Surprising one for me was "all dressed" as a term for, e.g., a pizza with all the toppings.
Apparently it's a direct translation from French and is pretty exclusive to Quebec English and the Easternmost part of Ontario (which is heavily French).
And Saskatchewan. Which the site notes is "a bit of a mystery".
Also found "parkade" interesting--apparently it's still much more heavily used in Western Canada, and they attribute that to it having been "seeded" by some Hudson's Bay advertisements run at their original 6 locations all in Western Canada.
Some other words/terms that surprised me: renoviction, gong show, kerfuffle, off-sale, stagette
Having spent a large portion of time answering phones in the pizza business, I can assure you that a great many people in Saskatchewan will order an all-dressed pizza even though we had no such thing on the menu.
Yeah, mostly came as a surprise to me because I've spent most of my time in Saskatchewan and Ontario near the Quebec border. I somehow managed to spend my entire life bouncing around Canada and never spend much time anywhere where "all dressed pizza" didn't exist, even though it's apparently a highly-specific term.
> And Saskatchewan. Which the site notes is "a bit of a mystery".
There's no mystery. This is rubbish research. In parts of Manitoba we also use all-dressed for the same purpose (and of course chips). The unifying factor is French culture. The Riel Rebellion helped bring tremendous franocphones, and French culture out west. There are areas like St. Boniface in Winnipeg where s some people speak only French. The Metis are in both Manitoba and Quebec...
It's been a long time now, but from what I remember from school, a critical part of the notability of Gabrielle Roy[1] was that she wrote from the perspective of francophones living in the prairies.
I appreciate the DHCP-3 is not a monolithic work, but to have both authorship and editorial oversight of a corpus that presents itself as a rigorous treatise of Canadianisms demonstrate either broad ignorance of, or reckless disregard for a significant portion of our heritage is just baffling to me. What's the point if one is not going to be ruthlessly thorough?
Manitoba was founded by French speakers (the Metis) and about 2000 Metis were supposed to get most of what is now downtown Winnipeg. Their culture was eventually suppressed by Ontario.
> Surprising one for me was "all dressed" as a term for, e.g., a pizza with all the toppings.
What on Earth. Wikipedia tells me:
> An all-dressed chip called The Whole Shabang is produced by American prison supplier Keefe Group. It became available to the general public in 2016.[4] Frito-Lay began selling all-dressed Ruffles potato chips in the United States that same year.[5]
I had assumed the entire time that everyone uses this term for potato chips (and that everyone has the flavour) and that the Quebecois were just being weird by also applying it to pizza.
--
"Renoviction" is a very recent neologism that's mainly used in the specific major cities where it's an issue (because of the housing market).
"Gong show" I think is relatively old-fashioned (as in Gen X) by comparison. I'm actually surprised Americans don't say that, given that the actual show was on NBC.
In Vancouver in the 1990s, if you wanted to buy a six-pack of beer at 10pm after the government-run liquor store closed, you would walk into a local pub and ask the bartender if they did "off-sales". If yes, they would sell you a cold six-pack for a very small markup.
Also, in Ontario in the 1990s, one-eighth of an ounce of weed was called a "half-quarter", ha ha.
That's very common word these days at least here in PEI. Kicking people out to "renovate".
It basically means renovate as in sweep the floor and paint a small patch on the wall, done. All so they can kick out the tenant and up the rent 1,000%.
Huh, that makes sense given "all dressed" came from French and New Orleans' French history.
I'm not sure why we both ended up with "dressed" given the French is literally "all garnishes / toppings" or "wholly garnished / topped". I'm sure some linguist could probably do a dissertation on this or something. And hopefully also cover how Saskatchewan ended up with using "all dressed" because I'm really curious about that outlier.
I wish they would've explained the term "soaker" a bit better as it's such a Canadian thing.
Basically, when the snow starts to melt in the spring, you'll sometimes accidentally step on some thin ice that leads directly to a puddle underneath and soak your boot. It sucks! Also, we would often call these "booters" in Manitoba, where I'm from.
As a Canadian who married an American and now lived in the US, I was surprised how many things I say are Canadianisms without me having realized. There have been a lot of (minor) miscommunications because I didn't realize I was saying something only Canadians understand. Like when I told her that my parents' hydro had been out all day.
I initially worked in Canada where it wouldn't be uncommon to go out for a work lunch and order a beer.
When I got a new job in the US, my boss took me and several coworkers to a restaurant for lunch as a way to welcome me. When the waitress asked what I wanted to drink I asked for a beer. I then heard one of my coworkers who was sitting next to me ask me incredulously, "What are you doing?" I responded that I was ordering a beer. He said that I could get fired for that. That's when I realized that for a country that seemed so similar to Canada on the surface it was quite different below that surface.
It's common to order a beer at work lunch in the US too.
Though I have worked at places if the company was paying for the lunch they won't pay for alcohol. In those cases we've always asked for the beers to be on a separate check so the expense report is easier.
The term Hydro for electrical power (power lines) is not used in PEI the older generation would call it the "light bill" younger people now may call it the "power bill". If it was out we'd just say the power is out.
I always assumed we just called it hydro in BC because so much of the power comes from hydroelectric, but then I moved and it seems we call it hydro everywhere no master source..?
Hydroelectric was historically even more dominant in Canada than today. In places that aren't majority hydro now, they were in the past, like in Ontario and Alberta.
The name of the utility companies in most provinces was probably an influence. Until 1999 in Ontario it was the Ontario Hydro-Electric Power Commission, shortened normally to Ontario Hydro. Manitoba Hydro. Hydro Quebec. I think in Toronto they still stamp manhole covers with THES (Toronto Hydro-Electric System).
> Like when I told her that my parents' hydro had been out all day.
When I immigrated to Canada (Ontario) a decade ago, the term hydro was the most confusing to me. I assumed it meant water supply or plumbing, but it was always in the wrong context. I imagined the disaster of hooking up the plumbing to the electrical service! Now it’s completely natural to call it “hydro” but confusing at first.
I travel to the UK a lot and am usually pretty careful with my Canadianisms, but during my last trip I accidentally asked a server for both a pop and a serviette at the same time, leading to a blank stare.
Washroom vs. bathroom: I’ve always found it strange to call a room a “bathroom” if it doesn’t have a shower or tub. On the other hand, most single-family homes in Canada have a “powder room” where people can wash their face and hands. Although these facilities serve similar purposes, the former is used for public spaces, while the latter is found inside homes.
As an Australian I always find it funny going places and having to remember which dance-around word everyone uses for "toilet". Washroom, restroom, bathroom, there's so many!
The easy to remember terms and will work nearly anywhere without giving offence are: "loo" in a residential property or "gents/ladies" for a non-residential property.
This one (among others) does really fascinate me. Maybe it’s due to spending a lot of time around diverse groups of people but I’ve never really seen a huge distinction between these words. Washroom, bathroom, toilet, I and everyone I know pretty much would use interchangeably? Or at least wouldn’t blink at someone else using them.
Restroom, and a variety of others, might be slightly more usage specific but still… wouldn’t be unexpected or weird, I’d say?
This list somehow doesn't have "converter" (to refer to a television remote), which was the first word to unexpectedly baffle my American coworkers the first time I said it, to my own surprise.
I'm from Northern Ontario and never heard that one, but I was also surprised by a missing term: "transport". In my neck of the woods, that's how we refer to a semi-truck / 18-wheeler.
