If you ever watched The Hills or The O.C while growing up, you too may have been mystified by the meaning of the phrase 'hook up'.
'They hooked up'.
'Did you hear that Lauren and Brody hooked up last night?'
'Did you hook up?'
For the love of God, Americans, what are you talking about?
Do you mean kiss? Do you mean sex? Clarify, people.
Anyway, it looks like us Brits are finally taking our revenge over such linguistic confusion as we've just uncovered an old conversation among British and American Reddit users, where the Brits offer some helpful translations.
Here's what we found out confuses Americans:
'Fancy'
'The way they use 'fancy' is unique. 'Do you fancy this? Fancy that? Do you fancy her?' It sounds well, fancy!' wrote one American user.
Yes, our overseas friend, that's because we're super fancy over here in the UK.
'Snog'
'This confused the sh*t out of me when I read Harry Potter,' revealed one Reddit user.
We'd hate to know what he thought it meant.
'Bellend'
Cue streams of quotes from The Inbetweeners such as 'briefcase wank*r'. It never gets old.
'Cheers'
One American told Reddit users he heard his Irish colleague use the sign-off and started using it himself. Er, not quite sure it has the same effect from an American but go for it, pal.
Another was confused why we use 'cheers' for gratitude and for an informal toast.
'Spanner'
The best explanation of this is from someone who summarises it to also mean 'an ugly person as in the phrase 'a face like a bag of spanners'.'
Ah, you've got to love language.
'Dodgy'
There didn't seem to be an American-English equivalent but someone then said these phrases sound like they're being 'uttered by Vinnie Jones or Nigel Thornberry', which is pretty spot on.
'Right' before a sentence
There was a lot of confusion over this one but it was aptly given the example: 'I'll be on the sofa watching Great British Bake Off or Countdown or whatever, think to myself 'I fancy a cup of tea', and start the process with an audible, 'Right' as I rise up to make said tea, to indicate to those around that I'm on a mission.'
Look there are probably a lot of words us Brits don't have the foggiest idea Americans are talking about too so we're even stevens, okay?
Katie O'Malley is the Site Director on ELLE UK. On a daily basis you’ll find Katie managing all digital workflow, editing site, video and newsletter content, liaising with commercial and sales teams on new partnerships and deals (eg Nike, Tiffany & Co., Cartier etc), implementing new digital strategies and compiling in-depth data traffic, SEO and ecomm reports. In addition to appearing on the radio and on TV, as well as interviewing everyone from Oprah Winfrey to Rishi Sunak PM, Katie enjoys writing about lifestyle, culture, wellness, fitness, fashion, and more.
