Are you feeling a little 'washed out' or 'fed up'? The World War I may have something to do with it! The conflict which ended almost a century ago is responsible for hundreds of words and phrases being used on Monday in the English language, according to a new study.
Terms believed to have become common parlance because of the war include 'cushy', 'snapshot', 'bloke', 'wash out', 'binge drink' and 'pushing up daisies', the 'Daily Mail' reported.
It is claimed that many of the phrases had previously been used by just one geographical region or social class before the war - until hundreds of thousands of British men were forced to mix with one another in the trenches. Historians Peter Doyle and Julian Walker have analysed thousands of documents from the period and after studying letters from the front, newspapers and diaries, they have traced the striking development of the English language between 1914 and 1918. The study found that the war brought military slang into the mainstream, imported French and German words to English and saw words from local dialects become part of national conversation.
‘The war was a melting pot of classes and nationalities, with people thrown together under conditions of stress. It was a very creative time for language. Soldiers have always had a genius for slang and coming up with terms,’ Walker, who works at the British Library, said. ‘This was a citizen army - and also the first really literate army - and at the end of the war, those that survived took their new terms back to the general population,’ Walker added.
The historians co-authored the book 'Trench Talk: Words of the First World War' and revealed that many of the words were created by soldiers to describe their unfamiliar surroundings.
Terms believed to have become common parlance because of the war include 'cushy', 'snapshot', 'bloke', 'wash out', 'binge drink' and 'pushing up daisies', the 'Daily Mail' reported.
It is claimed that many of the phrases had previously been used by just one geographical region or social class before the war - until hundreds of thousands of British men were forced to mix with one another in the trenches. Historians Peter Doyle and Julian Walker have analysed thousands of documents from the period and after studying letters from the front, newspapers and diaries, they have traced the striking development of the English language between 1914 and 1918. The study found that the war brought military slang into the mainstream, imported French and German words to English and saw words from local dialects become part of national conversation.
‘The war was a melting pot of classes and nationalities, with people thrown together under conditions of stress. It was a very creative time for language. Soldiers have always had a genius for slang and coming up with terms,’ Walker, who works at the British Library, said. ‘This was a citizen army - and also the first really literate army - and at the end of the war, those that survived took their new terms back to the general population,’ Walker added.
The historians co-authored the book 'Trench Talk: Words of the First World War' and revealed that many of the words were created by soldiers to describe their unfamiliar surroundings.