americans, why do you call crisps 'chips', and chips 'fries'?

Question

as you can probably tell, i'm english, and we invented the english language, you know, as well as inventing the americans.

why did you stray from your mother tongue?

come back.

all is forgiven.

Answer 1

I'm british well actually Welsh and i think chips should be called fries as they are mostly fried. Do you ever go to MacDonalds or Burger king? If u do what do u say please can I have a burger and chips no you don't I bet you say fries. Americans also spell things how you say it we have stupid silent letters and we wonder why so many people are dyslexic in the UK.

Answer 2

Americans are self-invented, but I'm being picky. The words you mention are all slang terms and slang is always local. Our "fries" is shortened from "french-fried potatoes" so named because the potatoes are cut in the "Julienne" style before cooking and that style of cutting vegetables is thought of as the French way. However, since the French don't support Mr Bush's war, he doesn't want Americans to have anything French in our language. He said we should call french fries "freedom fries". C'est la vie. Only two more years and GWB is fired! If you think Americans are hard to understand try listening to an Aussie or better yet a Jamaican. And still, Jamaicans will tell you that they speak the King's English! Booyaka!
No American can possibly understand Cockney rhyming slang, not even if we tried. And what, exactly, are bollocks, anyway? Or is bollocks?
Here's a fun thing in American English. You Brits call that moving box in a tall building a "lift". We call it an "elevator". Both of these words imply going up. Does it need a different name on the trip back down? If I'm already up, why would I want to get lifted or elevated? I could go on...
Crisps is just an awkward word, with a "p" in between two "S's". How do you say it without spitting?

Answer 3

"You say potato and I say potato" (doesn't work so well when you write it down, does it).

Chip: from Old English forcippian [to cut off]
Crisp: Firm, dry and brittle [orig. Latin for Curly]
Fries: From French Fries

The British names are just descriptions of the objects but, while the American word "chip" is used in the same way, "fries" is a contraction of "French Fries", a reference to the French style of frying potatoes (which is, in fact, thinner than the British chip). Americans chose not to use the French name for these items, probably because it translates as "Fried Apples" (Pommes Frittes).

American did, quite deliberately, stray from the Mother Tongue. Noah Webster wrote a "truly American dictionary" and changed the spellings he thought confusing ('centre' becomes 'center' etc.) so, while English was an organic combination of many European languages American English was a restructured and simplified version.

I don't imagine many Americans would want to "come back", since they wouldn't be able to understand what we were talking about.

Answer 4

Your answer to the french fry is, The commercial success of fried potatoes began in 1864, when Joseph Malines of London put "fish and chips" on his menu. His success inspired others across Europe to do likewise. However, they were still not called french fries until around 1918. Hungry American soldiers stationed in Northern France and Belgium during World War I, first tasted the thinly-sliced regional potato specialty and began to refer to them as "french fries," after the French-speaking people who sold them. By the end of the 20th century Americans ate more than 4.5 billion pounds a year of French fries.
And your answer to the chip... which was invented in America by an American Indian... therefore you are pronouncing that word wrong, it's a chip not a crisp.:) So it looks like we're 50/50 for now.

Answer 5

I wondered that too. I mean, we call chips chips because they are chipped from a potato. I suppose you could call anything a chip when it has been chipped though and french fries could actually be anything which has been fried in a way associated originally with the French. I suppose crisps and chips are both potato chips actually. But I usually refer to fries as those horrible thin things you get in fast food places and chips are the nice fat ones you get from the chippy(as in chip shop). So really neither language is clear as to what we mean because you could Frnch fry carrots and call them fries or you could chip a block of chocolate and call it chips.

Answer 6

It's because they're silly :)

Well if I told you the real reason why, I may get my answer deleted for racism, so I won't, even though it's true.

You above me, bollocks are what men have 2 of between their legs and crisps isn't that difficult to say, neither is aluminium. (note the 2nd i )

tiger-lily, I say chips at McDonalds etc. so HA! and I always ask for a batch and I don't even care that hardly anyone calls it a batch, that's what it is, that's what it has been for 24 of my years on the planet and that's what I will ask for!! And yes I AM stubborn!

Answer 7

I'm English too, and I have to agree with the majority of Americans on here, (the sensible answers anyway)...English, the same as any other language, is always evolving and changing.

Look at local English dialect, too...there is plenty of disparity just within this country without picking fault with the American version of English.

Answer 8

Well, I'm not American (I'm Canadian), but I can shed some light on these terms.

Fries (or French Fries) refers to the cut of the potato, as well as how it is prepared (deep fried in oil)

Chips (or Potato Chips) refers to the cut of the potato, which resembles a poker chip.

As for the straying, it stems from cultural phenomenas that alter the language.

Canada never forgot, but we do forgive.

Answer 9

Because crisp is a way of describing something.
Chips are crisp.
And fries dont chip so why call them that in the first place?

Answer 10

It is my American understanding that Fries are of French origin, not English. Perhaps you should address it with them.

As far as inventing americans, I believe you are the first Englishman I have met that would take credit for that.

As far as straying from the mother tongue, I prefer to think of it as enhancing the language.

lol