Timeline for What is a word with a negative connotation that describes a person who talks as if he or she knows everything?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
14 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
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| Feb 1, 2023 at 2:50 | comment | added | BobRodes | @SimonCrase Interesting. I have the strange experience for an American of having a perfect English accent at one point in my life, and hearing both NZ and Australian accents from both perspectives. (Not to mention how funny Americans sound to English people.) NZ and Australian sounded "sort of American" when I lived in England as a boy, and sound "sort of English" to me now. | |
| Jan 31, 2023 at 22:39 | comment | added | Lambie | The term is know-it-all in English, of any variety. Know-all, do-all x. | |
| Jan 31, 2023 at 22:26 | comment | added | Simon Crase | @BobRodes I know the expression "know all" from 1950s New Zealand. Our dialects are closer to the UK and Australia than the US. "Know it all" sounds awkward to me. | |
| Jan 31, 2023 at 19:41 | comment | added | BobRodes | @Tristan Maybe it's REALLY dated, because I grew up in the 70s/80s. I lived in England (Oxford) from 69-71, attended second and third form. I thought I might have heard the term from those RP types who speak the English language "correctly," saying things like "hyah" and "Hempstead" and mean rugby when they refer to football (what the rest of the Brits call football, of course, is "association"). | |
| Jan 31, 2023 at 11:34 | comment | added | Prof. Falken | @MichaelHarvey if we are talking about German: "Besserwisser". | |
| Jan 31, 2023 at 9:39 | comment | added | Tristan | @MichaelHarvey from Peter's ngram comment I'm guessing it's my age (or lack thereof) showing then! | |
| Jan 31, 2023 at 1:40 | comment | added | Peter | Interesting. I do not recall ever hearing know-it-all (in Australia). The ngram showed Know-all was more common in UK until around 2000, but in US until 1900. | |
| Jan 30, 2023 at 21:26 | comment | added | MJ713 | "Know-it-all" is far more commonly used today than "know-all", based on my Google Ngram search. (I had to fiddle with the query a bit to stop it from interpreting hyphens as a special character.) | |
| Jan 30, 2023 at 19:43 | comment | added | Michael Harvey | @Tristan - 'know-all' was pretty common in London in the 1960s. | |
| Jan 30, 2023 at 19:08 | comment | added | Davislor | I've never heard this one in America. | |
| Jan 30, 2023 at 19:04 | comment | added | Michael Harvey | Know-all, clever Dick, Doktor Pfiffikus (from my cousin who spent some time in Germany) | |
| Jan 30, 2023 at 15:52 | comment | added | Tristan | @BobRodes as a Brit I'd have guessed "know-all" was an American expression because it's unfamiliar to me (I'd always go for "know-it-all"). Maybe it's dated (I grew up in the 90s/00s) | |
| Jan 30, 2023 at 12:03 | comment | added | BobRodes | That's interesting. Sounds like a British expression; I've always heard "know-it-all." When I lived in England at age 14, I was often a "know-it-all," and kids would say "you fancy yourself, don't you?" | |
| Jan 30, 2023 at 5:04 | history | answered | Peter | CC BY-SA 4.0 |