The USS Liberty incident

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Originally Posted by JPaul

Isn't Yankee what the people in the South used to call people in the North, a sort of civil war thing.

Then others shortened it to Yank, to mean anyone from the USA. That's what I always thought, for no particularly good reason.

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yup n they still do

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Originally Posted by JPaul

Isn't Yankee what the people in the South used to call people in the North, a sort of civil war thing.

Then others shortened it to Yank, to mean anyone from the USA. That's what I always thought, for no particularly good reason.

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Exactly.

Some people seem to think the English language is static and unchanging, which is far from the truth. Words take on different meanings and happily co-exist alongside their older definitions.

My son calls things that are good, 'sick', and things that are very good, 'totally sick'. Now, according to busybody, that can't be, sick is sick because the two words are spelt the same.

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Originally Posted by Ava Estelle

Quote:

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Originally Posted by JPaul

Isn't Yankee what the people in the South used to call people in the North, a sort of civil war thing.

Then others shortened it to Yank, to mean anyone from the USA. That's what I always thought, for no particularly good reason.

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Exactly.

Some people seem to think the English language is static and unchanging, which is far from the truth. Words take on different meanings and happily co-exist alongside their older definitions.

My son calls things that are good, 'sick', and things that are very good, 'totally sick'. Now, according to busybody, that can't be, sick is sick because the two words are spelt the same.

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Yeah, like those gay's stole a perfectly good word from us.

And also some smashing names. Like Lance, Bruce, Justin etc.

im not a english major or nething..... but if you shorten a word im pretty sure the root meanin stays the same.

u say yanks are americans(settlers/colonist to brits).... to U.S. southerners a yankee would be guess what. a settler/colonist, same thing. busy said pretty much what J said and ummm so did i

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Originally Posted by JPaul

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Originally Posted by Ava Estelle

Exactly.

Some people seem to think the English language is static and unchanging, which is far from the truth. Words take on different meanings and happily co-exist alongside their older definitions.

My son calls things that are good, 'sick', and things that are very good, 'totally sick'. Now, according to busybody, that can't be, sick is sick because the two words are spelt the same.

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Yeah, like those gay's stole a perfectly good word from us.

And also some smashing names. Like Lance, Bruce, Justin etc.

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:lol:no J, we stole those gay names from u. ya had it backwards.

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Originally Posted by ram82082

im not a english major or nething..... but if you shorten a word im pretty sure the root meanin stays the same.

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Not if you contract it and change it's meaning at the same time.

See my previous.

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Originally Posted by ram82082

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Originally Posted by JPaul

Yeah, like those gay's stole a perfectly good word from us.

And also some smashing names. Like Lance, Bruce, Justin etc.

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:lol:no J, we stole those gay names from u. ya had it backwards.

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I didn't realise you were gay, no offence like. It was just meant as a joke.

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Originally Posted by JPaul

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Originally Posted by ram82082

im not a english major or nething..... but if you shorten a word im pretty sure the root meanin stays the same.

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Not if you contract it and change it's meaning at the same time.

See my previous.

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point made, but this word(Yank) still means the same thing. it still refers 2 americans, jus over here its region specific. lol maybe thats where we lost Ava... that n the 2 e's. might jus b 2 much at once 4 him.

lol ass... im not a cigarette

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Originally Posted by ram82082

im not a english major or nething.....

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Really?

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but if you shorten a word im pretty sure the root meanin stays the same.

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When you attach a different meaning to a word it becomes a new word, even if the spelling stays the same, which in this case it doesn't.

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u say yanks are americans(settlers/colonist to brits).... to U.S. southerners a yankee would be guess what. a settler/colonist, same thing. busy said pretty much what J said and ummm so did i

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Not the same thing, our definition has nothing to do with settlers or colonists, just Americans.

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Originally Posted by JPaul

Not if you contract it and change it's meaning at the same time.

See my previous.

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That went right over his head JP.

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point made, but this word(Yank) still means the same thing. it still refers 2 americans, jus over here its region specific. lol maybe thats where we lost Ava... that n the 2 e's. might jus b 2 much at once 4 him.

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No, it doesn't mean the same over there, you've already said so, and if you've 'lost' me it's because I only understand about a third of your illiterate posts.

Well Rikk you seemed to have lost something (I'm not surprised).

Let's see if you can get it (GayPaul even mentioned it).

"Yank" and "Yankee" are and have been used by foriegners to refer to Americans.

That's pretty simple. You can yell about different spellings and whatnot but the fact is that "Yankee" has more than one meaning depending on whether you are American or foreigner. "Yank" is short for "Yankee".

Duhhh.:1eye: