Phrases/words that set your teeth on edge.

[Bryn]

Got it in one.

Apprehended the essence in a singular expression, indeed.

[cloughie]

Got it in one.

Nothing wrong with ‘got’ but ‘gotten’ a wee bit American? Mind you it didn’t do Gene Pitney any harm!

[Pulcinella]

Nothing wrong with ‘got’ but ‘gotten’ a wee bit American? Mind you it didn’t do Gene Pitney any harm!

Yes, predominantly American, but only because they will have kept the form imported there from us, way back when.

[Bryn]

Yes, predominantly American, but only because they will have kept the form imported there from us, way back when.

Indeed, perfectly good, if now largely abandoned, English.

[teamsaint]

Indeed, perfectly good, if now largely abandoned, English.

Now back in common usage among young people .

[french frank]

Now back in common usage among young people .

American cultural-linguistic imperialism?

[cloughie]

Virtual.

[LezLee]

Literally.

[Pabmusic]

Yes, predominantly American, but only because they will have kept the form imported there from us, way back when.

Indeed. And we still use it in one sense. If you understand the difference between forgot and forgotten then you'd have no trouble using got and gotten.

[Bryn]

[kernelbogey]

American cultural-linguistic imperialism?

Sixty-odd years ago, my brother asked his new American landlady, here in UK, where he should fill his kettle. Her reply completely mystified him: 'There's a faucet in the john'. I think most people would understand that now.

[french frank]

Indeed. And we still use it in one sense. If you understand the difference between forgot and forgotten then you'd have no trouble using got and gotten.

Except that isn't exactly how language develops, is it? To use 'gotten' because that was a much older verbal form isn't what people ordinarily do. Young people use 'gotten' because it's a 'new' form which their peers have picked up and started using, and which they've become used to hearing. We're in the early stages of this 'new' form 'gotten' where it still grates. But it is the dictatorship of American English!

Literally.

I like this quote from 1906, the Westminster Gazette: "Mr. Chamberlain literally bubbled over with gratitude."

We're in the linguistic transition period when the usage still grates with some, is regularly used by others, unaware of its earlier meaning. In 50 years time, the OED will give the earliest examples as 'Hist. Obsolete" and the later meaning as the current one.

The earliest meaning of literal, 1394 is simply:'Of or relating to a letter or letters.'

Add: 'There's a faucet in the john.' It's the difference between understanding and using. Neither term is current in British English although we need to understand 'faucet' to know what the President is wittering on about:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XGHzK7PQqCs

[cloughie]

Sixty-odd years ago, my brother asked his new American landlady, here in UK, where he should fill his kettle. Her reply completely mystified him: 'There's a faucet in the john'. I think most people would understand that now.

Take care not to force it!

[Bryn]

Take care not to force it!

What would one call a faucet in a water butt?

[kernelbogey]

What would one call a faucet in a water butt?

Rather interestingly, from OED:
faucet n. 2.
a. A tap for drawing liquor from a barrel, etc. Now dialect and U.S.Formerly more fully spigot and faucet, denoting an old form of tap, still used in some parts of England, consisting of a straight wooden tube, one end of which is tapering to be driven into a hole in the barrel, while the other end is closed by a peg or screw. The peg or screw when loosened allows the liquor to flow out through a hole in the under side of the tube. Properly, the spigot seems to have been the tube, and the faucet the peg or screw (as still in the Sheffield dialect); but in some examples the senses are reversed, and each of the words has been used for the entire apparatus. In the U.S. faucet is now the ordinary word for a tap of any kind.