Talk:woz

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woz

Alt spelling of "was", and slang form of "worry". If it passes, it also needs some serious cleanup (and I wouldn't be terribly offended if someone decided it wasn't worth the effort and simply deleted it). -Atelaes λάλει ἐμοί 21:21, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Are you being serious? What kind of world are you living in if you have never seen "was" interchanged for "woz"? The term "woz" when used as a substitute for "worry" is less common, and I think more common in the UK than in the USA, but try typing in "dont woz" on google (i think better results come up without the apostrophe in "dont"), and you will see it is certainly in use. Nwspel 22:26, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

The thing which you must understand is that, while we do include slang terms, our criteria for them are somewhat higher than, say, the Urban Dictionary. Find three instances of use in printed media and you're golden. -Atelaes λάλει ἐμοί 22:33, 15 May 2008 (UTC)

Many other articles which are far less likely to be true do not have references, but I know from experience at Wikipedia that policies do not allow this to be a good enough reason, so:

• This site uses "And he woz" to mean 'and he was', as a pun on someone's name.
• The BBC sites where famous Ali G character says "woz" to mean 'was'.
• The Sun newspaper online says "Woz we robbed" as a replacement of the verb "was"

Hope that's enough. Cheers. Nwspel 12:36, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

I'm going to cite woz, synonym for "wuz". In doing so I might find citations for the worry sense, though I doubt it. Does anyone have any idea of the context in which the "worry" sense might be likely to arise? DCDuring TALK 15:05, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

I have split the rfv into three rfv-senses. Each needs to be cited I think. DCDuring TALK 15:28, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Are the citations I gave for it meaning "was" (wuz) not good enough? And the term usually appears in a phrase like "dont woz" when talking about "worrying". Nwspel 15:07, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

I don't think the punning reference to "Woz" counts (or should count, anyway). I personally don't like titles as a source because they rarely "convey meaning"; they are teasers. Title usage is often not repeated in the body of the text. DCDuring TALK 15:28, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

As mentioned above, google:"dont woz" gets 2k+, all very informal, no g.b.c hits. May take a bit to cite if possible, May also be ephemeral; I didn't really try to date anything. Robert Ullmann 15:15, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Maybe groups has some cites for the worry sense, but they need to be over a few years. DCDuring TALK 15:28, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

There are two other references I gave, btw. O_o Nwspel 15:37, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

The Sun article is an illustration of the title teaser problem. The only use of "woz" is in the title, AFAICT. "Was" is used in the body. I personally would never have challenged the "be" meanings of "woz". I'd never heard of the "worry". BTW, I can't find "wozd" and "wozing", even in Groups. DCDuring TALK 16:29, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

I find "don't-woz" and "dont woz" in only one group, 2 independent cites here from 2001 and 2003. No cites from Books, Scholar, News. This wouldn't meet our citation standards. DCDuring TALK 16:40, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

So the "was" version is agreed to be ok so far? Looking around, I can't actually find anything to cite about the "worry" definition. I know this one most certainly can't be used as a reference, but just to prove I'm not lying, after typing in "wozing" on google, I got to this bebo profile, where someone comments saying "talk about nyfink wozing or bothering u at all" (talk about anything worrying or bothering you at all). I know it can't be used, but it's just to show that it is used, and that I'm not sending you on a wild goose chase or anything. But anyway, that's "wozing"... there appear to be plenty more sites mentioning "dont woz". Nwspel 17:51, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

I've consolidated the "first-person" and "third-person" senses, since a) IMO this should be a soft redirect to was anyway, and b) first-person plural and second-person cites are also readily available, but having a separate sense for each of these seems fatuous. I'm not sure if the old eye dialect use should be considered distinct from the modern deliberate-misspelling use; both are pretty clearly widespread, though.

In citing, I came across a number of publications in the late-XIX phonetic spelling system called phonography. I have studiously avoided citing these, although in theory this use could merit its own sense line (and context label, and category). -- Visviva 05:42, 20 May 2008 (UTC)

I thought we don't allow redirects here, since it's policy to have a short article on everything? Nwspel 08:53, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Yes, generally. In Wiktionary parlance a "soft redirect" is a entry which simply indicates that the word is an alternative/incorrect/etc. form. See for example the contents of Category:English alternative spellings; most of these would be considered soft redirects. -- Visviva 08:58, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

But there are two meanings; one is a misspelling of wuz, and the other means "worry", so I'm not sure a soft redirect would be the best option here. Nwspel 09:05, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Right, what I mean is that this section should be a soft redirect to was. Since (in this section) it is simply a misspelling of "was," this section should simply point the user to that entry for information on how this word is used. This seems more efficient (and stable) than independently specifying the word's use as a first, second, and third person plural and singular form, with varying degrees of nonstandardness, in the woz, wuz, and was entries. -- Visviva 09:13, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Ok I agree with that, but if anything, it should go to wuz, not was. Nwspel 09:16, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

This website makes 3 uses of 'woz' as a worrying sense. I would like to draw to people's attention that there is a difference in pronunciation between the 'wuz' meaning, and the 'worry' meaning. Nwspel 08:26, 22 May 2008 (UTC)

"Was" sense RFV passed, kept; thanks, DCDuring;
"worry" sense RFV failed, deleted (but may be re-added with valid citations).
—Ruakh_TALK 19:33, 30 May 2009 (UTC)