I think that's actually going to be more of an age thing as well. The converter wasn't just the remote, but the little box, separate from the TV, needed to convert signals for an older TV.
Basically, the 'cable box' or the 'satalite box.'
But ya, 45 years old, grew up in Toronto and Southern Alberta and it was a converter, until it wasn't.
I grew up in BC as well and never heard it. My parents were from Ontario and always called it the flipper. Because it flips channels I guess. Felt like every household had a different name for it though.
Probably one of my favorite commonly-used Canadian slang is "to chirp someone". It's a term that's frequently used in hockey circles, but more generally means to make fun of someone in a banter-y kind of way.
I've always took it as the opposite. Chriping is just noise with no real threat (most chirping birds are not a threat to humans). It's just someone being friendly with their banter usually in a making fun of you type context.
The one subtle difference I've noticed between Canadian and American English is on school grades. American say "first grade" where as Canada say "grade one".
Apparently originated in Australia, though it is definitely an established usage in Canada. I seem to recall hearing that usage in Vancouver in the 90s.
In a feeble attempt to rationalize the Canadianism "pencil crayon"...
Pencils have cores based on graphite or charcoal.
Pencil crayons have cores based on wax or oil, with pigments added. This is basically the composition of crayons or pastels. Then it's wrapped in wood like a pencil. Thus ... "pencil crayon".
Crayons are the fat sticks of wax (e.g. Crayola brand). Colored pencils are, well, colored pencils.
There are also various different ways to pronounce “crayon”; is that also true in Canada? For example I pronounce it with one syllable: “cran”, just like the beginning of “cranberry”. I get the feeling that’s not the majority pronunciation but it’s not exactly rare either (at least where I grew up).
Nope, coloured pencils are coloured wax encased in wood. Canadians emphasize that they are crayons in pencil shape; Americans emphasize that they are pencil-form but coloured.
Well... they're generally wax or oil based like a crayon. Just wrapped in wood like a pencil rather than in paper. Like some sort of... pencil... crayon. >_>
This is excellent stuff, I am going to be spending a lot of time on this.
My absolute favourite Canadianism is how, on wikipedia, the 401 (major highway that goes through Toronto) is "colloquially referred to as the four-oh-one" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ontario_Highway_401).
I don't really think it is...in Washington State for instance the highway through the Seattle suburbs is called "the four-oh-five" (there's a Death Cab For Cutie song about this one).
Even though I lived in the US for a decade, it still surprises me to learn that certain words are Canadianisms. I wonder how often people had no idea what I was talking aboot and just didn't speak up.
I strongly suspect most language / communication is clear from inference and context, and the exact words used aren't super important unless they are really out there or a different language entirely. It's the same with learning a foreign language (english in my case), you read books and posts on the internet but once you reach a certain base level, except for the really out there words, you can infer the meaning from context.
> you read books and posts on the internet but once you reach a certain base level, except for the really out there words, you can infer the meaning from context.
Yes. Unless you are like me, you think you are good at inferring from context, never lookup a word in the dictionary and think for a few years it means something while it actually means the opposite.
Significant pronunciation differences are related, but not covered in this list.
For example, in Ontario (perhaps elsewhere in Canada) the word asphalt is pronounced like “ash fault” (ˈæʃfɑlt) as opposed to U.S. pronunciation like “ass fault.” (ˈæsfɔlt)
Also “pasta” is often ˈpæstə as opposed to ˈpɑstə in American English.
It's the same people mispronouncing "asphalt" with a "sh" that also use "nucular" energy to watch filums about athuletes in the artic. Some of them have even visited Warshington in the USA.
I don't think any of that is particularly Canadian though.
« Melon d'eau » ? For watermelon? I thought it was a joke, but well, Wikipedia mentions it: « La pastèque [...], parfois appelée melon d'eau » (https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Past%C3%A8que)
Everyone says « pastèque » in mainland France, where I've lived for over 40 years.
I've never seen melon d'eau and I doubt anyone will understand it unless they know the English word.
Office Québécois de la Langue Française (OQLF) promotes the french language and adapt new English words (whereas France typically integrate English words in their vocab).
The website Banque de dépannage linguistique (BDL) will have a lot of useful resources if you're interested! For instance, how to write a professional sounding email, names of official documents, invoice templates.
Highlights (good and bad):
* emails -> courriels (courrier + iels; mail + similar sounding syllable)*
* spam mail -> pourriels (pourri + iels; rotten + similar lexem as courriels)
* to spoil (as in spoilers) -> divulgâcher (divulguer + gâcher; to reveal + to ruin)
* to mansplain -> mecspliquer (mec + expliquer; man + to explain); This one is outrageous (and uncommon) because it's an homonym to "m'expliquer" (explain to me)
* to browse (the web) -> naviguer (as in "to navigate"; browser -> "navigateur")
And Quebec has it’s own English. I spent a few years working in Montreal and soon learned about “passing the vacuum” and “closing the light”. There are so many bilingual folks that concepts and word orders flow back and forth. I had an interesting discussion with a bilingual anglophone about how in English elsewhere it’s called a “pacifier” and not a “souce”
déjeuner is a literal translation though. "Breaking fast" -> "dé-jeuner" (undo fasting).
French people typically say:
- breakfast - petit-déjeuner (small breakfast)
- lunch - déjeuner (breakfast)
- diner - diner
Québecois people say:
- breakfast - déjeuner
- lunch - diner
- diner - souper (eating soup; probably historical roots like "getting your big meal of the day" which is likely broth + potatoes)
"upload" and "download" are interesting to me, which, in addition to the standard meaning, refer to the transfer of costs/jurisdiction to a higher and lower level of government respectively (between provincial and federal for instance)
That usage came about during the right-wing political swing of the 1990s, just as the phrase was becoming popular in connection with computers. Generally, costs and responsibilities were downloaded and revenues and control were uploaded.
There must be so many tiny little differences like this. I remember when I lived in Toronto for a bit that the way they phrased whether you wanted a fast food order to eat at the restaurant or to take home was a little different from in Alberta. I know in Alberta, they would ask "to stay, or to go?" when ordering, but in Toronto I think it was "for here or to go?" which is how I've heard it phrased in the U.S. as well.
Totally minor difference, but it did feel jarring when I heard it differently from the first time as someone who grew up in Alberta.
I'm from Northern Ontario and me and my buddy went to a poutine place in Toronto. He asked for a poutine (naturally), and the worker didn't understand him. Southern Ontario says "poo-teen" /pu.tin/, but we say "p'tin" /pə.tɪn/ where I'm from. The original French way is [pu.t͡sɪn].
Never here that term used but I'm out west as well. We're all semi's, all the time.
"two-four" is there and can confirm that is more an eastern term as well. Never heard the term until I spent a year out in Ontario many years ago. Still hasn't really made its way to the west in all that time.
This classification seems extremely arbitrary. What purpose, exactly, does this classification serve? What insights about “Canadian as she is spoke” do we learn by using this?
I have a sure fire method for detecting Canadians out in the wild. Pay close attention to how they pronounce the word “resources”. If you hear the letter Z in there then they are probably Canadian.
Most people who refer to "North Americans" collectively are Canadian. People in the US can forget Canada exists. People in Canada can't forget the US exist and so they need a term that includes both.
