Lois & Clark Forums Forums General Discussion Off Topic If You Speak American English...

About the soda/pop question...

To be honest, I've never been in a restaurant where I had to speak English. But if I had to ask for such a thing, I'd ask for a refreshment. I don't know if the term is correct, (it's the exact translation of the Greek word and I'm sure I've seen it many times in menus) but neither soda or pop sound good to me, because:

a) Soda, in Greek, (pronounced with a soft d) is a carbonated, colorless beverage we drink when we've eaten too much... anyone knows what I'm talking about? Anyway, since I don't know its English name, I'd fear they'd get me one of these.

b) Pop is the kind of music we all know. And you can't drink music, can you?

BTW, which is the term L&C would use?

See ya,
AnnaBtG.

I know what you mean by 'soda', Anna - it's what we (ie in the UK/Ireland) know as bicarbonate of soda. There's also a drink called soda water, which is carbonated water, but not quite the same as Perrier (though I couldn't tell you what the difference is! ).

I grew up in Dublin calling soft drinks 'minerals' - it was what everyone around called them. I think that's an Irish thing. Then they became 'fizzy drinks'. And then, when I moved to the UK, 'soft drinks'. In Canada, or at least in Ontario, 'pop' seems to be the most common term - but I can't quite bring myself to use that, because my mental image from the word is of a minor explosion!

In English, you wouldn't ask for 'a refreshment', however; it's either 'refreshment' or 'refreshments', without an indefinite article. But refreshments can mean food and drink, so if you asked for that in a restaurant it wouldn't be specific enough. Better just to ask for a drink - as in "What drinks do you have?" That's mostly what I do these days, in order to avoid the thorny soda/pop/whateverelseitmightbecalled question!


Wendy

Anna, around here that's called "seltzer" or "club soda." I believe there's a technical difference between the two (seltzer has slightly more carbonation, I think), but they're often used interchangably. Airlines always call it "club soda," as do higher class bars and restaurants (or those that want to appear higher class). If you're at home, though, or at a diner or something, it's probably seltzer.

About accents and pronounciations -- Webster\'s Online has audio clips of the US standard (aka "unaccented" ) pronounciations of most common words. For some words, like caramel , they have two. The first little red speaker icon has the two-syllable pronounciation. The second has the three-syllable version.

Paul

But isn't there a difference between seltzer and soda water/club soda? At least, there is in the UK - not in the US?

Seltzer, I'm assuming, is what I call bicarbonate of soda, and which you take for an upset stomach or hangover.



Whereas this is soda water/club soda:



Curious now,


Wendy

When I think of what you call Seltzer, Wendy, I would say Alka Seltzer. When i think of the word Seltzer, I think of flavored carbonated water (like the New York Seltzer from when I was a kid and can't find pictures of) or the pressurized water that clowns spray on each other.

Anna, I think Lois would say 'soda' because she is born and raised on the East Coast. Being from Kansas, Clark, would have likely grown up saying "pop", but with all of his travels and living in Metropolis, he might have picked up saying "soda." I think Martha and Jonathan would say "pop," though.

Anna:
isn't a drink necessarily. It is anything that refreshes including a cold shower! Or food. Menus would say "Drinks" and include coffee, hot tea, iced tea, soft drinks (unspecified but usually Coke, Pepsi or both). The server usually lists the brands of soft drinks verbally. If I remember correctly, the McDonalds in Athens on the Plaka listed "Drinks" and then the Coffee, tea and Coke. Also, that includes diet Coke here even if they don't say so. Oh by the way, Lois's favorite cream soda is called that and usually isn't ever served in a fast food place. It's kind of a New York thing.
Actually, pop the drink came before pop the music. Pop music is called that because the fans were young people who drank pop.
Alka Seltzer is a pill dropped in water to help cure an upset stomach. Selter water is an east coast thing and was the separate fizzy part you put into a flavored syrup to create a beverage like Coke before Coke was bottled and sold everywhere. Soda water (also club soda) can be drunk separately but is commonly used like tonic water with alcoholic beverages. The difference between club soda and tonic water is the quinine in the tonic water. That's how people got their anti-malaria drug for the tropics in the 18th century.

Artemis

Okay, Bethy made me do it.

65% General American English
15% Yankee
5% Dixie
5% Upper Midwestern
0% Midwestern

Kaethel

Here's mine ... El made me do it so she could prove she's more of a Yankee than I am.

45% General American English
25% Dixie
25% Yankee
5% Upper Midwestern
0% Midwestern

I'm surprized cow tipping ain't in there, but TP'ing was.

CC observed:
ROTFL! /me hides behind a big box of caramel corn to escape the glare. <bg>

I must say, though, this thread has taught me one thing -- I have never been able to spell caramel correctly because it's not how I say it. But I think after this, that's one typo I won't make any more. <g>

LOL! Oh, Paul, I could kiss you. Two was first ... heh heh heh.

