The A to Z of isms...
Britishism.
Britishism - a term denoting a word or phrase
that only functions properly and without footnotes
in the United Kingdom,
but which has begun to spread across the globe
like a cup of tea spilt over a map of the world.
Some examples of...
for a person you consider to be not as clever as you.
as in "I fancy you".
for being startled or amazed.
would have been unfathomable a few years ago.
But even Obama has used the word gobsmacked and he's no numpty.
A British person in that vast area of the atlas that he calls abroad.
Someone behind a counter in a shop says "How are you?"
and the British person replies "Fine thanks, how are you?"
which, of course, the person behind the counter wasn't expecting.
To the British person it's a genuine question.
To the rest of the world
it's just a little flag in the foothills of the day's conversation.
Although the word 'Britishism' was first uttered in the 19th Century
it's become more prominent in recent years
for reasons that are hard to fathom but which may have something to do
with the international spread of Englishes
and the way that, when they rub against each other, sparks can fly.
Every country, every region will have its own isms of course.
There'll be French isms and Australian isms and Canadian isms
and they begin, I guess,
with the micro languages within national borders
that don’t travel too far
or didn’t travel too far before we all began to travel.
Within Britain, there are various local words
that are their own postcode versions of Britishisms,
not moving far across what linguists call an isogloss -
a place where language use changes over a small geographical space.
So in the British Isles you could say "Come in..."
Sit down on the sofa or the settee
in the...
The essence of the Britishism
is perhaps the essence of the British psyche -
eccentric, self-effacing, gently poking fun at itself.
To be a train spotter with your notebook,
scribbling down the numbers of the engines as they trundle by,
is a very British thing.
Welcome to the world of Britishism spotting.
Last one with an open notebook is a...