What do you reckon?
In my mind "reckon" had always been a bit of a country-bumpkin type of a word. But apparently here, it's a regular part of the vernacular. People reckon lots of things. Or rather people reckon heaps of things.
When discussing this with my Australian coworkers. I pointed out that I thought they used "reckon" in place of "think". They shrewdly made the point, that they have "think" and they use "reckon" instead. The point was made that reckon:think as sure:yes. It's a little less certain. Closest I can come up with is "guess" or "bet" but even these words have a slightly different meaning.
In the end, I like "reckon." I don't know that I can use it without sounding phony. But I like that it expresses a slight variation in meaning that Americans don't recognize.
the english use it, too, and i totally picked it up when i worked with nick. you feel phony the first few times, but sometimes it just slips out... it´s like when i first started using peruvian slang and people made fun of me. or rather, they poked fun at me, which is different. i had a lot of conversations, asking if it sounded like i was trying to hard to use it or something and they said no, it was natural and fine but "cute".
ReplyDeleteyou reckon it´s "cute" when you use it??
hehe love you!
wow, it's been a while since i read your blog. gotta keep up with you!
ReplyDeletei've been noticing lately how much people in the south split infinitives. at first, i scoffed. because, you know, splitting infinitives is sooo Plebian. then i caught myself doing it.