Discussion Groups / British English / September 2004

Anyone else bemused by the lyrics of "Gravity" by Embrace (actually
penned by Chris Martin of Coldplay), which is getting a lot of airplay
at the moment?
Lots of "you and me" to start with.  Fine.

Which is gramatically correct?
"I feel badly for the family."
"I feel bad for the family."
I am an Anglo-Argentine who immigrated to the US many years ago. My memory is

I'm no Professor 'Iggens, but I have a lifelong interest in, and sensitivity
for local dialect pronunciations.  I'm particularly fascinated with the
persistence of Elizabethan dialectic pronunciations that have been
documented in various backwater areas of the eastern United States. ...

Really! I've just heard Sarah Montague of the Today programme say that
she'd "just snuck into the main hall" of the LibDem conference.

I'm reading a text by Ron White about politeness in international
communication (i.e. in international English). He mentions the phrase
"going bald on record" as an example of behaviour in relation with
positive politeness.

Thanks so much for the quick responses.
I'd appreciate comments on the following.
"to plead guilty with full credit"
1.  Is this phrase immediately recognizable to an

I'm translating (from Dutch) a magazine article about an artist, based
on an interview. Here's an example:
[lots of text]
... Why does Von Woffelen regularly resort to using photographs from her

This is from a document intended for the general UK
public.
"two firms pleaded guilty with full credit"
<-- does this mean that the firms pleaded guilty

I 've found this sentence in a translation. And understand all the words but
I cannot understand its meaning :
"In prison I'm worn out with care"
worn out is, I suppose, "worn-out", which means "exhausted".

a man, believed to be a gypsy, called me a cory today. From what followed i
know it is insulting.
Actually, for precision, he _addressed_ me as cory. As in 'Oi Cory'. Don't
know if that is the correct spelling.

Can you be lost if you don't know where you're going?

As far as I know, you usually can't leave out "got" after "have" in
negative and interrogative sentences. Grammars say that you may sound very
formal if you leave out "got" in this sort of sentences but, for some
reason, they supply the same one example: "Have you an

"Critical mass", how to translate this? the whole sentence is below:
Unfortunately, the project never
gained critical mass, so it was deemed best to close it