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Negative traits attributed to others | ||
Tags: Cultural Identity | Idiom | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Cultural Experiences in Foreign Languages |  | |
| Faim de Siècle Diglot Newbie United States Joined 5810 days ago 36 posts - 39 votes Speaks: English*, French | Message 17 of 74 03 May 2010 at 9:12pm | IP Logged | ||
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There is the famous duo:
French: filer à l'anglaise English: to take French leave 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| dantalian Diglot Senior Member Bouvet Island Joined 5685 days ago 125 posts - 156 votes  Speaks: Russian*, English Studies: German | Message 18 of 74 03 May 2010 at 9:49pm | IP Logged | ||
In Russian the expression to take English leave (Уйти по-английски) with the same meaning("Leave of absence without permission or without announcing one's departure", including leaving a party without bidding farewell to the host") is quiet popular. Another, maybe slightly dubious, Russian expression is French cold (Французский насморк). In popular «folk medicine» all diseases are divided into those that come from nerves and those that are derived from pleasure. French cold belongs to the second group. In other words, to catch a French cold means that you have cold-like problems with the less «noble» part of the body than your nose. Edited by dantalian on 03 May 2010 at 9:52pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| anamsc Triglot Senior Member Andorra Joined 6206 days ago 296 posts - 382 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Catalan Studies: Arabic (Levantine), Arabic (Written), French | Message 19 of 74 03 May 2010 at 10:54pm | IP Logged | ||
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There's also "pardon my French" and "it's all Greek to me". I don't think those are particularly negative, though. Most of the English ones in this thread I hadn't heard of!
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| ReneeMona Diglot Senior Member Netherlands Joined 5338 days ago 864 posts - 1274 votes Speaks: Dutch*, EnglishC2 Studies: French | Message 20 of 74 04 May 2010 at 1:15am | IP Logged | ||
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In Dutch we have Oost-Indisch doof which means "East-Indian deaf" referring to the former Dutch East Indies, now Indonesia. Someone who is Oost-Indisch doof is deaf to things he doesn't want to hear or know about so he only hears what he wants to hear. Edited by ReneeMona on 06 May 2010 at 2:27pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| ManicGenius Senior Member United States Joined 5484 days ago 288 posts - 420 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Esperanto, French, Japanese | Message 21 of 74 04 May 2010 at 1:32am | IP Logged | ||
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That puerto rican bath thing I've heard a number of ways, all meaning the same thing.
Insult to that ethnicity. Peurto Rican bath Guido/Wop bath Cuban bath Mexican shower ... etc Pretty much any ethnicity. Towards English: Breakfast Farts (Seriously... friggin beans for breakfast? Why, god, why?) 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| psy88 Senior Member United States Joined 5594 days ago 469 posts - 882 votes Studies: Spanish*, Japanese, Latin, French | Message 22 of 74 04 May 2010 at 2:26am | IP Logged | ||
"It's all Greek to me" is a line from Shakespeare's Julius Caesar. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Mafouz Diglot Groupie Spain Joined 5328 days ago 56 posts - 64 votes Speaks: Spanish*, English Studies: German, Japanese, French | Message 23 of 74 04 May 2010 at 2:29am | IP Logged | ||
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"Irse a la francesa" is common in Spanish also. Apart from cooking specialties (tortilla francesa, ensaladilla rusa, filete ruso) and sexual activities (no examples). I can't remember right now specific national traits used commonly in language, although I can think of some of them with a strong racist content: "ser un moro" is to be a machoist, "trabajar como un chino", or worst, "como un negro" is to work really a lot. "Hacer el indio" is to do weird and stupid things, and although I am not sure, I think this last one is modern and refers to far west movies.
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| Juаn Senior Member Colombia Joined 5348 days ago 727 posts - 1830 votes Speaks: Spanish* | Message 24 of 74 04 May 2010 at 4:09pm | IP Logged | ||
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In economics there is the "Dutch disease", whereby a country loses competitiveness because of a massive influx of foreign currency from natural resource exports which appreciates the local currency, making manufactured goods relatively more expensive (and thus less competitive) in export markets. Edited by Juаn on 04 May 2010 at 4:13pm 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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