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| asies Bilingual Tetraglot Newbie India Joined 4704 days ago 36 posts - 44 votes Speaks: English, Hindi*, Nepali*, Urdu Studies: Spanish | Message 17 of 22 17 November 2011 at 8:02am | IP Logged | ||
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Vocabulary and colloquialisms
While Indian English is historically derived from British English, recent influences from American English can be found to have created its own idiosyncrasies. For instance, both "program" and "programme" can be found in Indian newspapers. Indians also continue to use phrases from British English that other English speakers now consider antiquated. Official letters include phrases such as "please do the needful" and "you will be intimated shortly". Rubber - Pencil eraser Flat - 'Apartment' / 'Apartment house' pant - 'Trousers' Mess - A dining hall, especially used by students at a dormitory. 'Mess' is also used in reference to eateries catering primarily to a working class population. Originated from the military term of similar meaning. Eve teasing - 'Verbal sexual harassment of women' Where are you put up? means 'Where are you currently staying'?. Where do you stay? is the same as 'Where do you live?' or 'Where's your house?'. This is also used in Scottish and South African English. to shift - to relocate (e.g. He shifted from Jaipur to Gurgaon). Wheatish (complexion) - light, creamy brown, or having a light brown complexion.[13] "Out of station": "out of town". This phrase has its origins in the posting of army officers to particular 'stations' during the days of the East India Company. "acting pricey": playing "hard to get", being snobbish. "pass out" is meant to graduate, as in "I passed out of the university in 1995". In American/British English, this usage is limited to graduating out of military academies. "on the anvil" is used often in the Indian press to mean something is about to appear or happen. For example, a headline might read "New roads on the anvil". "under scanner" is used often in the Indian press to mean something is being investigated by authorities. For example, a headline might read "Power Station under scanner for radiation". "tight slap" to mean "hard slap". Time-pass - 'Doing something for leisure but with no intention or target/satisfaction', procrastination, pastime. Time-waste - Something that is a waste of time; procrastination. Presumably not even useful for leisure. Dearness Allowance - Payment given to employees to compensate for the effects of inflation. Pindrop silence - Extreme silence (quiet enough to hear a pin drop). chargesheet n. formal charges filed in a court; v. to file charges against someone in court redressal: n. redress, remedy, reparation "Hill Station" - mountain resort. "Railway Station" - Train station. "stepney" refers to a spare tyre. The word is a genericized trademark originating from the Stepney Spare Motor Wheel, itself named after Stepney Street, in Llanelli, Wales. "specs" means spectacles or glasses (as in colloquial UK English). Cooling glasses - Sunglasses "cent per cent" - "100 per cent" as in "He got cent per cent in maths". "loose motion" - diarrhoea "expire" - To die, especially in reference to one's family member. "prepone" - To bring something forward in time. As opposed to postpone. "bunking" - To skip class without permission. "carrying" - to be pregnant, as in "She is carrying". "pressurize" - to put pressure on someone, to influence. "non-vegetarian" or non-veg - Food that is not vegetarian; a person who eats such food. "'club'" or "'clubbing'" - To merge or put two things together. "'Just club it together'" "'cantonment'" - permanent military installation. Forgive me if i am making a mistake by posting it here but i thought of sharing it with you all, if any of you is planning to visit India, i hope this will help.(Indian spoken English is little different so it could be useful, if you have any interest or planning to visit this country.) Thanks =) Edited by asies on 17 November 2011 at 8:04am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| asies Bilingual Tetraglot Newbie India Joined 4704 days ago 36 posts - 44 votes Speaks: English, Hindi*, Nepali*, Urdu Studies: Spanish | Message 18 of 22 17 November 2011 at 8:08am | IP Logged | ||
