In anticipation of upcoming fieldwork in Quebec, my advisor instructed me to watch "Strange Brew." A spoof of life in Canada, the movie is centered on a pair of brothers (played by Rick Moranis and Dave Thomas) who subsist on beer and jelly donuts. Not too shabby for a couple hosers, eh? But instead of critiquing the mediocre movie, let's explore the dialect of that Great White North.
Moranis's and Thomas's characters define the word hoser as "what you call your brother when your mother is in the room"--an all-purpose mild insult. Originally used to describe the poor Canadian prairie farmers of the 1930s who siphoned gasoline from the tractors of neighbors, the term hoser is a condensation of the word "hosehead." The word still carries some socioeconomic baggage. For example, if you're a big hoser, one of those flannel shirts hanging in the closet might be a dinner jacket. The expression also had significance in the pre-Zamboni world--losing ice hockey teams had to hose off the ice.
Another endemic Canadianism is that insignificant chortle dangling at the end of a stereotypical Canuck sentence pronounced "eh." Minnesotans have evolved to the point where a gentle lilt replaces the heavy-handed eh, but both affects are commonly rhetorical in nature, a sign of self-concurrence. The Canadian Oxford Dictionary defines eh as "ascertaining the comprehension, continued interest, agreement, etc., of the person or persons addressed." Unfortunately, the Quebecois aren't big eh enthusiasts. Maybe I'll pretend to be from Manitoba.
Another linguistic experiment I might run will involve liberal use of the the word tabernacle, in a thick French-Canadian accent, of course. A variety of religious words have taken on profane meanings in Quebec, with tabernacle being one of the more potent expressions. I'll start mild, possibly commenting "d'la bouffe en tabernacle," on how there is a lot of food. But I'm not even going to try joking about how Mozusse broke les tabernacles after drinking a little too much from la câlice. That'll get me hosed.
Moranis's and Thomas's characters define the word hoser as "what you call your brother when your mother is in the room"--an all-purpose mild insult. Originally used to describe the poor Canadian prairie farmers of the 1930s who siphoned gasoline from the tractors of neighbors, the term hoser is a condensation of the word "hosehead." The word still carries some socioeconomic baggage. For example, if you're a big hoser, one of those flannel shirts hanging in the closet might be a dinner jacket. The expression also had significance in the pre-Zamboni world--losing ice hockey teams had to hose off the ice.
Another endemic Canadianism is that insignificant chortle dangling at the end of a stereotypical Canuck sentence pronounced "eh." Minnesotans have evolved to the point where a gentle lilt replaces the heavy-handed eh, but both affects are commonly rhetorical in nature, a sign of self-concurrence. The Canadian Oxford Dictionary defines eh as "ascertaining the comprehension, continued interest, agreement, etc., of the person or persons addressed." Unfortunately, the Quebecois aren't big eh enthusiasts. Maybe I'll pretend to be from Manitoba.
Another linguistic experiment I might run will involve liberal use of the the word tabernacle, in a thick French-Canadian accent, of course. A variety of religious words have taken on profane meanings in Quebec, with tabernacle being one of the more potent expressions. I'll start mild, possibly commenting "d'la bouffe en tabernacle," on how there is a lot of food. But I'm not even going to try joking about how Mozusse broke les tabernacles after drinking a little too much from la câlice. That'll get me hosed.
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