English people have many colloquial phrases and expressions, that are very commonly used in day to day speech. Being able to use and understand English expressions correctly is integral to becoming a competent English speaker. Don’t neglect the common terms that you’ll hear everyday when interacting with people from England. Things like;
- Someone might say cheers, when they have a drink and clink their glasses together. But often cheers is interchanged with thanks or thank you.
- Meaning something like, are you all right? Or, how are you? This phrase can also be a response to itself. As in; “Alright mate?”, “Alright?”.
- Mate is a friendly term of endearment that can be used to address people.
- Just a more casual pronunciation of ‘no’. Very informal and basically slang.
- Blasphemous exclamation. Might be offensive to a very few people of religious inclination, but is often used to express surprise or stress.
- Sweet is formally the opposite of sour and synonymous with flavour. But generally, sweet is anything positive. The English lesson was sweet, for example. Or as a response to something you find pleasing.
- Oi can be used in different ways. If used to get someones attention most people consider it quite rude, so don’t yell it at someone unless its an emergency or something. Otherwise it’s used in response to something that slightly goes against your favour. Like if someone stole one of your biscuits.
Damn / Damn it
- In olden days this would have been used against a very serious situation. Like if your crops had died before the summer harvest. Now it’s a little more common and less dramatic. You might say damn if you tripped or dropped something.
So there are some phrases you may well hear in day to day interactions with English people.
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