10 Everday American Words That Are Totally Inappropriate In Britain

6. Fanny-Pack

This inevitable offshoot of 'fanny' has no literal translation in Britain, yet it's still one which induces widespread humour and offense in some due to the connoted imagery of the word 'fanny' being paired with 'pack'. As we have seen already, 'fanny' means posterior in America, meaning that what we call a bum-bag is termed a 'fanny-pack' in America. Regardless of terminology, the exponential and explosive growth of the man-bag has signalled the metaphorical death-knell of the bum-bag. The incompatibility between our understanding of 'fanny' and the less lascivious American understanding of the term makes almost any derivative of the phrase one which will cause offense in the United Kingdom. Bum-bags and fanny-packs may be perpetual fashion faux pas these days, but in previous decades they were a pivotal component of many holiday makers and day trips; due to this it is virtually inconceivable that anyone in Britain has escaped the almost inescapable American TV reference to a fanny-pack. American culture is slowly engulfing our own, and as we become desensitised to the almost alien concept of strange language like fanny-pack we in turn facilitate the flood of American culture into our own.