Regional Variations of Hiberno English / Slang

gerryza

I'm writing a Irish English phrasebook. It's one of a series so the style and TOC needs to be identical.

The editors favourite section is called Regional Variations and I need some help.

The Aussie one is like this:
Regions: NSW QLD SA TAS VIC WA
costume worn when swimming
cozzie; togs togs bathers; togs bathers; togs bathers; togs bathers; togs

10 oz glass of beer
middy middy schooner pot pot pot

round slice of potato covered in batter and deep-fried
potato scallop potato scallop potato fritter potato cake potato cake potato cake

fizzy drink with a dollop of ice cream
ice cream soda ice cream soda spider spider spider ice cream soda

small red sausages at cocktail parties
cocktail frankfurts cheerios frankfurts saveloys; little boys cocktail sausages frankfurts

children’s playground apparatus used for sliding down
slippery dip/slide slippery dip slippery dip/slide slide slide slippery dip

smooth sandwich paste made from ground roasted peanuts
peanut butter peanut paste peanut butter peanut butter peanut butter peanut butter

non-alcoholic aerated sweet drink
soft drink cordial soft drink cordial soft drink soft drink

a common black-and-white bird
magpie; peewee magpie; peewee Murray magpie; peewee magpie; mudlark magpie; mudlark magpie

thin loop of rubber used for holding together small objects
rubber band rubber band lacky band rubber band lacker band rubber band

mid-morning break at primary school
playlunch; recess little lunch recess playtime playlunch recess
=========

Are there any items in a similar vein that have different names in the North / South / East / West / Midlands of Ireland.

An exile stuck in the bog end of Africa would be enternally grateful for any assistance

Cheers

Gerry

Victor

There are regional variations, but they might be a bit harder to define. You will certainly have and urban/rural divide and a north/south divide.

North - Northern Ireland and to a lesser extent the rest of Ulster has a distinct accent and draws more strongly from Scottish and British english. For example, the Scottish word "wee" would be used automaticly, whereas for a southerner it would be used in a contrived fashion. The closer to Scotland the stronger the influence.

Dublin - two distinct accents, the middle-upper class "DORT" accent and the inner-city, working-class "Anto" accent. Dubliners have the strong habit of abbreviating even short words to the first syllable and then adding a vowel, Hence "Anthony" becomes "Anto" to his mates. The DORT (after "DART" - Dublin Area Rapid Transit) accents tend to borrow more strongly from Upper-class English English and American English.

Cork - has a bit of a "sing-song" accent that also exists in parts of the Caribbean. Change in emphasis / stresses in words.

Rural "bogger" - can be utterly impentrable in the was certain working class Glaswegian accents can be, but is infamous for changing "vehicle" to "veh-hick=kill" among garda (police). Lots of sub-variants.

Victor

costume worn when swimming
togs or swimsuit, but very much becoming the style "I'm wearing shorts" or "she is wearing a bikini"

10 oz glass of beer
Glass

round slice of potato covered in batter and deep-fried
Doesn't exist if it did battered potato slice or potato cake.

fizzy drink with a dollop of ice cream
ice cream soda

small red sausages at cocktail parties
cocktail

children’s playground apparatus used for sliding down
slide

smooth sandwich paste made from ground roasted peanuts
peanut butter

non-alcoholic aerated sweet drink
soft drink

a common black-and-white bird
magpie

thin loop of rubber used for holding together small objects
rubber band

mid-morning break at primary school
recess, small break

simu

Victor wrote:

Rural "bogger" - can be utterly impentrable in the was certain working class Glaswegian accents can be, but is infamous for changing "vehicle" to "veh-hick=kill" among garda (police). Lots of sub-variants.

A lot more comprehensible than the average Dub tbh!

gerryza

Thank you all for the suggestions... the aussie ones were intended merely as an example. I know the Irish don't have different words for those items, regionally. Here's the start of my list... perhaps this will jog some input / corrections

Cheers
Gerry

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Regional Variations

Being a small country, there are not too many words that do not travel around the country and are used freely "all over the show" but here are a few that have stayed a little longer in some of the larger towns and cities.

extremely pissed off about something
Limerick: I was bullin' about my stolen car.
Dublin: I was havin' a freaker about my stolen car.
Leitrim: I was at the height of it over me stolen car

let's go out and get drunk
Limerick: will we go on the batter?
Dublin: let’s go on the piss?
Cork: go out and get langers, polluted

a complete idiot
Limerick: a complete ghoul /ghoul bag
Dublin: an absolute gob****e
Cork: a total langer

macho or hard-man
Cork: sham-feen
Dublin: hardchaw


an elastic to keep your hair up
Limerick: a go-go for my hair?
Dublin: a scrunchie for my hair?

