How to Speak ENGLISH like a BRIT in 10 Easy Steps

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How to Speak like a Brit in ten easy steps or ten unmistakable signs that

you're speaking like a British person or something like that...

from LetThemTalkTV.

1 You say ALL RIGHT

ALL RIGHT has many different meanings

it can mean HELLO "all right" and the response is the same

"all right" you try that.

So ALRIGHT means lots

of things I guess it should be "Are you alright?" but nobody says that we

don't say the ARE YOU part in fact we don't even say ALRIGHT

often the L sounds more like a W and the T is a glottal stop that's the sound you

make from the back of the throat when you are trying but you don't quite make

a T but it does depend on which part of the UK come from I'm from London so I

say AWRIGH' not ALL RIGHT. It means OK "Can you do this for me?" ALRIGHT

ALRIGHT shows concern. "You fell off your scooter you alright Mate?" "I'm all

right" it can mean SO "Allright everybody let's begin"

2 you use CHEERS not just when drinking.

Cheers can mean CHEERS

when you have a drink CHEERS of course but it also can mean thank you

"ah! a matcha latte oh that's my favorite cheers mate" or it can mean

goodbye "well I'm done for the day cheers

everybody see you tomorrow."

3 You call people mate even when they're not your mate

MATE we love to say MATE especially among men but you hear it more and more

often from women too. Use it to talk about friendship

"Hello mate I haven't seen you in ages."

"You're my best mate. Am I your best mate?"

"Well you're in the top 20, probably"

use CHEERS MATE To say thank you.

"Yes I'll look after your cat Tiddles this weekend." - "Cheers mate you're a star."

Be careful though in some situations

CHEERS MATE sounds sarcastic "You drank all my wine and then vomited on my Persian

carpet cheers mate." to make and show surprise "huh mate you should have seen

her face when she found out the big secret." when someone wants to attract

your attention in the street they will often use MATE

this is just for men though "Excuse me mate. How do I get to Trafalgar Square." oi

mate, you dropped your your wallet over there." so if you want to get the attention of a

British guy then don't say "excuse me" or "excuse me

sir "or "excuse me my friend" say "excuse me mate. "

4 you employee understatement fairly often.

So understatement is presenting something as less important

than it really is. Yes we do use words like amazing, incredible, fantastic but

often we like to let others read between the lines. Being too emotional can be

seen as a bit vulgar by British people that's why we employ words like fairly,

quite, pretty, rather. "You've just won ten billion euros on the lottery how do you

feel." - "fairly pleased actually." - "You've just finished running a double marathon

in the desert, how do you feel?" - "Pretty tired to be honest." "You've lost your job

and your wife ran away with your best friend all in the same week are you all right?"

"I'm quite upset actually."

"You've won the gold

medal in world-record time." "Yeah I'm rather pleased."

LetThemTalk in Paris is the best language school in the world OK sometimes we don't use understatement.

5 use US to mean ME

so sometimes British people when they're

talking in the singular will use US instead of ME why we do this I'm not

sure I guess we're being more indirect so it sounds a bit more polite but let

me show you what I mean here's some examples: "Can you give us a minute? I just have to

finish this email."

"Can you lend us £20 until next Thursday?"

"Oh give us a moment I'm just gonna finish this."

"Hello darling give us a kiss."

6 you laugh at double entendres.

Now double entendre is a French

term that we use in English now in French they don't say double entendre so

if you're French please don't write angry comments to me I know it's not

correct French but that's what we say. So a double entendre is a statement that has

a double meaning and often the second meaning is funny

and sometimes a bit sexual or indelicate. For example "I went to the market today

and the woman in the fruit stall had really big melons." One reason why we love

Double entendres is because a long time ago theatre, stage shows and later TV, was

censored. Obvious sexual content was forbidden and the way you got around

this was with innuendo and double entendre and they're still popular today

even without the censorship.

I see her every day at the vegan cafe she's eats cauliflower and peas (pees).

When I look through the telescope I can...

When I look through the telescope I can see Uranus. The man in supermarket was

going to give me a small bag so I shouted out "have you got a big one" he looked

embarrassed. Even Shakespeare loved double entendres he used them often

and if you want an example Google HAMLET, COUNTRY MATTERS and you'll see what I mean.

7 You say bloody all the bloody time

British people like to use BLOODY. When we're happy "That was bloody good." When

we're angry. "You spilt my pint you bloody bastard." When we're sad "I don't bloody

believe it! She left me for that bloody bloody idiot." when we're surprised

"Bloody hell! that woman is a man maybe I should stop dating her." We can even put

bloody in the middle of a word abso-bloody-lutely and this is called

TMESIS. TMESIS and I think it's the only word in English language

which begins with TM. "Are you coming away with me to Goa?" oh yeah! absobloodylutely."

8 you are an expert at reading between the lines.

Now I've travelled quite a lot

and lived in a number of different countries and what I've noticed is that

reading between the lines is quite a British trait. So British people often

don't like to speak directly or in a confrontational way especially in formal

situations such as in a work environment. Other nationalities will often tell you

what they think while the British will circumvent conflict. Now this is a

generalization, a big generalization and I'm sure there are many, many exceptions

so tell me what you think anyway I guess I should give an example of that

so imagine I'm in a meeting how to solve the problem of pollution in

London so somebody gets up and says "Yeah I've got brilliant idea, we move London

to the countryside because there is no pollution there. An island off the north

coast of Scotland for example." A non-british response might be "that's a f**ing stupid

idea you're an idiot." but the British response might be "OK,

interesting, interesting we've got fairly busy agenda

now so let's talk about this another time."

9 you might say INNIT

British often say INNIT and this can be right or wrong grammatically speaking.

Now when INNIT means ISN'T IT then it's perfectly correct and I might use it

myself when I'm speaking informally. "It's hot innit?" "This is best pub in London, innit?"

"That's the thief, innit?" But now you're seeing INNIT used as a question tag for

everything and that sounds wrong. "He doesn't like bananas, innit?" "You're my

best friend, init?"...

no...no "He doesn't like bananas,

does he?" "You're my best friend, aren't you?" I guess if everyone is using

it then it's right that's what they say that's how language changes but I'm

having a hard time with this one.

10 Crime and PUNishment

So there was a Spanish magician and he said "UNO, DOS" and then he disappeared

without a TRES (trace). A pun is a play on words when two words sound the same or almost

the same and you can make a joke on it and British love them. If you don't

believe me then just look at the names of fish and chip shops in Britain for

example The Codfather, The plaice to be. Plaice is the name of fish of course. Frying

Nemo, the Fiscoteque, For Cod's sake. Newspapers love them too. Now a long time

ago in 1984 there was a dispute when British exporters of lamb were attacked

in France by French farmers who were unhappy with the cheap imports of

British lamb and they burnt the British lorries and the headlines of the Sun

newspaper was L'AMBUSH. Even though I'm not a fan of the Sun I must admit that

it's a brilliant pun on the words LAMB and AMBUSH and has the L apostrophe to

indicate the connection with France. I've tuned my ukulele and now I'm going to

tuna fish. So if you want to make English friends then make a pun and

what's the best day to do that Punday of course