Discussions of healthcare facilities always get me in Canada. Grew up in the states, but born in Canada, when you have to use the emergency room it’s said that “they went to Hospital” as opposed to “they went to ‘the’ hospital”. No one up here ever seems to see the oddity of always referring to multiple different hospitals as the singular Hospital.
Also varies by region in the US for referring to highways. In Southern California it is usually "the I-5" while on the other coast you will hear a plain "I-95".
Here in PEI I'm sure every isolated community has thousands of sayings. The island as a whole I'm sure has many. Canada is probably like that small communities with slang none of us have ever heard. The ones that break out regionally still may not make it to other areas even after decades being in use.
On one of the recent seasons of Alone there was a guy from Labrador who had an solidly Irish accent, no hint of North America, right down to saying 'tree' for '3'. I can only imagine that's who the settlers were and the isolation meant the accent never changed.
I'll have to go through this with my family; we have a number of terms we use that we're never sure if they're Canadian, non-regional uncommon words, or just things our family say.
My grandpa called toonies "bearbucks", which isn't listed, but is in one of the quotes on the toonie entry. No listing for "reef" as in yanking on something, though I don't know if that's a Canadianism or not.
Same. As an American living on the Canadian border most of my life, I learned most of my Candaianisms from factory coworkers and AvE's youtube channel.
It's mostly West coast. Origin is Pacific West Coast pidgin (Chinook). Some people in Yukon and the prairies use it, but it becomes rarer the further you are from B.C.. It has become more widely used in recent years though.
> While brown bread may have contained some molasses in the early 1900s, post-WWII it was usually made without. So Canadian brown bread is, unlike Boston-style bread, not sweet (see the 1909 quotation) and also distinct from Irish brown bread, though the latter may have inspired it.
Brown bread is sweet, and you are supposed to cut it up into little hockey pucks and toast it. It is the perfect shape when it comes out of the can.
Lived in BC, SK, and ON. I'm far enough east that I regularly hit up both Ottawa and Montreal.
In my experience "brown bread" is a synonym for whole wheat bread. If you go order a sandwich and they ask what bread you want it on and you say "brown", you're getting whole wheat (or maybe 60% whole wheat... just not white).
I'd be very confused if I ever got this molasses-sweetened bread everyone is talking about.
My family were definitely not tourists, but come to think of it I don’t recall seeing the canned stuff in my friends’ houses. So maybe we were just locals who fell for a prank that was being played on the tourists, or something.
It isn’t, apparently, that’s what I’m upset about. Canada and New England are supposed go way back, longer than the countries. But apparently we didn’t share our bread technology advances.
title? this is a full Dictionary of Canadianisms, words included according to a six facet typology. i.e. the typology is not the main story.
Type 1 – Origin: a form and its meaning were created in what is now Canada
Type 2 – Preservation: a form or meaning that was once widespread in many Englishes, but is now preserved in Canadian English in the North American context or beyond; sometimes called “retention”
Type 3 – Semantic Change: forms that have undergone semantic change in Canadian English
Type 4 – Culturally Significant: forms or meanings that have been enshrined in the Canadian psyche and are widely seen as part of Canadian identity
Type 5 – Frequency: forms or meanings that are Canadian by virtue of frequency
Type 6 – Memorial: forms or meanings now widely considered to be pejorative
Non-Canadian: forms or meanings once thought to be Canadian for which evidence is lacking
I always loved the term "keener" growing up and was disappointed that it wasn't a term of use down here in the States. It's essentially the same thing as a "brown-noser" but a little less graphic.
Well, why not include the word "Canadian", which significantly predates the country, as the prime example?
It's derived from Iroquois Nation words and used by French settlers to refer to Indigenous people. The word "Canada" was used by explorer Jacques Cartier to refer to the city now called "Québec". It broadly refered to the territory of a specific Indigenous tribe. (could be derogatory, but seemingly accurate / matter-of-fact)
After the British invasion, the British start using "Canadian" to describe both First Nations and French settlers (derogatory, "non-British)
Over time, "Canadian" generally refers to habitants of Canada.
Related: the hockey team "Les Canadiens" is from Montréal in the province of Québec in Canada. It's the oldest hockey team (1909, pre-NHL). The name is a reappropriation of the word Canadian at a time where it was used derogatively against "French-Canadians" (term that didn't exist at the time). Their chant "go, habs, go" refers to the "habitants", i.e., French settlers.
Related: "province" originates from latin used by Romans to described conquered territory. This is the term founders of Canada in 1867 decided to use instead of "state"
For anyone interested in Canadian history, always check-out the French version of a wikipedia page (and translate it). English pages have a lot of hand-waving and start history with their conquest. Also, ChatGPT makes outrageous historical mistakes all the time, such as suggesting that French-Canadians were a minority group in the 19th century
> Related: "province" originates from latin used by Romans to described conquered territory. This is the term founders of Canada in 1867 decided to use instead of "state"
> In fact, the word province is an ancient term from public law, which means: "office belonging to a magistrate".
"State" is an overloaded term. In British English it usually refers to the top level political entity, e.g. "head of state" unless specifically talking about the US (except for the Secretary of State...)
I wonder if the word choice was influenced by the US civil war ending only a couple of years previously and wanting to make it unambiguous where the centre of power lay.
> The English word province is attested since about 1330 and derives from the 13th-century Old French province, which itself comes from the Latin word provincia, which referred to the sphere of authority of a magistrate, in particular, to a foreign territory.
The fact that British authorities picked a French word that the conquered would understand is significant.
> I wonder if the word choice was influenced by the US civil war ending only a couple of years previously
Interesting interpretation! I would agree given Canadians were given the opportunity to ally with the 13 colonies at the time (but didn't). British loyalists also fled the United States. "Province" made allegiance to the crown oversea clear
> For anyone interested in Canadian history, always check-out the French version of a wikipedia page
In reading about Canadian history this entire comment strikes me as very "East" biased? (Because I'm reading a strong implication that the French are the true holders of the history and the English just showed up later. Which may very well be true)
> I'm reading a strong implication that the French are the true holders of the history
I interpreted this more as "don't forget to check out the French-language Wikipedia articles too, since they might have contents that are absent from the English-language Wikipedia articles." This would likely be the case for anything concerning Québécois or Acadien culture, or the early settlements by the French; but not likely for most things west of Ottawa (aside from some pockets like Grande Prairie, Alberta or Saint Boniface, Manitoba).
It seems everyone outside of Ontario feels some kind of alienation or other. The west, as you mentioned, but also the maritimes, and especially the Québécois.
>> Their chant "go, habs, go" refers to the "habitants"
The province of Quebec has very strong language laws intended to protect the French language. Heavy-handed? You be the judge. City buses in Montreal were recently "pressured" to stop displaying the chant (one of the most Quebecois things you can say to promote your pride) because it's English. Instead they were told to use the super-common-rolls-off-the-tongue-and-way-better "Allez! Canadiens Allez!"
edit: this was later reviewed because of public pressure about just how stupid it is and now "go" is ok. But the language police still say "go" is an Anglicism and public bodies are obligated to use "exemplary" French, so you can see some of that snooty OG France perseveres - I guess the system works!
Be sure to also check out how francophone Quebecois have been very effective at revenge - driving out anglophones and allophones from Quebec through vindictive attacks against their language, culture, schooling and employment. It's sad, but I am ultimately glad I will be the last generation of my family born in Quebec. Au revoir and good riddance.