Wendy remembered:
LOL, I remember you saying that, and I've been dying to ask ... *how* do we sound different?? (And yes, I know that's probably an impossible question to answer. I mean, how does one describe an accent?)

And Anna, in an American restaurant, you could also ask for a "beverage" -- that's usually what that part of the menu is labeled. But "soft drink" is the generic term here for things like Coke, Sprite, Root Beer, etc.

Kathy

Seltzer vs. Club Soda vs. Perrier:

All are clear beverages. Seltzer has bubbles added, but no salt. It's made by adding carbon dioxide gas to plain water.

Club soda (aka soda water) has bubbles (usually a bit less than seltzer) AND sodium (or an acid, or both) added. It's made by adding sodium bicarbonate to water, which results in bubbles of carbon dioxide -- and sodium left dissolved in the water.

Perrier doesn't need to have bubbles added; the water is naturally effervescent.

Any of them may also have flavorings added. And I detest the lot of 'em. I prefer my water bubble-free.

Geesh... should be sleeping, but I had to add in my fun little (OT?) fact about TP'ing. This was an end of the season tradition in my softball league. Late at night after the team party, we'd pick a few houses (usually rival teams or popular coaches... was a pretty close-knit league so some were well known amongst us

Okay, going to bed now like I should have done hours ago...

Sara (who says "soda" and prefers Coke )

Thanks for answering my soda question, people And Laura, for answering the L&C soda/pop question.

Thanks for the clarification, Artemis. The term pop for the drinks hasn't made it over here but it has, for the music.

See ya,
AnnaBtG.

Artemis said:

That puzzled me; I'd always understood that 'pop' was simply an abbreviation of 'popular'. I don't have access to the complete Oxford English Dictionary online any more (to check the etymology there), but a quick Google found several references to pop music being a shortened form of popular.

Here's one encyclopaedia entry:

http://www.absoluteastronomy.com/encyclopedia/p/po/popular_music.htm

Britannica uses popular music and pop as synonymous.

Looking up 'pop music' in www.infoplease.com retrives this:
Cambridge Online Dictionary:
I won't bore people with any more - but the two terms, pop and popular music, are used as interchangeable on virtually every site I looked at.


Wendy

Yup, I'm totally with Wendy on the origins of the term pop music. I've never heard of your suggested derivation, Artemis, and I was going to say that since we Brits don't (and didn't) commonly use 'pop' to mean fizzy drinks, it wouldn't make sense that we'd make the same association you suggest, yet 'pop music' as a term has been in use here as long as I can remember. However, I guess it's possible we imported the term from the US, in which case my argument goes out the window.

Yvonne

Have to say I'm with the Brits on the pop music thing. I always believed it was simply a short form of popular music, just as fan is short for fanatic.

Have no idea why soda is called pop unless it's because the carbonation kind of "pops" as it bubbles in the glass. That might be a stretch.

Lynn

To throw things for a loop, some people here in America actually say "soda pop".

Well, Yvonne, here's something to start with. It's for US speakers, but I think it could work in reverse by looking up the British expression and seeing what it "translates" to in US English.



Lynn

Ooh, I actually have that book! (thanks, Kae! ) But some time ago I did actually find a British-American 'dictionary' on the web.

British/American Dictionary

Haven't tested it too far to find out how accurate it is, though!


Wendy

75% General American English
20% Yankee
5% Dixie
0% Midwestern
0% Upper Midwestern


No idea as to why it came out like that . I had to guess at some points (like the easy class... I'd never heard any of the terms :S... but ask me in Spanish and I'll give you a few )

I learned English when I was a kid, during the year we lived in Reno. But I've only gone back to the US a couple times after that (reno again and N Carolina), and it was only for a month in both cases... I guess it comes from reading, and this mbs...

well, I'm italian, so just for fun:

50% General American English
35% Yankee
5% Dixie

I didn't answer to "sweetened carbonated beverage" (I'd call it "soft drink") and "easy class" (never heard of these choices). I learnt English in High School with an English lady from Hull, I think, in College with a Canadian lady married with an italian, but above all here with your fics! Before discovering the L&C fanfictions world I have never read an whole novel in English just for fun; now I read a lot in English because of L&C fics and, beeing Jane Austen, E.M. Forster and Henry James my favourite authors out of Italy, I'm able to read them in their original language without problems. My conversations in English rarely are more than "yes, the station is at the end of this street", or "how much to the Duomo? Perhaps twenty minutes if you go on foot", so not very useful for me; so thank you for your daily help with my English! (still lacking, I know, but I'm improving)

simona

who's asking helself if this was understandable; at this hour I'm so tired and sleepy that my grammar feels the effects, I fear.