Re: Numpties and bennies

> > I guess this demonstrates the power of the internet over the BNC as 
> > a corpus.....

For rare events, events post-1994, and events beyond British English, 
perhaps...
There's still the problem of reliability...

At 12:21 06/12/2006, Diana Maynard wrote:
> Hi Harry
>
> My first thought was that it either meant "going on a bender" ie 
> going out and getting drunk, or having a big strop. The latter is 
> confirmed by good old Wikipedia:
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benny_(slang)
>
> /In England, the term is used as a pejorative slang term to describe 
> anyone of apparent mental slowness, especially by children (derived 
> from the character of the same name, played by Paul Henry 
> <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Henry_%28actor%29> in the soap 
> opera <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soap_opera> //Crossroads 
> <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crossroads_%28TV_series%29>). It is 
> also used to describe a person in a fit of rage or having a tantrum 
> as in "He's having a benny"./
>
> A google search for "having a benny" reveals this and many similar examples.
>
> The urban dictionary also reveals a number of other meanings
>
> http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=benny
>
> I guess this demonstrates the power of the internet over the BNC as 
> a corpus.....
>
> Incidentally, there's no wikipedia entry for "numpty".
> I must admit I would consider numpty to be on the fringe of the 
> nonPC terms, but then you can say the same about pretty much any of 
> its synonyms......
>
> Diana
>
>
> Harold Somers wrote:
> > A colleague has just emailed me suggesting that the word "numpty" has
> > become non-PC because of its association with Downs syndrome. I've never
> > made that association ... Has anyone else?
> >
> > A trawl of the standard "references" suggests that numpty is a Scottish
> > slang word (meaning 'idiot' or 'incompetent person') and is being
> > considered fro inclusion in the next edition of the OED; but
> > interestingly its total absence from the BNC suggests either that it has
> > only recently entered the language, and/or that Scottish English is
> > under-represented in the BNC.
> > Would I be right in thinking that the word is entirely unknown in AmE?
> >
> > On a similar theme, I was thinking about the word "benny", a slang term
> > which had a brief life in BrE. With the same meaning as numpty, its
> > etymology is a character in a soap (Crossroads I think) called Benny who
> > was "intellectually challenged". I seem to remember a news article
> > during the Falklands War in which soldiers were being admonished because
> > their slang word for Falkland Islanders was "bennies".
> >
> > "A benny" occurs twice in the BNC, both times in the same source (KCE -
> > a conversation recorded by `Helena' (PS0EB)) as follows:
> >
> > KCE 7007 so she had a bit of a benny it was KCE 7260 I hadn't had a 
> > benny for a few days actually
> > Helena also talks about "bennies":
> > KCE 7258 Not that I ever have major bennies or anything
> >
> > I'm guessing that here she means a "benzedrine" tablet, though that
> > interpretation doesn't really fit the syntax (a bit of a benny, major
> > bennies). Anyone any idea what a benny is in this context? (Perhaps the
> > surrounding text can help - what is the topic of the conversation?).
> >
> > There's one other occurrence of "bennies" in the BNC, from "Skinhead" by
> > Nick Knight, the meaning of which I think is "Ben Sherman shirts"
> > ARP 213 Most skinhead girls, sometimes called rennes, would wear
> > bennies, button-fly red tags, white socks and penny loafers or monkey
> > boots.
> >
> >
> > Harold Somers

Ramesh Krishnamurthy

Lecturer in English Studies, School of Languages and Social Sciences, 
Aston University, Birmingham B4 7ET, UK
[Room NX08, North Wing of Main Building] ; Tel: +44 (0)121-204-3812 ; 
Fax: +44 (0)121-204-3766
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