what's a git?

[Northern Piper]

can any of you Brits tell me, what's a git?

in "4 weddings and a funeral," Hugh Grant's late for lunch with his deaf brother, and the brother greets him by calling him a git, in sign language.

2 questions:

what is it?

where, on the socially inacceptable scale, does this fall? quaint euphemism? makes Aunt Fran blush? gets you thumped if you use it about someone in a pub?

[tomndebb]

I figured it meant a fool based on hearing "you silly git" hurled about by a Scot I knew.

The OED claims that it is a worthless person. Interestingly, the oldest cite for this usage is 1946. I had the idea it was quite a bit older.

I would guess that it would be most natural coming from a farmer or a machinist. Nothing to make Aunt Gertie blush, but not what you would generally say in front of the vicar.

I would rate it at about a "twit" level for societal purposes. It is more dismissive than pejorative.

------------------
Tom~

[Ukulele Ike]

"Git - (n) stupid person."

-- Jann Turner-Lord; BOB'S YOUR UNCLE: A DICTIONARY OF BRITISH SLANG FOR MYSTERY FANS, Fithian Press, Santa Barbara, 1992.

I have GOT to start cleaning out these bookshelves.

------------------
Uke

[Doctor Jackson]

Would the French usage be "le git"?

------------------
The overwhelming majority of people have more than the average (mean) number of legs. -- E. Grebenik

[ChiefScott]

Doc, la git. Feminine noun!

Ike, what's the deal with "Bob's your uncle"? A Brit slang phrase? Help, "shagging" has about run it's course!

[ruadh]

What's a "knees-up" ?

------------------
Never regret what seemed like a good idea at the time.

[glee]

A 'knees-up' could be an entertaining party, or a lively night out at the pub (= drinking establishment). Dancing would usually be involved (that could be the derivation, because there is a jolly song from the traditional East End of London called 'Knees-up Mother Brown').

I think 'git' is ruder than 'twit', but 'bastard' is ruder than both. You could put stupid in front of all 3, but f*ck*ng only goes with 'bastard'.

What would you understand by 'Nice set of wheels, John'?

[Ukulele Ike]

Good thing glee came through. There's nothing in the book between "knackered" and "knickers."

Now I'll just stand back here, well out of the way, and let everyone have fly at the above comment.

------------------
Uke

[mr john]

Whut's all this uhbayuout 'git' bein' some sort uv Ainglish word? Shoot yall is jist plain nuts.Soon's ah git me sumthin ta knock sum sense inta yore haids ah'll be raht back.

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"............"-Marx

[glee]

Ukulele Ike....I think 'knee-trembler' comes between 'knackered' and 'knickers'...

[Markxxx]

Usually it's prefaced by the phrase
"Sniveling little rat faced"

[voguevixen]

or in the title of the song "Randy Scouse..." (Monkees)

[Northern Piper]

I understood that "Bob's your uncle" dated back to the time of Prime Minister Robert Peel, who was famous for finding government jobs for nephews, cousins and friends of friends. If someone of little ability landed a cushy job, the explanation was "Bob's his uncle." (Sort of like FOB under the current U.S. administration, although that seems to get you more into the Lincoln Bedroom.)

[Ukulele Ike]

Chief,

"Bob's your uncle" is an exclamation meaning, roughly, "there you have it."

"I needed to know how I could get a free pass to the electric chair execution. I reached for my copy of Cecil's first book, and, Bob's your uncle, I had my answer!"

------------------
Uke

[glee]

'Scouse' means someone from Liverpool.
Randy, on this side of the pond, means someone with a voracious sexual appetite. This caused some confusion when my charming, polite cousin came over from Canada and said to all my female relatives 'Hi, I'm Randy'...

[Intriguing Question Mark]

It means idiot, Randy Scouse Git is Horney Liverpudlian idiot. (Or Alternate Title :-)

[Sue Duhnym]

Originally posted by glee
What would you understand by 'Nice set of wheels, John'?

Nice car?

My hubby always says (pertaining to bottom heavy women), "She's got wide wheels."

[Biggirl]

Speaking of English idioms, what does "snap!" mean after someone asks a question?

[lee]

Several years ago when I reseached the meaning after first watching Red Dwarf I found that a git is the son of a prostitute, an illegitimate child.

[Duke]

I've heard people say "snap" here; I think it's just a replacement word for "damn it, I should know the answer but I don't."

I have heard people saying "f---ing git," but never "f---ing twit."

My favourite cross-Atlantic misunderstanding: When I was at Leeds Uni, I knew a co-ed from South Carolina, where "to shag" means to dance. Her first night out at the bop, she innocently asked a bloke "Do you wanna shag?" His jaw hit the floor...

[DVous Means]

Originally posted by Biggirl
Speaking of English idioms, what does "snap!" mean after someone asks a question?

Don't you remember the children's card game of Snap? When two cards are the same you go "Snap!"

Hence, "Snap" is the response when someone asks the same question another person was also going to ask, or had the answer to.

PS If you want to pick up a working knowledge of East-end slang, just get addicted to British TV shows like The Bill.

[TomH]

Originally posted by tomndebb:
The OED claims that it is a worthless person. Interestingly, the oldest cite for this usage is 1946. I had the idea it was quite a bit older.

That's because git is a more recent variant of get. The older pronunciation is still the standard in the North of England.

