Dublinese: Know What I Mean?

The English say that Dubliners speak the best English in the world. Filmmaker Jim Sheridan insists they don’t, but that they do speak the most entertaining English. Whether it’s naming a piece of public sculpture (The Spike in the Dyke, the Floozie in the Jacuzzi) or commenting on the hardness of life (living on the skin of a rasher), it must be noted that Dubliner’s have a flair for waxing lyrical. So, in order to fully appreciate them, it is necessary to learn their language. Through centuries of settlement, conquest and change, the everyday language of Dublin has acquired its own accent, vocabulary and idiom. This study explores Dublinese highlighting the vowel play (kyar for car, muriels for murals), rhyming slang (Wolfe Tone for phone), turns of phrase (‘I’ll put manners on him!’) and all manner of verbal expressions that make up this language. This guided tour refers to historical sources and everyday usage commenting on subjects as varied as colloquial place names (‘The Morgue’ - The Templeogue Inn), transport (Dart, Doort or Daart?), animals (the dead zoo - the Natural History Museum) and day-to-day living. Literary figures like Joyce, Sheridan, Swift and Roddy Doyle lend their verbal dexterity to the dialogue, as well as Joe and Josephine Soap and their co-citizens. All have enriched the idiom of a city which, to coin a blasphemy, is in essence, the word-made flesh. Know What I Mean? includes chapters on: an introduction to Dublinese; everyday usage on the streets; playing with words; effing and blinding and contemporary culture; industry, commerce and a few scoops; and, characters from stage and the street and changes due to Dublin’s multi-culturalism.