"Uncle / Aunty" - Respectful way of addressing anyone who is significantly older than you. "Uncle, can I take your daughter Anouskha out on a date?" Amount - a sum of money, such as "please refund the amount." or "the amount has been billed to your credit card." Compulsorily - Mandatorily Damn - used as an intensifier, especially a negative one, far more frequently and with far more emphatic effect, than in other dialects of English, as in "that was a damn good meal." Dialogue - a line of dialogue in a movie. ("That was a great dialogue!" means "That was a great line!") "Dialogues" is used to mean "screenplay". In motion picture credits, the person who might in other countries be credited as the screenwriter in India is often credited with the term dialogues. Note the usage of British spelling. Dress - (noun) is used to refer to clothing for men, women, and children alike, whereas in international varieties of English a dress is a woman's outer clothing with a bodice and a skirt as a single garment. The usage of dress as clothes does exist in international varieties but only in very rare occasions and in relevant context., e.g. schooldress. Young girls in India invariably wear a dress, which is commonly referred to as a frock in Indian English. Elder - used as a comparative adjective in the sense of older. For example, "I am elder to you", instead of "I am older than you." Engagement - not just an agreement between two people to marry, but a formal, public ceremony where the engagement is formalized with a ring and/or other local rituals. Indians will not speak of a couple as being engaged, until after the engagement ceremony has been performed. Similar to the use of term marriage, a person may say "I am going to attend my cousin's engagement next month". Afterwards, the betrothed is referred to as one's "would-be" wife or husband. In this case, "would be" is used to mean "will be" in contrast with the standard and American and British connotation of "wants to be (but may not be)". Even - as well/also/too: "Even I didn't know how to do it." This usage of even is borrowed from native grammatical structure. Graduation - completion of a bachelor's degree (as in the UK): "I did my graduation at Presidency College" ("I earned my bachelor's degree at Presidency College"), whereas in the United States it refers to completion of Highschool, Master's or PhD as well. Hero - a male protagonist, especially of a movie; a person who is often a protagonist. Thus, "Look at Vik; he looks like a hero", meaning "he is as handsome as a movie star." Kindly - please: "Kindly disregard the previous message." Metro - large city (i.e. 'metros such as Mumbai and Delhi') This is a shortening of the term Metropolis. This can be confusing for Europeans, who tend to use the word to describe underground urban rail networks. However, following the popularity of the Delhi Metro, the word Metro now tends to be used to describe both the metropolis and the underground rail network. Music director - a music composer for movies. Non-veg - (short for non-vegetarian) is used to mean food which contains flesh of any mammal, fish, bird, shellfish, etc. or eggs. Fish, seafood, and eggs are not treated as categories separate from "meat", especially when the question of vegetarianism is at issue (milk and its products are always considered vegetarian). E.g., "We are having non-veg today for dinner", whereas the native varieties of English would have: "We are having meat today for dinner". Also note that a non-veg joke is regarded as a joke with mature content. Paining - hurting would be more common in Standard American and British: "My head is paining." Shirtings and suitings - the process of making such garments; a suffix in names of shops specializing in men's formal/business wear. Solid - great or exceptional ("What a solid idea!" means "What a great idea!"). Timings - hours of operation; scheduled time, such as office timings or train timings, as opposed to the standard usage such as "The timing of his ball delivery is very good." Gentry - generalized term for social class - not specifically 'high social class'. The use of 'good', 'bad', 'high' and 'low' prefixed to 'gentry' is common. mutton - goat meat instead of sheep meat. Although not mainstream, the insertion of as in describing a designation, where it would be omitted in Standard English: "Mahatma Gandhi is called as the father of the nation". This is similar to the American English usage of the phrase "different than", a form that would be considered erroneous in Britain. Words unique to (i.e. not generally well-known outside South Asia) and/or popular in India include those in the following by no means exhaustive list: batchmate or batch-mate (Not classmate, but a schoolmate of the same grade) "eggitarian" for a person who eats vegetarian food, milk and eggs but not meat; ovo lacto vegetarian. compass box for a box holding mathematical instruments like compasses, divider, scale, protractor etc. Also widely referred to as a "geometry box". cousin-brother (male first cousin) & cousin-sister (female first cousin) foot overbridge (bridge meant for pedestrians) flyover (overpass or an over-bridge over a section of road or train tracks) godown (warehouse) godman somewhat pejorative word for a person who claims to be divine or who claims to have supernatural powers gully to mean a narrow lane or alley (from the