Phrases/words that set your teeth on edge.

[Sir Velo]

... not to be confused with the Gloucestershire village of Snowshill (and the lovely Snowshill Manor) - pronounced ... Snozzle

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Mmm,,I always understood it was "Snowzle" but accents do vary.

[Sir Velo]

... there are many such. I like Saint Epney, Saint Evenage, the new town built on the minster of St Ur - and of course the ford of St Rat. We currently don't talk about the town renamed in the honour of St Alin...

Lovely.

Not forgetting of course St Ockwell (originally St Ock's Well so I'm led to believe), St Rand or St Aine's.

[Sir Velo]

A particularly loathsome locution of recent provenance being that of ending a statement of fact in the interrogative?

A recent example on social media: "I'm not at all sure what the pine marten is doing or eating?"

[kernelbogey]

A particularly loathsome locution of recent provenance....

Agreed - but, this is common in US English e.g. You're going out like that? I associate this form with 'immigrant' usage, possibly Yiddish in origin - but would welcome correction.

Possibly also related to upspeak? (See what I did there?)

(So you find that loathsome? )

[Serial_Apologist]

Agreed - but, this is common in US English e.g. You're going out like that? I associate this form with 'immigrant' usage, possibly Yiddish in origin - but would welcome correction.

Possibly also related to upspeak? (See what I did there?)

(So you find that loathsome? )

I don't think it's quite the same?

(See what I did just then? )

[kernelbogey]

I don't think it's quite the same?

The Wiki article refers to research suggesting its usage may relate to unconscious power dynamics.

[Sir Velo]

Agreed - but, this is common in US English e.g. You're going out like that? I associate this form with 'immigrant' usage, possibly Yiddish in origin - but would welcome correction.

Possibly also related to upspeak? (See what I did there?)

(So you find that loathsome? )

That's not the same?

[smittims]

I've always thought 'upspeak' came from people who had learnt English by watching Australian soaps in the late 20th century. I've heard it referred to also as 'the Australasian interrogative'. It's often used by people who use what I call 21st -century pronunciation:

'Gid, Kick , and Lik' instead of 'Good, cook, and book'. Every Friday Anita Rani says 'gid morning' to her listeners on 'Woman's Hour'.

[jayne lee wilson]

Not setting me on edge perhaps, but I'm fascinated by the rise of "the counterfactual". Useful expression really until the politicians caught the bug..... Liz Truss used it in her recent Self-Justification Tour of The Media........

[Pulcinella]

Not setting me on edge perhaps, but I'm fascinated by the rise of "the counterfactual". Useful expression really until the politicians caught the bug..... Liz Truss used it in her recent Self-Justification Tour of The Media........

In Truss' case she wouldn't recognise any fact that was counter to her own philosophy even if it jumped out and bit her!
So much for the Oxford PPE course.

[letterreader202]

Re St Epney etc.
Perth (where St Johnstone F.C. are based) is known historically as St John's Toun. The principal (oldest?) church (of the Church of Scotland) in Perth is St John's Kirk.

[letterreader202]

I see from digging through this forum that "curated" was identified some years ago as a verbal annoyance. I would like to report that it is still going strong - heard this morning during the Breakfast programme in a trailer for some for some forthcoming event.
My current bugbear is actually more of a newspaper phenomenon: the reinvention of "trove" as a noun. According to my sources, it has only one common use - in the phrase "treasure trove" where it comes from the old French word meaning "found" (similar to the past participle of modern French trouver).
The latest "trove" to come on the scene is the large collection of American secret documents.

[french frank]

My current bugbear is actually more of a newspaper phenomenon: the reinvention of "trove" as a noun. According to my sources, it has only one common use - in the phrase "treasure trove" where it comes from the old French word meaning "found" (similar to the past participle of modern French trouver).
The latest "trove" to come on the scene is the large collection of American secret documents.

I'd noticed 'troves' popping up all over the place too. It does seem to be a simple abbreviaion of treasure-trove, possibly invented by Kipling since the first two examples quoted by the OED were from him; a third quote is roughly contemporary. Thereafter troves lie buried until the late 20th c. when they are dug up a couple of times in American publications. The OED article was updated in 2022 and seemingly found nothing then from this veritable trove of new examples.

[eighthobstruction]

...."trove" is fine....walk on ....

[vinteuil]

...."trove" is fine....walk on ....

... tho' some prefer toves. Slithy or otherwise

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