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Oxford English Dictionary Extends Hunt For Regional Words Around the World (theguardian.com)
The Oxford English Dictionary is asking the public to help it mine the regional differences of English around the world to expand its record of the language, with early submissions ranging from New Zealand's "munted" to Hawaii's "hammajang." From a report: Last year, a collaboration between the OED, the BBC and the Forward Arts Foundation to find and define local English words resulted in more than 100 new regional words and phrases being added to the dictionary, from Yorkshire's "ee bah gum" to the north east's "cuddy wifter," a left-handed person. Now, the OED is widening its search to English speakers around the world, with associate editor Eleanor Maier calling the early response "phenomenal," as editors begin to draft a range of suggestions for inclusion in the dictionary.
These range from Hawaii's "hammajang," meaning "in a disorderly or shambolic state," to the Scottish word for a swimming costume, "dookers" or "duckers," and New Zealand's "munted," meaning "broken or wrecked." The OED is also looking to include the word "chopsy," a Welsh term for an overly talkative person; "frog-drowner," which Americans might use to describe a torrential downpour of rain; "brick", which means "very cold" to residents of New Jersey and New York City; and "round the Wrekin", meaning "in a lengthy or roundabout manner" in the Midlands. The dictionary has already found that, depending on location, a picture hanging askew might be described as "agley," "catawampous," "antigodlin" or "ahoo" by an English speaker, while a loved one could be called a "doy," "pet," "dou-dou," "bubele," "alanna" or "babber."
These range from Hawaii's "hammajang," meaning "in a disorderly or shambolic state," to the Scottish word for a swimming costume, "dookers" or "duckers," and New Zealand's "munted," meaning "broken or wrecked." The OED is also looking to include the word "chopsy," a Welsh term for an overly talkative person; "frog-drowner," which Americans might use to describe a torrential downpour of rain; "brick", which means "very cold" to residents of New Jersey and New York City; and "round the Wrekin", meaning "in a lengthy or roundabout manner" in the Midlands. The dictionary has already found that, depending on location, a picture hanging askew might be described as "agley," "catawampous," "antigodlin" or "ahoo" by an English speaker, while a loved one could be called a "doy," "pet," "dou-dou," "bubele," "alanna" or "babber."
"Hack" - 2018 definition: nobody even fucking knows anymore, and this word is used and abused by everyone to mean anything they want it to mean.
this is how marxism works. undermine the english language by promoting forign languages at OUR expense. outrageous. i am massively offended and outraged at this attack against america.
Ayuh.
how common was it before the internet for the dictionary to add random nonsense? kind of liked it better when the dictionary was an authority on what was and was not a word, so that you could be like "that is not a word" instead of everything just becoming a word. but maybe they have always been adding stuff and it just wasn't obvious because nobody ever bought new dictionaries, we all just used the one our parents gave us that their parents gave them over and over and over.
"frog-drowner," which Americans might use to describe a torrential downpour of rain; "brick", which means "very cold" to residents of New Jersey and New York City;
I live in New Jersey, USA, and have never heard either of these terms. How far down the rathole of subculture usage are they going to go?
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Whoever thought this up is a reet doylem.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
"Bubele" isn't from a (current*) regional dialect of English, it's Yiddish.
* You could make the roundabout argument that Yiddish, as a derivative of early German, is a dialect of the precursor to English, but I doubt anyone thinks of it that way.
while a loved one could be called a "doy," "pet," "dou-dou," "bubele," "alanna" or "babber."
Sorry, socially inept slashdotters. swn be your babber.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
To see such pericombobulation.
---- The above post was generated by the Turing Institute. Maybe.
There are lots of interesting English words used only in foreign langage speaking world; in France, words like "relooking" (makeover) , "footing" (jogging), or "smoking" (tuxedo) come to mind
Bannon recently coined a new regional word usage... Vernacular is now means speech peppered with lies, distortions and misrepresentations.
The term 'munted' was never heard in NZ before the big Christchurch earthquakes, in which the city got munted, twice. It's actually a South African racist term, and not very nice in its original usage in that country. The older term, still more commonly used, is 'buggered', which has an equally bad origin.
I lived in Christchurch from the early 90's through to the end of the year of earthquakes (2011). Munted was a term that was used at least as far back as the early 90's. And Christchurch got 'munted' 4 times with earthquakes - there were four quakes big enough to topple brick structures, liquify the ground, open up car-swallowing holes, and cover our road with silt. The last was on 23 Dec 2011 - I have a photo of my 11 year old son standing in a hole in the road with the road level at his shoulder. We left 2 days later because I couldn't find any work as a software dev. there. I don't recall hearing "munted" with an expletive prefix often, but the people I hung around with weren't big expletive users.
What a crock of shit. Australians have been using munted in the sense of "fucked up" since at least the 80's with no racist undertones.
It's normally used to describe levels of drunkenness.
"Did you see Davo last night? He was fucken munted!"
See also: http://www.yourdictionary.com/...
Cite your sources on the South African origin.
No, it was being used, but I had never "heard" it before. I read in a magazine about women getting "munted hairdos" a few years before the earthquakes and wondered what the word meant. I am in Christchurch and had never heard it said before, but it definitely was around before the earthquakes.
Okay, you've got me. The origin was a remembered newspaper article explaining what the term meant. Now that I actually look it up, all I can find is a Collins dictionary definition of the word 'munt' as being a South African/Zimbabwean derogatory term for a black African. No proven connection with 'munted' that I can see. So there you go; perhaps it is Australian after all, and what I read was a reporter's guess.