To put things into perspectives, let’s remember that anglophones in Québec, which represent about 10% of the population, have 3 universities, one of which is McGill, and have there theaters and artists, newspapers and tv shows. Many live in Montréal all there life without knowing a word of French, since it is possible to find almost everywhere someone that speaks English. By constrast, it is less and less easy to live only in French in Montréal, since it is not always possible to find someone that speaks French.
The original post was focused on history and language, and I added some political spice. Not discussing the politics of language (as in OP) is a bit outrageous.
You're right that French-Canadians are not guilt-free from discrimination et al. Québec only ever had French as an official language, but the last decades we've seen a series of dubious policies
Surprising one for me was "all dressed" as a term for, e.g., a pizza with all the toppings.
Apparently it's a direct translation from French and is pretty exclusive to Quebec English and the Easternmost part of Ontario (which is heavily French).
And Saskatchewan. Which the site notes is "a bit of a mystery".
Also found "parkade" interesting--apparently it's still much more heavily used in Western Canada, and they attribute that to it having been "seeded" by some Hudson's Bay advertisements run at their original 6 locations all in Western Canada.
Some other words/terms that surprised me: renoviction, gong show, kerfuffle, off-sale, stagette
I (West Coast) pretty much entirely associate "all-dressed" with potato chips.
As a West Coaster, I had to look up nearly every term in this article. As usual, "Canadian" almost entirely means the central/east areas.
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Dressed all over, zesty mordant, and gelapenno.
The goalie trinity right there
I (US) also associate "all-dressed" with potato chips since we started getting them down here.
The Works is usually a the name for the pizza. Chiming in for the east coast, all dressed is chips.
Having spent a large portion of time answering phones in the pizza business, I can assure you that a great many people in Saskatchewan will order an all-dressed pizza even though we had no such thing on the menu.
Yeah, mostly came as a surprise to me because I've spent most of my time in Saskatchewan and Ontario near the Quebec border. I somehow managed to spend my entire life bouncing around Canada and never spend much time anywhere where "all dressed pizza" didn't exist, even though it's apparently a highly-specific term.
The Works is pretty common in the US, too. Pizza and sandwich toppings
in MB, never heard of all-dressed pizza in my life. We have the chips and the works pizza
And bagels.
It was an Everything pizza at the place I worked at as a kid. They're disgusting.
Old, but good, CBC documentary on this type of thing:
https://youtu.be/eIoTpkM5N64?si=FnGploZrLZ1XRVXO&utm_source=...
> And Saskatchewan. Which the site notes is "a bit of a mystery".
There's no mystery. This is rubbish research. In parts of Manitoba we also use all-dressed for the same purpose (and of course chips). The unifying factor is French culture. The Riel Rebellion helped bring tremendous franocphones, and French culture out west. There are areas like St. Boniface in Winnipeg where s some people speak only French. The Metis are in both Manitoba and Quebec...
It's been a long time now, but from what I remember from school, a critical part of the notability of Gabrielle Roy[1] was that she wrote from the perspective of francophones living in the prairies.
I appreciate the DHCP-3 is not a monolithic work, but to have both authorship and editorial oversight of a corpus that presents itself as a rigorous treatise of Canadianisms demonstrate either broad ignorance of, or reckless disregard for a significant portion of our heritage is just baffling to me. What's the point if one is not going to be ruthlessly thorough?
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gabrielle_Roy
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Manitoba was founded by French speakers (the Metis) and about 2000 Metis were supposed to get most of what is now downtown Winnipeg. Their culture was eventually suppressed by Ontario.
Kerfuffle is British - quite common here. 19th century Scots apparently!
> Surprising one for me was "all dressed" as a term for, e.g., a pizza with all the toppings.
What on Earth. Wikipedia tells me:
> An all-dressed chip called The Whole Shabang is produced by American prison supplier Keefe Group. It became available to the general public in 2016.[4] Frito-Lay began selling all-dressed Ruffles potato chips in the United States that same year.[5]
I had assumed the entire time that everyone uses this term for potato chips (and that everyone has the flavour) and that the Quebecois were just being weird by also applying it to pizza.
--
"Renoviction" is a very recent neologism that's mainly used in the specific major cities where it's an issue (because of the housing market).
"Gong show" I think is relatively old-fashioned (as in Gen X) by comparison. I'm actually surprised Americans don't say that, given that the actual show was on NBC.
I can easily find "kerfuffle" in supposedly American online dictionaries so I think their claim is rather dubious. On the flip side, I've never in my life heard "off-sale"; and in Ontario it's only quite recently (https://www.ontario.ca/document/alcohol-master-framework-agr... https://news.ontario.ca/en/release/1003988/ontario-consumers...) that you can even legally purchase beer and wine at a grocery store.
In Vancouver in the 1990s, if you wanted to buy a six-pack of beer at 10pm after the government-run liquor store closed, you would walk into a local pub and ask the bartender if they did "off-sales". If yes, they would sell you a cold six-pack for a very small markup.
Also, in Ontario in the 1990s, one-eighth of an ounce of weed was called a "half-quarter", ha ha.
> Renoviction
That's very common word these days at least here in PEI. Kicking people out to "renovate".
It basically means renovate as in sweep the floor and paint a small patch on the wall, done. All so they can kick out the tenant and up the rent 1,000%.
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I've never in my life heard "off-sale" . . .
Off-sale has long been used in Alberta. I have a memory of asking my parents what it meant when I was a kid (and I am in my 40s, now).
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In Quebec French we use “toute garnie” to refer to a pizza with red sauce, mozzarella, mushrooms, green peppers and pepperonis.
Which is funny because that translates to "fully garnished" not "all dressed". Tabarnac
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Here in Ontario English we call that pizza deluxe!
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That is what OP said. "All dressed" is a direct translation from French.
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Do you call “tomato sauce” “red sauce”?
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"Can confirm".
In the mid 70s, I would order a small pizza, all dressed from McGill Pizza, when feeling peckish. $1.10, delivered to your door in no time at all.
There's a significant (though not exactly large) french-speaking population in Saskatchewan.
I live a couple blocks from a large french-only school.
A “fully dressed” poboy in New Orleans is one with all the fixing’s
Huh, that makes sense given "all dressed" came from French and New Orleans' French history.
I'm not sure why we both ended up with "dressed" given the French is literally "all garnishes / toppings" or "wholly garnished / topped". I'm sure some linguist could probably do a dissertation on this or something. And hopefully also cover how Saskatchewan ended up with using "all dressed" because I'm really curious about that outlier.
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There are several parking structures called "parkades" in Salem Oregon.
I wish they would've explained the term "soaker" a bit better as it's such a Canadian thing.
Basically, when the snow starts to melt in the spring, you'll sometimes accidentally step on some thin ice that leads directly to a puddle underneath and soak your boot. It sucks! Also, we would often call these "booters" in Manitoba, where I'm from.
Wow! I remember getting soakers as a kid! I had no idea it was a Canadianism!
When and why/how did you stop getting soakers? Asking for a friend
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Yup, they'll forever be booters to me to. Go Bison?
And go Jets!
I can relate to the experience, but never even thought of having a word for it...
got a booter eh bud?
In Southern Ontario, it feels like it's soakers all winter long!
first time i’ve found a fellow manitoban on HN greetings !
As a Canadian who married an American and now lived in the US, I was surprised how many things I say are Canadianisms without me having realized. There have been a lot of (minor) miscommunications because I didn't realize I was saying something only Canadians understand. Like when I told her that my parents' hydro had been out all day.