ugly
Limerick: yer one is kicked
Dublin: yer one is rottin' lookin

travellers
Cork: pavees
Limerick: latchees, scobes, wa
Dublin: scangers

to hit somebody in the face
Belfast: lamp / clatter him
Cork: give him a tullock
Limerick: puck someone
Dublin: belt somebody

a lot of people
Limerick: there was a rake of people in the club
Dublin: a shower

talking about someone behind their back
Limerick: I was readin' him last night
Dublin: havin' a bitch about him

falling aroung the place laughing
Limerick: I was scittin' myself
Dublin: I was breakin' my ****e laughing

friendly greeting (for a guy)
Limerick: how's it goin', sham
Dublin: how's it goin', head or skin
Cork: how's a going, cove
Leitrim: how's it goin', mate

referring to any guy
Belfast:
Cork: fiend
Dublin: yer man
Galway: yer one


added at the end of a sentence
Belfast: that's 25p, so it is
Cork: that'll be 25p, like
Dublin: that'll be 25p, right
Limerick: that'll be 25p, so

a gay person
Limerick: steamer
Dublin: fag

sports shoes
Limerick: tackies
Dublin: runners
Leitrim: trainers

are you leaving now?
Belfast: are you away?
Limerick: are you gonna away?
Dublin: are ya headin' off?

drunk
Belfast:
Cork: polluted
Dublin: locked
Galway
Leitrim: on his way

police
Belfast: peelers
Cork: shades
Dublin: copper
Rest of the country: guard / garda


the most common greeting in a store
Belfast: are you gettin'?
Cork
Dublin: howaya? or yeah?
Galway
Athlone

date with a pretty girl
Cork: a jag with a lasher
Dublin:

Haircut
Cork: Bazzar -


going for a pee
Cork: a whaz
Dublin: a slash


girl (derogatory)
Belfast: minger
Cork: beor
Dublin: wagon
Waterford: bibe

mother
Cork: old lade
Dublin: aul wan

girlfriend
Cork: old doll
Dublin: mot

simu

gerryza wrote:

added at the end of a sentence
Belfast: that's 25p, so it is
Cork: that'll be 25p, like
Dublin: that'll be 25p, right
Limerick: that'll be 25p, so

25 cent, it should be!

gerryza

that's exactly the sort of feedback I need .. so that's cent NOT cents? (25 cent, so it is etc)... I'd forgotten there were no more pounds, pennies, pence or punts

G

biko

Did you check out Wikipedia? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page Can be helpful for words and phrases e.g http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skanger

Victor

gerryza wrote:

the most common greeting in a store
Belfast: are you gettin'?
Cork
Dublin: howaya? or yeah?
Galway
Athlone

Don't forget

Cashier: "Are you alright?"
Response (whiel head twitches): "No, I've severe mental problems."

gerryza

Yeah right Victor

Biko.. who's de man... that's great altogether

Cheers

Gerry

pickarooney

Some variations on these, namely from Kilkenny/Carlow.

Victor wrote:

fizzy drink with a dollop of ice cream
ice cream soda

We used to call them ...-cows depending on the drink added, e.g. brown cow for a coke and ice-cream mix.

Victor wrote:

non-alcoholic aerated sweet drink
soft drink

mineral

Victor wrote:

thin loop of rubber used for holding together small objects
rubber

elastic band

Victor wrote:

mid-morning break at primary school
recess, small break

little lunch

pickarooney

There are thousands of expressions for drunk, and are all fairly evenly spread throughout the country I reckon.

From what I gather 'beor' is actually complimentary, or at least used to describe an attractive girl, whereas 'wagon' is usually a (negative) comment on a woman's personality, akin to 'rip', 'streel' or 'cow' in other parts of the country.
Also 'yer one', unless Galway people are really strange, refers to a woman, not a man, and is used everywhere.
'a lock of people' (a lot) seems to be common in Monaghan/Cavan. 'A hape' (heap) is widely used down Kilkenny/Carlow way.
'scangers' are not travellers, at least not in common usage, it's more along the lines of 'spiv' or 'chav'.
'hallion' is a poular one up north for what we'd usually term 'eejit' (idiot) down south.

Oh, and it's cents, with an 's' just like any other currency

Victor

pickarooney wrote:

Oh, and it's cents, with an 's' just like any other currency

You will see dual usage of both "Thats fifty-three cent, sir." and "Thats fifty-three cents, sir."

Of course, you can't buy anything for 53c anymore.

PunyHuman

gerryza wrote:

ugly
Dublin: yer one is rottin' lookin

Also, 'in bits', or 'bet down'. The latter is one of my favourites.

gerryza wrote:

travellers
Dublin: scangers

No, afaik, 'scangers' refers to settled people of a certain quality. 'Tinkers' would be more apposite or, more recently, 'our friends in the Travelling Community'.

gerryza wrote:

a lot of people
Limerick: there was a rake of people in the club
Dublin: a shower

Perhaps more accurately, for Dublin, 'a rake of heads'.
In my experience, 'shower' is more frequently used pejoratively, i.e. 'a shower of w*nkers'.

gerryza wrote:

police
Dublin: copper
Rest of the country: guard / garda

I wouldn't say that. Many people in Dublin refer to the Gardai as 'Guards'. This can be traced back to a short period immediately following the civil war during which (if memory serves) the official title of the police was the 'Civic Guards'. People abbreviated this to 'Guards', and the name stuck.

gerryza

for much appreciated feedback and suggestions.

Cheers

Gerry