Juhe,

That may be right

Kendal posted

quote:

I wish my Hiney was that perky! Wink Grin

on my Halloween Mooning post. So I would like someone to help me out on its meaning.

It sounds as if I was right. :-) Mooning and hiney certainly go together. I guess the word comes from hind quarters? And what's this about mooning for Halloween?!?!

Here's simple differentiation in pronunciation:
The proper name Derby - West of Nottingham, South of Manchester - that Derby

US: Durby
UK: Darby

Likewise Berkeley - BUT within living memory, the UR rather than AH pronunciation has been known as a regional or class variation in some parts of the UK. I think the best-known Derby has always been pronounced Darby (certainly the race, which is named for an Earl of Derby), but I'm not so sure about West Derby (suburb of Liverpool). Also, one popular notion of the derivation of the (insult) "berk" (= idiot or nebbish) has to do with the ER pronunciation of Berkeley and a piece of highly indelicate rhyming slang - that may be entirely fanciful, but the point is that the ER pronunciation was considered possible in the UK.

And Jeff,

Don't forget that Nottingham is pronounced No-ting-um (No as in not). I suppose ther must be other Nottingham.

In Oz, Melbourne is pronounced Mel-burn, but the village near Nottingham is pronounced Mel-born, like all the other bournes in England.

My cousins lived in Derby, Connecticut. Of course, it was pronounced like the hat.. not like the horse race.

So why is the hat pronounced one way, and the town in England the other way? Does anyone say 'darby hat?' I am getting more confused by the minute. :-)

I was taught to pronounce darby hat.
I was also taught to pronounce Kearney St of San Francisco as Karney, but no one pronounces it that way any more, and San Franciscans correct me when I say Karney.
English - be it British English or American English - is not my native tongue, so who knows. I just say whatever I was taught originally to say.

That's proper names for you. Without straying too far from the subject here:

In the Rochester, NY area there's a town spelled Chili (looks like it oughta be pronounced like Chile (as in food or country), but instead is pronounced Chai lai (as in Jai Lai)

Also in the same area the town of Lima is pronounced like the bean, rather than the capital of Peru.

I've said Karney St., too. When did *that* change I wonder.

When I lived in Detroit for a year back in the Stone Age, I was amazed how the street names were pronounced. Many were French, which I speak, but they were said in a very, harsh American way. Gratiot had become Gratchet!!

quote:

Gratiot had become Gratchet!!

That, I think, could well be a sign of an older rather than more recent adaptation (cf. in Scotland there is a word "ashet", which is the French "assiette").

Going back a bit, another variant is

US: derby (hat)
UK: bowler (hat)

In Cambridge (UK, not MA) Gonville and Caius College is pronounced
Gone-vil and Keys

and Magdalene College is pronounced as in maudlin.

quote:

Originally posted by zuriga:
I've said Karney St., too. When did *that* change I wonder.

When I lived in Detroit for a year back in the Stone Age, I was amazed how the street names were pronounced. Many were French, which I speak, but they were said in a very, harsh American way. Gratiot had become Gratchet!!

Changing the pronunciation is very common, if not a US govt or Postal mandate.
All the towns had their spelling changed to -berg from whatever except for Pittsburgh which claimed it was a Scottish burgh and not a German berg. Well the story is something like that.
And I always notice Leroy (Le Roi) and loo-tenant for lieutenant.

quote:

the derivation of the (insult) "berk"

I was startled to read this derivation only a few days ago in the Wikipedia article about Rhyming Slang.

I was browsing there because I was interested in confirming the origin of the phrase 'to have a butcher's' meaning 'to have a look', from the rhyme with 'butcher's hook'. As Wikipedia says this has become relatively widespread in Britain. Wikipedia comments "examples of this kind are often now used without awareness of their origins. Many English speakers are oblivious of the fact that the term 'use your loaf' is derived from 'loaf of bread', [rhyming with] head."

My British husband loves rhyming slang and knew exactly what I meant by 'having a butcher.' He sound it seems to be used quite a lot among the people he knows. Well I, for one, learned something new!

Just noticed this in a moderator's post

quote:

We've opened up our weekly Gold Star Chats to all members through the end of the year

My UK/Aus version would be

quote:

We've opened up our weekly Gold Star Chats to all members until the end of the year

I've noticed this too. The UK/Aus practice is perhaps ambiguous, since (say) "until Monday" might mean "until sometime on Monday" or even "until midnight Sunday/Monday", whereas the US practice - to me - says clearly "[until and] through [till the end of] Monday". Is that how Americans understand it?

And while we're at it, there's an interesting local usage in parts of the north of England, of "while" meaning "until": which was said to cause some confusion at level crossings on the railway, since signs told drivers to "Stop and wait while the red light shows"......