Anyone from my hometown will recognise it
immediately, but many native speakers of English would struggle to understand
what the sentence means or even to identify it as a variant of English.
It is Scottish English, more specifically
from Glasgow or the surrounding area.
“Gie’s a brek”, translated into standard English means, “Give me a
break”.
My Japanese wife went to Glasgow to study
English and when she got there, she wondered why so many people were speaking
German. It’s not German. We just have a strong accent and a strong local
identity, with many idioms or expressions which are not used in the rest of the
English speaking world.
I guess I had a similar experience. When I first came to Japan I lived in
Osaka. I wondered why I couldn’t find
many of the expressions and words I heard around me in my Japanese textbook. “Maido, Okini!”
Perhaps it would not be useful for most of
my students to closely study Glaswegian English unless they intend to go to
Glasgow. But it might be fun anyway to
try to guess the meanings of some phrases.
So I will write some below. See
if you can guess any correctly and let me know how you get on:
Gonnae no dae that!
Will you please not do that!
Ah’m aff tae buy a bunnet.
I’m off to buy a hat.
Where’s the burds?
Where are the women/chicks?
Ah cannae dae it.
I can’t do it.
Y’aw right, hen? How’s it gaw’n?
Are you all right, dear? How are you?
He’s a Weejie.
He’s a Glaswegian.
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