I initially worked in Canada where it wouldn't be uncommon to go out for a work lunch and order a beer.
When I got a new job in the US, my boss took me and several coworkers to a restaurant for lunch as a way to welcome me. When the waitress asked what I wanted to drink I asked for a beer. I then heard one of my coworkers who was sitting next to me ask me incredulously, "What are you doing?" I responded that I was ordering a beer. He said that I could get fired for that. That's when I realized that for a country that seemed so similar to Canada on the surface it was quite different below that surface.
Many companies and cultures in the US are fine with a drink or two at lunch. What industry was this company in?
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had plenty of drinking lunches w/ US companies. the current (Canadian) company I'm at is quite strict about drinking -- would likely be fireable.
the Aussies would have been disappointed if I only had one...
It's common to order a beer at work lunch in the US too.
Though I have worked at places if the company was paying for the lunch they won't pay for alcohol. In those cases we've always asked for the beers to be on a separate check so the expense report is easier.
The term Hydro for electrical power (power lines) is not used in PEI the older generation would call it the "light bill" younger people now may call it the "power bill". If it was out we'd just say the power is out.
Hydro is just for QC, ON and BC where the electrical companies have "hydro" in their name.
Other parts of the country just call it power/electrical. But in NS my grand parents would also call it a "light bill".
Hydro is from Canadian provinces that use mostly hydro power
I always assumed we just called it hydro in BC because so much of the power comes from hydroelectric, but then I moved and it seems we call it hydro everywhere no master source..?
Hydroelectric was historically even more dominant in Canada than today. In places that aren't majority hydro now, they were in the past, like in Ontario and Alberta.
The name of the utility companies in most provinces was probably an influence. Until 1999 in Ontario it was the Ontario Hydro-Electric Power Commission, shortened normally to Ontario Hydro. Manitoba Hydro. Hydro Quebec. I think in Toronto they still stamp manhole covers with THES (Toronto Hydro-Electric System).
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I think it’s primarily BC and Ontario. And maybe a French version in Quebec.
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I've had to explain to an Albertan friend that hydro meant power, they mostly use coal out there from what I understand.
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> Like when I told her that my parents' hydro had been out all day.
When I immigrated to Canada (Ontario) a decade ago, the term hydro was the most confusing to me. I assumed it meant water supply or plumbing, but it was always in the wrong context. I imagined the disaster of hooking up the plumbing to the electrical service! Now it’s completely natural to call it “hydro” but confusing at first.
I travel to the UK a lot and am usually pretty careful with my Canadianisms, but during my last trip I accidentally asked a server for both a pop and a serviette at the same time, leading to a blank stare.
Pop isn't a Canadianisms, is common in a lot of the US too.
https://www.businessinsider.com/soda-pop-coke-map-2018-10
do people look at you puzzled when you say "keener"?
Washroom vs. bathroom: I’ve always found it strange to call a room a “bathroom” if it doesn’t have a shower or tub. On the other hand, most single-family homes in Canada have a “powder room” where people can wash their face and hands. Although these facilities serve similar purposes, the former is used for public spaces, while the latter is found inside homes.
As an Australian I always find it funny going places and having to remember which dance-around word everyone uses for "toilet". Washroom, restroom, bathroom, there's so many!
'Toilet' itself is a euphemism, an archaic term for dressing/washing room and/or the act of washing up
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Don't forget water closet!
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Toilet, bog or lav in the UK are some options.
The easy to remember terms and will work nearly anywhere without giving offence are: "loo" in a residential property or "gents/ladies" for a non-residential property.
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other notables include the loo, the can, the john, and of course the dunny
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Toilet is the object, not the room it's in
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Restroom has always puzzled me. Seems like it should be an alternate name for a bedroom instead.
This one (among others) does really fascinate me. Maybe it’s due to spending a lot of time around diverse groups of people but I’ve never really seen a huge distinction between these words. Washroom, bathroom, toilet, I and everyone I know pretty much would use interchangeably? Or at least wouldn’t blink at someone else using them.
Restroom, and a variety of others, might be slightly more usage specific but still… wouldn’t be unexpected or weird, I’d say?
> most single-family homes in Canada have a “powder room” where people can wash their face and hands.
I think only people of a very specific upbringing ever call it that here. Certainly nobody in my circles would.
yeah can't say I know of anyone with a powder room
I use washroom and bathroom interchangeably.
its been said that Canada is still mentally stuck in the Victorian age somewhat
Animal shithouse
This list somehow doesn't have "converter" (to refer to a television remote), which was the first word to unexpectedly baffle my American coworkers the first time I said it, to my own surprise.
I'm from Northern Ontario and never heard that one, but I was also surprised by a missing term: "transport". In my neck of the woods, that's how we refer to a semi-truck / 18-wheeler.
Converter was definitely heard when I was growing up and I would know what you were talking about 100%
Now a days I am probably more likely to say "Clicker" unless otherwise prompted.
I think that's actually going to be more of an age thing as well. The converter wasn't just the remote, but the little box, separate from the TV, needed to convert signals for an older TV.
Basically, the 'cable box' or the 'satalite box.'
But ya, 45 years old, grew up in Toronto and Southern Alberta and it was a converter, until it wasn't.
Where are you from? I'm from BC and I've never heard that one either.
I grew up in BC as well and never heard it. My parents were from Ontario and always called it the flipper. Because it flips channels I guess. Felt like every household had a different name for it though.
I've never heard that one... what part of the country is that from?
What is it converting?
never heard of that, but always delighted my friends when id ask for the channel changer
Probably one of my favorite commonly-used Canadian slang is "to chirp someone". It's a term that's frequently used in hockey circles, but more generally means to make fun of someone in a banter-y kind of way.
I think of chirping as specifically mean-spirited bullying, especially in an attempt to provoke a reaction. Source: grew up in BC.
For chirping, I'll bring up Shoresy, spin off of Letterkenny TV show, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shoresy
The film Slapshot with hockey banter/ribbing (at a Gilmore Girls-type pace).
I remember being very amused at a party when hockey, baseball and football players were teaching each other their respective lockerroom slang.
It might be more popular in Canada but I think "chirping" is pretty common in the US.
yeah heard it a bunch in the context of talking shit in sports
Having courtside seats at a basketball game means getting to listen to the players chirp each other.
Nah if you say someone chirped you say, on the street or in a pub, it's fighting words...
I've always took it as the opposite. Chriping is just noise with no real threat (most chirping birds are not a threat to humans). It's just someone being friendly with their banter usually in a making fun of you type context.
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The one subtle difference I've noticed between Canadian and American English is on school grades. American say "first grade" where as Canada say "grade one".
Toronto here, I think approximately I'd say first-sixth grade, and grade 7-12. Grade one just sounds wrong though.
Odd, I grew up in Toronto and Grade 1 sounds fine to me.
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Well, Toronto is ground zero for Americanization. First grade sounds super American to my ear, I'd never say it over grade one.
As American who's recently discovered Corner Gas, I just learned that nearly every resident of Saskatchewan is named "Jackass".
Sad to not see "dart" in there, I assumed from Letterkenny that it was a regular Canadianism. Perhaps it's too new?
Popularized by Trailer Park Boys in the 2000s, if not well before
We called em darts when I was in highschool back in the 90s.
I don't remember darts as much on TPB... the phrase "Corey, Trevor, two smokes, let's go" stands out.
