Boat Talkers vs. Non-Boat Talkers

In some of the previous posts, you have seen references to the confusion that can exist between Boat Talkers (that would be the group of people who do not call a rope a rope) and Non-Boat Talkers (that would be the group of people who would ask "do you mean the red rope or the black rope?").

Boat talkers never call something by its land name.  For instance, a room with a bed would never be called a bedroom, it would be called a cabin.  The area where you cook would never be called a kitchen, it is the galley.  Of course everyone is aware that there are no bathrooms on a boat, merely heads.   But, at least in most cases, if you have a decent sailing primer, a Non-Boat Talker can actually figure out what a Boat Talker is saying if they use the proper term for something on the boat.  Things become much more complex when a Boat Talker moves to "Boat Slang".  For instance,  the primer calls the sail at the front of our boat a jib.  Except most Boat Talkers call it a ginny.  Try looking that up in the primer.

And then, there are so many words that seem to mean close to the same thing.  Take the back of the boat.  Pretty simple concept--t-h-e--b-a-c-k--o-f--t-h-e--b-o-a-t.  Just a few of the Boat Talker words for that general area include aft, stern, transom, sugar scoop (and there are more). 

Just when you think you might have the hang of some of this slang, ask your captain how fast you are going and their reply is likely to be, "Over water or over land?".  Ask how hard the wind is blowing and the reply might be "True or Apparent?".  Ask what the compass reading is and you will likely get "True or Magnetic?"  Oh my, the Boat Talkers really must not want anyone else to understand them.  Maybe they could devise the next code for the NSA.

Then there is the world of non-verbal communication so many Boat Talkers use--but I will save that for another post.