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It would be “pulling birds” in BrE with no preposition. Verb objects (and transitive/intransitive) are another difference between the dialects. In AmE you can

It would be “pulling birds” in BrE with no preposition. Verb objects (and transitive/intransitive) are another difference between the dialects. In AmE you can say “I wrote Grandma yesterday”; in BrE that would be “I wrote to Grandma yesterday”. A lot of AmE usage is becoming commonplace in Britain thanks to the Internet, though. You’ll now see commercials in Britain that implore you to “Search ‘Fred Insurance’ for full details”. Five years ago that would have been “Search _for_ ‘Fred Insurance’”.

bitwize 5y ago
> A lot of AmE usage is becoming commonplace in Britain thanks to the Internet, though. My girlfriend and I were watching the Harry Potter movie cast reunion, and I noticed how the younger cast members let a lot of Valley-Girl-isms slip into their speech. "So I was like" (introducing a quotation), and "totally" (meaning very, extremely), and so forth. Quite different from how I expect a British person to talk. The younger generation of Brits seem to have fully embraced what Stephen Fry called "Buffy talk, Sabrina the Teenage Witch talk" and "the language of the Sunny Delight generation": https://youtu.be/xs5fH1ECzWc https://youtu.be/xs5fH1ECzWc (Note that Fry was specifically addressing the related phenomenon of AQI, a.k.a. "uptalk", but he diverts into things like "I was like" to introduce a quotation.)
- jgwil2 5y ago
  As actors, they've probably all spent a lot of time in Southern California or working with people from there, so it shouldn't be surprising that they would pick up some of the speech patterns.
- housecarpenter 5y ago
  I think these features are more general young-isms, not really regional. Older Americans don't use them either, right?
  - bitwize 5y ago
    They were regional (localized to the USA and possibly Canada) until recently.
selimthegrim 5y ago
‘Agree’ is the other way around, more often than not takes a preposition after in AmE as opposed to BrE
WalterBright 5y ago
I remember clearly it was "pulling FOR birds". I wonder why the difference. Perhaps it was because my anecdote took place in the 80's. Language does shift over time.
- jjgreen 5y ago
  Odd, since the pulling would be the act of chatting-up-and-convincing-someone-to-sleep-with-you, so "pulling a bird", "pulling some birds", "out on the pull", etc. Much less common than it used to be in any case.
CRConrad 5y ago
> You’ll now see commercials in Britain that implore you to “Search ‘Fred Insurance’ for full details”. Five years ago that would have been “Search _for_ ‘Fred Insurance’”. But in many forms of commercials it's advantageous to have a short text: you can use a bigger font while paying for the same size advertisement / poster / pop-up window. So maybe that was more a "shortism" than an Americanism.

bitwize 5y ago

> A lot of AmE usage is becoming commonplace in Britain thanks to the Internet, though. My girlfriend and I were watching the Harry Potter movie cast reunion, and I noticed how the younger cast members let a lot of Valley-Girl-isms slip into their speech. "So I was like" (introducing a quotation), and "totally" (meaning very, extremely), and so forth. Quite different from how I expect a British person to talk. The younger generation of Brits seem to have fully embraced what Stephen Fry called "Buffy talk, Sabrina the Teenage Witch talk" and "the language of the Sunny Delight generation": https://youtu.be/xs5fH1ECzWc https://youtu.be/xs5fH1ECzWc (Note that Fry was specifically addressing the related phenomenon of AQI, a.k.a. "uptalk", but he diverts into things like "I was like" to introduce a quotation.)

jgwil2 5y ago
As actors, they've probably all spent a lot of time in Southern California or working with people from there, so it shouldn't be surprising that they would pick up some of the speech patterns.
housecarpenter 5y ago
I think these features are more general young-isms, not really regional. Older Americans don't use them either, right?
- bitwize 5y ago
  They were regional (localized to the USA and possibly Canada) until recently.

selimthegrim 5y ago

‘Agree’ is the other way around, more often than not takes a preposition after in AmE as opposed to BrE

WalterBright 5y ago

I remember clearly it was "pulling FOR birds". I wonder why the difference. Perhaps it was because my anecdote took place in the 80's. Language does shift over time.

jjgreen 5y ago
Odd, since the pulling would be the act of chatting-up-and-convincing-someone-to-sleep-with-you, so "pulling a bird", "pulling some birds", "out on the pull", etc. Much less common than it used to be in any case.

CRConrad 5y ago

> You’ll now see commercials in Britain that implore you to “Search ‘Fred Insurance’ for full details”. Five years ago that would have been “Search _for_ ‘Fred Insurance’”. But in many forms of commercials it's advantageous to have a short text: you can use a bigger font while paying for the same size advertisement / poster / pop-up window. So maybe that was more a "shortism" than an Americanism.