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Another Trailer Park Boys classic: "That's the way she goes"
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=65w7ha4DZKo
As a Nova Scotian I can tell you it was present before 2000s... at least 90s.
Apparently originated in Australia, though it is definitely an established usage in Canada. I seem to recall hearing that usage in Vancouver in the 90s.
https://gikken.co/mate-translate/blog/from-darts-to-cigarett...
Darts an old one. At least since my parents age.
In southern Ontario a dart is also called a bogey
"Dart" is absolutely still used. "Eh bud. Can I bum a dart from ya?"
Throw me a dart, yeah?
[dead]
Americans dont use the term "pencil crayons"???
What do you call them?
In a feeble attempt to rationalize the Canadianism "pencil crayon"...
Pencils have cores based on graphite or charcoal.
Pencil crayons have cores based on wax or oil, with pigments added. This is basically the composition of crayons or pastels. Then it's wrapped in wood like a pencil. Thus ... "pencil crayon".
Wait, coloured pencils aren't actually pencils?
I've never heard Pencil Crayon, in British Columbia, but then again I did live in the U.S. for all of my school years.
Crayons are the fat sticks of wax (e.g. Crayola brand). Colored pencils are, well, colored pencils.
There are also various different ways to pronounce “crayon”; is that also true in Canada? For example I pronounce it with one syllable: “cran”, just like the beginning of “cranberry”. I get the feeling that’s not the majority pronunciation but it’s not exactly rare either (at least where I grew up).
Nope, coloured pencils are coloured wax encased in wood. Canadians emphasize that they are crayons in pencil shape; Americans emphasize that they are pencil-form but coloured.
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Same in UK for what they are ie sticks of wax (They can be thin for cheap ones that break)
In UK it is two syllables.
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Colored pencils
pencils of color :)
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One of the frequent debates with my wife lol... "But they are not crayons" does not help my case at all :-)
Well... they're generally wax or oil based like a crayon. Just wrapped in wood like a pencil rather than in paper. Like some sort of... pencil... crayon. >_>
That also blew my mind.
This is excellent stuff, I am going to be spending a lot of time on this.
My absolute favourite Canadianism is how, on wikipedia, the 401 (major highway that goes through Toronto) is "colloquially referred to as the four-oh-one" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ontario_Highway_401).
I'm genuinely curious what else it would be called. I live 5Kms away from it, and that's just "what it's called."
Four zero one? Or Four-Hundred and One?
I'm surprised "Four Oh [X]" is specifically a Canadianism. I would have expected it to manifest more broadly, given things like:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/409_(song)
I don't really think it is...in Washington State for instance the highway through the Seattle suburbs is called "the four-oh-five" (there's a Death Cab For Cutie song about this one).
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The Atlanta area code is definitely "four-oh-four" (and also the HTTP error)
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"Four-oh-one", is equally very British to me.
Even though I lived in the US for a decade, it still surprises me to learn that certain words are Canadianisms. I wonder how often people had no idea what I was talking aboot and just didn't speak up.
I strongly suspect most language / communication is clear from inference and context, and the exact words used aren't super important unless they are really out there or a different language entirely. It's the same with learning a foreign language (english in my case), you read books and posts on the internet but once you reach a certain base level, except for the really out there words, you can infer the meaning from context.
> you read books and posts on the internet but once you reach a certain base level, except for the really out there words, you can infer the meaning from context.
Yes. Unless you are like me, you think you are good at inferring from context, never lookup a word in the dictionary and think for a few years it means something while it actually means the opposite.
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"brown toast".
When ordering breakfast, such as eggs and toast. "You want white or brown toast?"
Since most toast is toasted to a brown tone, the question confuses Americans (west-coast, anyways).
It's really the question: white bread toast or whole-wheat bread toast?
Significant pronunciation differences are related, but not covered in this list.
For example, in Ontario (perhaps elsewhere in Canada) the word asphalt is pronounced like “ash fault” (ˈæʃfɑlt) as opposed to U.S. pronunciation like “ass fault.” (ˈæsfɔlt)
Also “pasta” is often ˈpæstə as opposed to ˈpɑstə in American English.
It's the same people mispronouncing "asphalt" with a "sh" that also use "nucular" energy to watch filums about athuletes in the artic. Some of them have even visited Warshington in the USA.
I don't think any of that is particularly Canadian though.
as someone who learned continental french, when i visited quebec i saw "melon d'eau" and i nearly lost it.
Meanwhile I went hiking up on Georgian bay and saw a bilingual sign for a local landmark
“Overhanging point
Point Overhanging”
That's the first gloss DeepL gives me for it. I've never before in my life heard "pastèque" and I doubt I'll remember it.
« Melon d'eau » ? For watermelon? I thought it was a joke, but well, Wikipedia mentions it: « La pastèque [...], parfois appelée melon d'eau » (https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Past%C3%A8que)
Everyone says « pastèque » in mainland France, where I've lived for over 40 years. I've never seen melon d'eau and I doubt anyone will understand it unless they know the English word.
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Quebec has it's own dictionary.
Office Québécois de la Langue Française (OQLF) promotes the french language and adapt new English words (whereas France typically integrate English words in their vocab).
The website Banque de dépannage linguistique (BDL) will have a lot of useful resources if you're interested! For instance, how to write a professional sounding email, names of official documents, invoice templates.
Highlights (good and bad):
* emails -> courriels (courrier + iels; mail + similar sounding syllable)*
* spam mail -> pourriels (pourri + iels; rotten + similar lexem as courriels)
* to spoil (as in spoilers) -> divulgâcher (divulguer + gâcher; to reveal + to ruin)
* to mansplain -> mecspliquer (mec + expliquer; man + to explain); This one is outrageous (and uncommon) because it's an homonym to "m'expliquer" (explain to me)
* to browse (the web) -> naviguer (as in "to navigate"; browser -> "navigateur")
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And Quebec has it’s own English. I spent a few years working in Montreal and soon learned about “passing the vacuum” and “closing the light”. There are so many bilingual folks that concepts and word orders flow back and forth. I had an interesting discussion with a bilingual anglophone about how in English elsewhere it’s called a “pacifier” and not a “souce”
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Also good luck planning any meals.
Dejeuner is breakfast in Quebec (lunch in France).
Diner is lunch in Quebec (evening meal in France).
déjeuner is a literal translation though. "Breaking fast" -> "dé-jeuner" (undo fasting).
French people typically say: - breakfast - petit-déjeuner (small breakfast) - lunch - déjeuner (breakfast) - diner - diner
Québecois people say: - breakfast - déjeuner - lunch - diner - diner - souper (eating soup; probably historical roots like "getting your big meal of the day" which is likely broth + potatoes)
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how about une boîte aux lettres?
given the englishisms in quebecois i was amused to see arrêt signs, because I'm pretty sure they say stop in france.
"upload" and "download" are interesting to me, which, in addition to the standard meaning, refer to the transfer of costs/jurisdiction to a higher and lower level of government respectively (between provincial and federal for instance)
That usage came about during the right-wing political swing of the 1990s, just as the phrase was becoming popular in connection with computers. Generally, costs and responsibilities were downloaded and revenues and control were uploaded.
Seems very thorough.
I don't see "transport" or "transport truck" though. I think It's an Ontario expression and it sounds kind of weird to me as an Albertan.