The earliest example of get in the OED is 1706. From the examples it gives, it seems it meant "bastard" until about the 1940s, when it appears to have become a more generalised insult. FWIW, I think it's more insulting that "twit", but less so than "bastard", arsehole or "wanker".

I've rarely heard it used without a prefatory adjective: stupid, daft, mardy, posh, southern, etc. I suspect it's something to do with the fact that it sounds a bit weak as a monosyllable.

Originally posted by DVous Means
If you want to pick up a working knowledge of East-end slang, just get addicted to British TV shows like The Bill.

[tiresome pedantry]Except The Bill is set in South London, not the East End.[/tiresome pedantry]

[thinksnow]

quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I suspect it's something to do with the fact that it sounds a bit weak as a monosyllable.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

So how do you explain them calling someone a tit? As in the excamatory: "You tit!"

[TwistofFate]

Git = Rimmer, from Red Dwarf.

Randy Little Git= Marv Albert

Smug little Git= Regis Philbin

hope that helps.

[thinksnow]

I love gits. Especially cheese gits. Regular gits with butter don't do much for me, but they seem to be all the rage here in the South (they've replaced hash-browns, if you can believe that!)

[Girlbysea]

In the south, I think it means, Please leave the room!!!

[TomH]

Not sure, thinksnow. I think "tit" is more likely to be used in a jocular way than "git".

[QuickSilver]

Git, tit, twit, bastard, pillick, cloth eared bint.... you can have 'em all....

My all time favourite has to be - Berk!

As in: 'Ez a right berk, ain'e!

[casdave]

To me a git or get is someone who is wilfully stupid and not open to logic.
Like the little uniform officials who are also described as "jobsworths"
From the oft heard mini-hitlers who say "I can't let you do the it's more than me job is worth"

A tit can be anyone who has has rush of blood to the head and does something silly without thinking.Some folk are like this all the time but often it is used as self criticism like when you know you are going to hurt yourself doing something stupid and still do it anyway.

Few more for you,

Pratt
Knobhound
Tosser
Wanker
Pillock

[TomH]

I've not heard "knobhound" before, casdave. Is that local to you, or do I just lead an incredibly sheltered life?

[Intriguing Question Mark]

How bout when the Beatles say "and curse Sir Walter Raleigh / He was such a stupid git" in "I'm so tired" on the white album? I dont understand that.

[Fretful Porpentine]

IQM -- It makes a lot more sense if you quote it in context:

I'm so tired, I'm feeling so upset
Although I'm so tired I'll have another cigarette
And curse Sir Walter Raleigh
He was such a stupid git.

Raleigh, of course, introduced the English to the vice of tobacco smoking.

[TomH]

IQM, The line before the one you quoted gives it away:

Although I'm so tired I'll have another cigarette
And curse Sir Walter Raleigh
He was such a stupid get.*

Raleigh was credited (wrongly, I believe) with introducing tobacco to England from the New World.

*The Beatles, being Northerners, rhyme get with cigarette, rather than fit, as a Southerner would do.

[TomH]

But while we're on the subject...

The subject of Raleigh, potatoes and tobacco is covered in this month's Fortean Times. According to the article, the first report of a person smoking in England is in 1556 (a sailor in Bristol), and one of Columbus's sailors was arrested in Barcelona for smoking in the street in 1498. Raleigh was not born until 1552.

[kellibelli]

They used 'git' alot in Harry Potter - so it must be a word thats ok in polite company.

I like 'wanker' & 'arsehole' though. very expressive!

[Northern Piper]

okay, this is a "personal best" for one of my old threads being revived - over a year later.

nothing ever dies on SDMB, it seems.

[Intriguing Question Mark]

I didnt know it was old, I'm just new and looking for something interesting to talk about :-)

[Northern Piper]

hey, no probs - but were you searching for the word "git," or reading all the old threads, or what? how'd you come across it?

[casdave]

TomH

I'd no idea that 'knobhound' might be purely regional as it gets used round Castleford area so often, there are plenty of reasons it seems to do so.
I'm surprised that you are not familiar,after all, Sheffield is not that for away so this sounds very local to me.

[Crusoe]

I've certainly never heard it either, casdave, but then I am a soft southern lad.

[Andy]

Never heard it either, which is curious, becauses I'm definitely not a southern-shandy-drinking-dress-wearing-drinks-a-half-with-one-finger-sticking out-southern-jessie either.

[Intriguing Question Mark]

Actually I searched for the monkees, because I started writing when a friend sent me a link to the Favorite Monkee post and I decided to see what else people were saying about them and this came up in the list.

[Zenster]

Question Mark, Porpentine, TomH... All of you have missed the gist of the Beatles line about Sir Walter Raleigh. One of Sir Walter's most famous acts was to place his cape in the mud so that Queen Elizabeth could walk across it. Samuel Clemens, the American bard, once referred to men discovering chivalry as; "Getting a case of the Sir Walter Raleighs". In the song the theme is about a frustrated lover and how he wishes he could be with his girl. Well, it's not much of a leap to think that he might wish to go after her cave man style, but is prevented from doing so by the more modern notions of chivalric conduct and all that. Ergo the cursing of Sir Walter Raleigh for reintroducing the notion of chivalry from the days of the Knights Templar and The Crusades. Sheesh, like that wasn't obvious!!!