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Il Bay-Watch: English Words in Foreign Context
I recently came across a reference in an English sentence written by an Italian to a "bay-watch," where she meant to say "lifeguard." I asked my co-workers if they'd ever heard of a lifeguard being referred to in English as a "bay-watch," and no one had ever heard it used in such a way. We decided that this must be a term adopted in Italian from the internationally successful David Hasselhof/Pamela Anderson lifeguarding show, and used as a slang term to mean "lifeguard." Someone else brought up the fact that the French use "la pom-pom girl" to mean "cheerleader." I went searching for more examples, and found that in Austria, where "das Oldtimer" is an antique car and "das Handy" is a cell phone, the words "dressman, photoshooting, showmaster, beamer, popper, twen and sunnyboy" are all used to a different end than they might be in English, if they're ever used in English at all. Know of any other examples of an English phrase used to mean something different in a foreign language? E-mail us: watchyourlanguage@randomhouse.com (SUZANNE) Tags: French, German, Italian, loanwords, slang
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