There must be so many tiny little differences like this. I remember when I lived in Toronto for a bit that the way they phrased whether you wanted a fast food order to eat at the restaurant or to take home was a little different from in Alberta. I know in Alberta, they would ask "to stay, or to go?" when ordering, but in Toronto I think it was "for here or to go?" which is how I've heard it phrased in the U.S. as well.
Totally minor difference, but it did feel jarring when I heard it differently from the first time as someone who grew up in Alberta.
I'm from Northern Ontario and me and my buddy went to a poutine place in Toronto. He asked for a poutine (naturally), and the worker didn't understand him. Southern Ontario says "poo-teen" /pu.tin/, but we say "p'tin" /pə.tɪn/ where I'm from. The original French way is [pu.t͡sɪn].
Never here that term used but I'm out west as well. We're all semi's, all the time.
"two-four" is there and can confirm that is more an eastern term as well. Never heard the term until I spent a year out in Ontario many years ago. Still hasn't really made its way to the west in all that time.
"Two-four" hasn't made its way out west because we call it a case of beer, and we already have "two-six", which is a 26oz bottle of liquor.
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It made some inroads in to BC in the 80s, mostly thanks to Bob and Doug McKenzie, but never really stuck.
Yeah it’s a flat
This classification seems extremely arbitrary. What purpose, exactly, does this classification serve? What insights about “Canadian as she is spoke” do we learn by using this?
sad they don't have "barmp" here, it's a newfoundland-ism (maybe east coast) that means "honk" of a car horn.
rick mercer: https://x.com/rickmercer/status/1491480449226579969
nova scotia: https://theshuffledemons1.bandcamp.com/track/barmp-your-horn
newfoundland: https://barmp.com/
also missing "heatbag", another newfoundland-ism. Meaning "being very conspicuous while doing something you shouldn't"
also missing "bunk", again Newfoundland, meaning "bad"
Incredible. I’ve never heard this. How is Newfoundland even a real place.
I have a sure fire method for detecting Canadians out in the wild. Pay close attention to how they pronounce the word “resources”. If you hear the letter Z in there then they are probably Canadian.
Most people who refer to "North Americans" collectively are Canadian. People in the US can forget Canada exists. People in Canada can't forget the US exist and so they need a term that includes both.
A good test would be "ice eyes garage sorry resources".
For me it would be something like /ʌɪs aɪz ɡəˈɹæʒ ˈsɔːɹi ˌɹiˈzɔɹsɪz/.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_Canadian_English
Your method wouldn't detect me. But you'd get me when I pronounced "Z" as "Zed".
Sadly my last name starts with a Z so after a decade of living in the US, I lost the "zed".
easy way is "figure it out" -- that seems to be common in Alberta to Montreal
strong emphasis on the out as "ooot" -- "figure it ooot, bud"
Also if they refer to a washroom instead of a bathroom or restroom.
Mine's listening for proe-ject instead of prah-ject.
Do you call program “prah-gram”? Do you call pro shops at the golf course “prah shops”? I will die on the proe-ject hill.
car door gets me
Discussions of healthcare facilities always get me in Canada. Grew up in the states, but born in Canada, when you have to use the emergency room it’s said that “they went to Hospital” as opposed to “they went to ‘the’ hospital”. No one up here ever seems to see the oddity of always referring to multiple different hospitals as the singular Hospital.
“They went to hospital” is a Britishism and definitely not something you’ll hear all the time in Canada.
Confirming britishism - both are in use here in Australia.
I usually hear "they went to emerg(e?)"
In America you do something similar with school. I went to school (not “the school”).
Also varies by region in the US for referring to highways. In Southern California it is usually "the I-5" while on the other coast you will hear a plain "I-95".
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I've never heard a fellow Canadian say "to hospital" over "to the hospital", in person, or on TV.
went to hospital is a British thing and ive never heard it in Canada
This is neat. It gave me a headache because my brain really wanted DCHP to be DHCP and it was confusing me... but the actual content is great.
Is there a similar dictionary for US midwesternisms, or Texisms, or really any region?
Here in PEI I'm sure every isolated community has thousands of sayings. The island as a whole I'm sure has many. Canada is probably like that small communities with slang none of us have ever heard. The ones that break out regionally still may not make it to other areas even after decades being in use.
On one of the recent seasons of Alone there was a guy from Labrador who had an solidly Irish accent, no hint of North America, right down to saying 'tree' for '3'. I can only imagine that's who the settlers were and the isolation meant the accent never changed.
I'll have to go through this with my family; we have a number of terms we use that we're never sure if they're Canadian, non-regional uncommon words, or just things our family say.
My grandpa called toonies "bearbucks", which isn't listed, but is in one of the quotes on the toonie entry. No listing for "reef" as in yanking on something, though I don't know if that's a Canadianism or not.
Never heard of bearbucks but can confirm that "reefing" is pulling hard on something.
You reef lines (ropes) on a boat.
You reef sails (by using lines):
* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reefing
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My favo(u)rite Type 1 has got to be “whippersnipper” (string trimmer).
I use that one, also "dishswisher"
Chesterfield, serviette?
Those are British words which Canada uses a lot of.
bunny hug (saskatchewan) will always be my favourite.
https://dchp.arts.ubc.ca/entries/bunny%20hug
How does "Rip" not contain an entry for the driving equivalent of mall rats' loitering?
"Out for a Rip?"
Love to see Skookum in there.
Same. As an American living on the Canadian border most of my life, I learned most of my Candaianisms from factory coworkers and AvE's youtube channel.
https://www.youtube.com/arduinoversusevil/videos
Is that in all of canada or just west coast
It's mostly West coast. Origin is Pacific West Coast pidgin (Chinook). Some people in Yukon and the prairies use it, but it becomes rarer the further you are from B.C.. It has become more widely used in recent years though.
I’m very upset to hear that
> While brown bread may have contained some molasses in the early 1900s, post-WWII it was usually made without. So Canadian brown bread is, unlike Boston-style bread, not sweet (see the 1909 quotation) and also distinct from Irish brown bread, though the latter may have inspired it.
Brown bread is sweet, and you are supposed to cut it up into little hockey pucks and toast it. It is the perfect shape when it comes out of the can.
That's a weird (or perhaps regional) definition. Brown bread I've had is always molasses sweetened. Source: ontario and provinces east.
The boston canned brown bread i always assumed was a touristy thing, not something regularly consumed.
Lived in BC, SK, and ON. I'm far enough east that I regularly hit up both Ottawa and Montreal.
In my experience "brown bread" is a synonym for whole wheat bread. If you go order a sandwich and they ask what bread you want it on and you say "brown", you're getting whole wheat (or maybe 60% whole wheat... just not white).
I'd be very confused if I ever got this molasses-sweetened bread everyone is talking about.
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Massachusetts native, we regularly are brown bread from a can as a kid. Not a touristy thing.
My family were definitely not tourists, but come to think of it I don’t recall seeing the canned stuff in my friends’ houses. So maybe we were just locals who fell for a prank that was being played on the tourists, or something.
Can? Where in Canada is this canned brown bread at?
Check the foreign foods section of your local supermarket. Probably right beside those chocolate sprinkles intended for making sandwiches.
It isn’t, apparently, that’s what I’m upset about. Canada and New England are supposed go way back, longer than the countries. But apparently we didn’t share our bread technology advances.
I've had it. You're really not missing out. I always assumed it was a depression era thing (canned bread!).