Hindi word "gali" meaning the same). long-cut (The "opposite" of short-cut, in other words, taking the longest route). mugging or mugging up (memorising, usually referring to learning "by rote," and having nothing to do with street crime, what the word would mean in British/American English). nose-screw (woman's nose-ring) prepone (The "opposite" of postpone, that is to change a meeting to be earlier). Many dictionaries have added this word. tiffin box for lunch box. The word is also commonly used to mean a between-meal snack. BHK is real-estate terminology for "Bedroom, Hall and Kitchen", used almost exclusively in housing size categorization. "Hall" refers to the living room, which is highlighted separately from other rooms. For instance, a 2BHK apartment has a total of three rooms - two bedrooms and a living room. co-brother indicates relationship between two men who are married to sisters, as in "He is my co-brother" co-inlaws indicates relationship between two sets of parents whose son and daughter are married, as in "Our co-inlaws live in Delhi." co-sister indicates relationship between two women who are married to brothers, as in "She is my co-sister" boss is a term used to refer to a male stranger such as shopkeeper (Its a respect shown to the shopkeeper and not a derogatory remark pass to him/her. If later is the case he would have banged out the customer): " Boss, what is the cost of that pen?" vote-bank is a term commonly used during the elections in India, implying a particular bloc or community of people inclined to cast their votes for a political party that promises to deliver policies favouring them. Words which are considered archaic in some varieties of English, but are still in use in Indian English: Curd - yoghurt Dicky/dickey - the trunk of a car. In tension - being concerned or nervous. Phrased another way, "He is taking too much tension". Found in eighteenth century British English. Into - multiplied by, as in 2 into 2 equals 4, rather than 2 times 2 is 4, which is more common in other varieties of English. The use of into dates back to the fifteenth century, when it had been common in British English. ragging - hazing(US). equals - is equal to (in calculations) the same - the aforementioned, as in "I heard that you have written a document on .... Could you send me the same?" Use of double and triple for numbers occurring twice or three times in succession, especially for a phone number. For example, a phone number 2233344 would be pronounced as double two, triple three, double four. Use of thrice, meaning "three times", is common in Indian English. Use of the phrases like nothing or like anything to express intensity. For example, "These people will cheat you like anything". Such usage was part of colloquial English language in seventeenth century Britain and America. Word pairs "up to" and "in spite" compounded to "upto" and "inspite" respectively. Edited by asies on 17 November 2011 at 8:09am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Ari Heptaglot Senior Member Norway Joined 6525 days ago 2314 posts - 5695 votes  Speaks: Swedish*, English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Mandarin, Cantonese Studies: Czech, Latin, German | Message 19 of 22 17 November 2011 at 9:22am | IP Logged | ||
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Interesting stuff! But since it has nothing to do with the original post, this might be better posted as a separate thread.
1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| asies Bilingual Tetraglot Newbie India Joined 4704 days ago 36 posts - 44 votes Speaks: English, Hindi*, Nepali*, Urdu Studies: Spanish | Message 20 of 22 17 November 2011 at 11:40am | IP Logged | ||
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I know my apologies to you, since i am new here so couldn't think of any better place
than this. =/ 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Doitsujin Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 5263 days ago 1256 posts - 2363 votes Speaks: German*, English | Message 21 of 22 17 November 2011 at 11:51am | IP Logged | ||
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If you copy whole Wikipedia pages, you should at least provide a link.
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| asies Bilingual Tetraglot Newbie India Joined 4704 days ago 36 posts - 44 votes Speaks: English, Hindi*, Nepali*, Urdu Studies: Spanish | Message 22 of 22 18 November 2011 at 4:42am | IP Logged | ||
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Sí señor, aquí está http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Indian_English mira
I was being specific, my whole idea was to show the important part anyway..thanks Edited by asies on 18 November 2011 at 4:43am 1 person has voted this message useful |
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