Well, it happened again. I had today's post scheduled for several hours ago, but it didn't post when it was suppose to. Hurm. I hate it when that happens. But now as I reread that post before winding down for bed, I'm not in the mood for it. Instead let's jump into some trivia for today!
You know, one of the interesting things about living and working in Japan is that I meet, talk with, and befriend people from all the other English speaking countries. My English friends especially seem to love mocking certain Americanisms in English. And I in turn really love pointing out when those Americanisms they are mocking actually were originally from England.
The most well-known of these might be autumn/fall. Fall was originally the preferred term in England and that term made its way to the US, but then England switched to using autumn and now Brits who don't know any better love to complain about the US using "the wrong word".
Soccer is another great example. My English friends love to complain about the US using that word and misusing football. What they often don't realize is that the term soccer came from England. Association football was often shortened to just the first word instead of the second as you might assume today, and that word itself was often abbreviated when speaking quickly, sounding more like "sociation". Then we add in London slang at the time which was to add -er to the end of words and it's a small jump to SOCiation drifting into soccer. Soccer became a very common way to refer to the sport and so that's the word that came to America. But then back home in England they decided to go back to the word football. And now ever since, they have been laughing at Americans for using the wrong word.
Football itself did not refer to a game where you kicked the ball with your feet as opposed to holding it with your hands (as in American football). No, instead football referred to games that weren't played on horse, or, in other words, games that were played by standing on your feet instead of sitting on a horse. In this way, the American usage of football hails back to this old usage of the word and is not technically incorrect.
Now we get to my favorite. Many people, not just my English friends, are perplexed by the bizarre names Americans give the four years of high school. Instead of just a logical year 1, year 2, year 3, and year 4, we use freshman, sophomore, junior, and senior. What the heck, right?
But... you guessed it, this system of names actually comes from England, though they long ago stopped using it. Freshman has long been used for first year students. First year everyone. It was a common term that went back to the 15th century and was originally used in religious orders. Later this would sometimes be shortened to fresher, which shouldn't surprise you, it's the same London -er slang I mentioned above that turned association into soccer.
Anyway, moving on, originally universities were usually three years. First year students were freshmen, using the common term. Second and third year students got the nickname sophists, a word that comes from Greek and means "wise". You can see it was a very aspirational term. People who went to university wanted to think of themselves as wise by the time they had completed the school journey. Sophists was then divided into junior sophist for the second year and senior sophist for the third and final year. One can easily see how these might be then shortened to just junior and senior.
When schools added a fourth year, they needed a new nickname. Thus was born sophomore for the second year, which combines the Greek words “sophos” (wise) and “moros” (foolish), reflecting the idea of a “wise fool.”
And that is how we got these strange designations for the four years of high school: freshman, sophomore, junior, and senior. Interesting, huh?
These words came to America and were adopted by US universities and then US high schools, and now today while they are still sometimes used in university, they are most common in high school. Meanwhile, England long ago stopped using them and changed to just logically numbering the years, leaving young Brits confused as to why Yanks use these bizarre words.
Ah, English is fun. Do any of you have favorite examples of this kind of thing?
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David is an American teacher and translator lost in Japan, trying to capture the beauty of this country one photo at a time and searching for the perfect haiku. He blogs here and at laspina.org. Write him on Mastodon. |
This whole British English and American English is such a fun topic and it could go on for ages.
But seriously, did we start all those words, got you guys to use it, then abandon it and use something else? What a genius way to make you guys look weird 😂
haha so that was the strategy!! ...not a bad idea.
Very interesting, I didn't realize that about the school classmen. American English and British English have certainly parted ways, just like Australia. My friends form England always like to make fun of American English, but there are some words used in England that I have no clue what they mean!
Yeah, no kidding. I can figure out normal words just from context, but when they start using slang... some of that Brit slang is just bizarre and I can't even guess. Then there's cockney rhyming slang. Might as well be another language for all I can understand it.
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Wow, that is very interesting! I never would have known that for any of those words. I mean I have never really thought about it before, but it's pretty cool how stuff like that evolves. They are going to make fun of anything because they are still mad we won :)
Oiii!!! I saw that!!!!! 😄
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