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We call it spoon bread in the east. True spoon bread is baked in an old tin can. Not sweet.
title? this is a full Dictionary of Canadianisms, words included according to a six facet typology. i.e. the typology is not the main story.
Type 1 – Origin: a form and its meaning were created in what is now Canada
Type 2 – Preservation: a form or meaning that was once widespread in many Englishes, but is now preserved in Canadian English in the North American context or beyond; sometimes called “retention”
Type 3 – Semantic Change: forms that have undergone semantic change in Canadian English
Type 4 – Culturally Significant: forms or meanings that have been enshrined in the Canadian psyche and are widely seen as part of Canadian identity
Type 5 – Frequency: forms or meanings that are Canadian by virtue of frequency
Type 6 – Memorial: forms or meanings now widely considered to be pejorative
Non-Canadian: forms or meanings once thought to be Canadian for which evidence is lacking
I'm surprised that no one commented on the waste of taxpayer dollars that such a compilation must be.
Growing up in Toronto during the 70s, I remember several expressions I've rarely, if ever, heard elsewhere.
"No guff"--meaning something like "no, really?" in a sarcastic sense
"My foot"--maybe something similar to "my ass!"
And later, when living in Montreal, I remember several expressions that were basically direct translations from the French
"Me, I..."--from the French "Moi, je..."
"In place of"--instead of "instead of"
"In place of" sounds like a direct translation of "En lieu"
"wet coast"
Slang for BC. It's a joke, because (coastal) BC is mostly wet. And BC is the westernmost province.
I always loved the term "keener" growing up and was disappointed that it wasn't a term of use down here in the States. It's essentially the same thing as a "brown-noser" but a little less graphic.
A keener is an ardent enthusiast. A brown-noser (aka a browner) is a sycophant. Not the same thing at all.
Also, a brown-noser should not be confused with a blue-noser.
The distinction between an ardent enthusiast and a sycophant was lost on many I encountered using the term.
A keener is also a bit of a try-hard.
A little less derogatory, in my estimation.
Growing up in downtown Toronto in the 90s we always played sue sum see, living in AB I just get confused looks now.
(rock paper scissors)
I want to see Ausralian version.
I'm pleased to see some of the Chinook jargon is there.
Skookum as frig!
Actually they should just watch a few AvE videos, he’s a goldmine for old Canadian lingo.
I still use "saltchuck" when I'm distracted. Confuses the heck out of Californians.
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Take off, eh!
It's missing.
No mention of bunnyhugs
Disappointed there's no ginch/gonch/gotch/gitch: https://www.reddit.com/r/canada/comments/nincf2/gotchies_got.... Closest is gotchies for a wedgie. How can we contribute?
And related, "gooch", as both a noun and a verb.
I wish there was a random button
Well, why not include the word "Canadian", which significantly predates the country, as the prime example?
It's derived from Iroquois Nation words and used by French settlers to refer to Indigenous people. The word "Canada" was used by explorer Jacques Cartier to refer to the city now called "Québec". It broadly refered to the territory of a specific Indigenous tribe. (could be derogatory, but seemingly accurate / matter-of-fact)
After the British invasion, the British start using "Canadian" to describe both First Nations and French settlers (derogatory, "non-British)
Over time, "Canadian" generally refers to habitants of Canada.
Related: the hockey team "Les Canadiens" is from Montréal in the province of Québec in Canada. It's the oldest hockey team (1909, pre-NHL). The name is a reappropriation of the word Canadian at a time where it was used derogatively against "French-Canadians" (term that didn't exist at the time). Their chant "go, habs, go" refers to the "habitants", i.e., French settlers.
Related: "province" originates from latin used by Romans to described conquered territory. This is the term founders of Canada in 1867 decided to use instead of "state"
For anyone interested in Canadian history, always check-out the French version of a wikipedia page (and translate it). English pages have a lot of hand-waving and start history with their conquest. Also, ChatGPT makes outrageous historical mistakes all the time, such as suggesting that French-Canadians were a minority group in the 19th century
edit: format, typos
> Related: "province" originates from latin used by Romans to described conquered territory. This is the term founders of Canada in 1867 decided to use instead of "state"
According to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Province this is a false etymology:
> In fact, the word province is an ancient term from public law, which means: "office belonging to a magistrate".
"State" is an overloaded term. In British English it usually refers to the top level political entity, e.g. "head of state" unless specifically talking about the US (except for the Secretary of State...)
I wonder if the word choice was influenced by the US civil war ending only a couple of years previously and wanting to make it unambiguous where the centre of power lay.
From the link you shared:
> The English word province is attested since about 1330 and derives from the 13th-century Old French province, which itself comes from the Latin word provincia, which referred to the sphere of authority of a magistrate, in particular, to a foreign territory.
The fact that British authorities picked a French word that the conquered would understand is significant.
> I wonder if the word choice was influenced by the US civil war ending only a couple of years previously
Interesting interpretation! I would agree given Canadians were given the opportunity to ally with the 13 colonies at the time (but didn't). British loyalists also fled the United States. "Province" made allegiance to the crown oversea clear
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> For anyone interested in Canadian history, always check-out the French version of a wikipedia page
In reading about Canadian history this entire comment strikes me as very "East" biased? (Because I'm reading a strong implication that the French are the true holders of the history and the English just showed up later. Which may very well be true)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Western_alienation
> I'm reading a strong implication that the French are the true holders of the history
I interpreted this more as "don't forget to check out the French-language Wikipedia articles too, since they might have contents that are absent from the English-language Wikipedia articles." This would likely be the case for anything concerning Québécois or Acadien culture, or the early settlements by the French; but not likely for most things west of Ottawa (aside from some pockets like Grande Prairie, Alberta or Saint Boniface, Manitoba).
It seems everyone outside of Ontario feels some kind of alienation or other. The west, as you mentioned, but also the maritimes, and especially the Québécois.
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and it was originally Canadiens, not Canadians :)
>> Their chant "go, habs, go" refers to the "habitants"
The province of Quebec has very strong language laws intended to protect the French language. Heavy-handed? You be the judge. City buses in Montreal were recently "pressured" to stop displaying the chant (one of the most Quebecois things you can say to promote your pride) because it's English. Instead they were told to use the super-common-rolls-off-the-tongue-and-way-better "Allez! Canadiens Allez!"
edit: this was later reviewed because of public pressure about just how stupid it is and now "go" is ok. But the language police still say "go" is an Anglicism and public bodies are obligated to use "exemplary" French, so you can see some of that snooty OG France perseveres - I guess the system works!
Be sure to also check out how francophone Quebecois have been very effective at revenge - driving out anglophones and allophones from Quebec through vindictive attacks against their language, culture, schooling and employment. It's sad, but I am ultimately glad I will be the last generation of my family born in Quebec. Au revoir and good riddance.
To put things into perspectives, let’s remember that anglophones in Québec, which represent about 10% of the population, have 3 universities, one of which is McGill, and have there theaters and artists, newspapers and tv shows. Many live in Montréal all there life without knowing a word of French, since it is possible to find almost everywhere someone that speaks English. By constrast, it is less and less easy to live only in French in Montréal, since it is not always possible to find someone that speaks French.
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The original post was focused on history and language, and I added some political spice. Not discussing the politics of language (as in OP) is a bit outrageous.
You're right that French-Canadians are not guilt-free from discrimination et al. Québec only ever had French as an official language, but the last decades we've seen a series of dubious policies