe the appalling after effects of an all-night binge and when i say humans i mean american humans who coined this word on the idea that it meant something left over from the night before and never mind overdoing it on the eggnog and brandy what about underdoing it on the eggs the genus name salmonella was coined in 1900 in reference to the american veterinary surgeon daniel e salmon probably pronounced salman it was he who isolated a part of the bacteria in 1885 but a particular word was coined that might be used to describe your reticence to eat eggs after watching this video and that word is cagey as in operating with reluctance and while the word originated in the united states is a colloquial phrase the word is widely used among british football commentators to describe a defense that's absolutely bricking it oh look yet more evidence of america's former obsession with alcohol the word chaser used to this day in both countries a non-alcoholic drink taken to temper the effects of the opposite is first attested as an americanism from 1894. perhaps most of us can say that we've experienced the highs and lows of a ferris wheel in fact having lived in london i've endured one of the world's most famous but only one can lay claim to the world's first unveiled in 1893 right here in chicago at the world's fair and the ferris wheel was named for its designer george washington gail ferris jr an illinois native well what do you know the youngans were at it again that's right the word jim is a shortening of gymnasium appears to have first been used by u.s students in the early 1870s given the weather systems of the united states is perhaps no surprise that the word blizzard originated here while its exact origin is uncertain the oed suspects that it might be onomatopoeic that is a word that sounds like the action that it is describing in britain if people get carried away they might use the word blizzard to describe an inch of snow sure the word vigilante existed in spanish long before it ever entered english but when it did enter english it did so via the united states while today a vigilante is somebody that investigates or punishes somebody without the legal authority it meant a member of a vigilance committee when it entered american english in 1856 the word raggedy pops up now and again in the british science fiction show doctor who amy refers to the doctor as raggedy man but a hundred years before this in the united states an illustrator by the name of johnny gruelle created a series of stories called raggedy anne and even then the word raggedy was old having been first attested in southern u.s english since 1845. earlier in the 1830s it was becoming apparent that american english was going to be okay and that's because it gave us okay and while the word is most certainly first attested right here in the united states nobody is completely sure how it came about one of the leading theories is that it originated out of bostonian abbreviations in the 1830s during this time and place in history many words were often comically misspelled and then abbreviated accordingly hence all correct equals okay as chance would have it this phrase was popularized further during the presidential campaign of martin van buren his nickname of old kinderhook in relation to his birthplace was abbreviated during that campaign to okay and to that i would say just okay i'm voting for the other guy who was the other guy william henry harrison i can't wait to see what his four years in office brings but from one of the most commonly used words in the english language to one of the most commonly used words in the english language that's right the word hello with that very spelling originated right here in the united states while variants like hollow and hallo had been around for a while the word hello as we've come to know and love was first found in american publications going back all the way to 1826 when it featured in the norwich courier of norwich connecticut this variation on the word started to be used more frequently throughout the 1800s until it ceased to be just another americanism and became a well-known greeting throughout the english-speaking world and there was one well-known american who had a message for us europeans that would belittle all things america in fact he delivered this message while coining the word belittle and that american was third u.s president thomas jefferson in his notes on the state of virginia jefferson used the word for the first time in the history of everything to describe the unflattering viewpoint promoted by a french naturalist that americans were somehow inferior to europeans that's it for this episode let me know in the comments below which of these words was most surprising i'm laurence brown you can follow me on twitter lost in the pond us and do not forget to subscribe to my channel so that my videos don't get lost in the pond a shout out to my patrons who make these videos possible if you would like to become a patron of lost in the pond you can do so at patreon.com lost in the pond until the next video goodbye [Music] you

Channel: Lost in the Pond

Views: 106,796

Keywords: Laurence Brown, America, Americanisms, Britain

Id: Hov31wtYZik

Length: 10min 5sec (605 seconds)

Published: Fri Sep 17 2021