So I realize this one is a Me Thing, but I once read a SU fanfic set in England, and there was so much obscure British slang in it and no glossary/explanations. Like, I’m talking slang I actually had to look up, because I’d never even heard my British friends use it—genuinely obscure shit. That’s not why I stopped reading it (I stopped because it was kind of an OOC mess), but it was still annoying to have to look things up every other chapter...
I asked a British friend if one of those terms was at all common...and she said it’s almost entirely used by older people. Like, boomer-aged and older. You wouldn’t hear it much amongst millennials, much less teens. This actually makes it way weirder, since all the characters using it were in high school.
now you've got me really curious about this treasure trove of obsolete british slang. not that i want to read the fic. i just want the vocab.
The one I saw the most often was “skive,” which apparently refers to skipping school or work. That’s the one that I asked my friend about. There was plenty more, but that’s the only one I really remember?
To be fair, I’ve read very little HP fanfic (and very little of the series itself). Or fanfic for any other British fandoms, come to think of it. That might explain why I had never heard it before...
i've said 'skive' on occasion and like... i'm a gen x minnesotan... so make of that what you will i guess? i don't remember where it was, some tv show or other, but i recently heard someone say "cor!" out loud and suddenly it made sense as an exclamation for the first time. it was more of a "kaah" noise like a sharp exhalation. kind of a soft vocalized gasp, but more on the exasperated end of surprise. it was not actually silly. i was a little weirded out tbh. that one's supposed to be quaint. shrug!
There is a quainter version of 'cor', but it tends to be "cor blimey luvva-duck, wouldya look at the apples-and-pears on that bird!"
I was reading an ot4 getting together fic and something was skeeving me out and it finally clicked- the character who was obstensively the "center" of the ot4 (already not a version of polyshipping I'm suuuuper fond of) had the least dialogue, the least description of his thoughts, ect. It's all him having radient smiles and the others wanting to protect him and how he is so ~pure~ which I fucking hate.
Also like. That is the sort of thing I see people complaining about under the banner of "feminizing" characters. Like "don't feminize him! He's tough and badass and isn't insecure about anything!" and hearing that all the time just. Pisses me off. It's not femizing to make a dude character insecure about his looks or gentle or romantic, and it sure as fuck ain't feminizing to turn a dude character into a wimpering sunshine smile machine.
Oh, and turning someone into a fucking idiot who can't stop squealing over small animals and babies even when it's actively hurting other people also isn't "feminizing" them it's just making then obnoxious as fuck
it took me a While to understand that "er," was supposed to sound like "uh" in hp and discworld, because to an ontario resident that just looks like they're saying "urr" edit: in the context of "er, um, ah, sorry?" I literally thought it was like, urrr edit edit: and with discworld trolls saying "der" for "the" confused me because i was like, how does "the" turn into "dare"
I would’ve read that as “urr” too, especially since I’ve heard “er” pronounced that way a LOT in that same context.
