big-time

[Sepmre]

Hi, Could anyone please tell me what it means?


In 2008, after the economy crashed, I woke up big-time about money.

From the book "Be Obsessed or Be Average"

Thanks

 

[GoesStation]

Big-time is a casual intensifier. The author didn't just become aware of the need to manage money; s/he became intensely aware of it.

Mr. Trump often uses a similar intensifier, big-league. His pronunciation sounds like "bigly" to many listeners, so this new adverb has entered English as an example of mangled usage.

 

[GoesStation]

On the Trump use of 'bigly' there was a discussion of this on another site that caters to the English (the UK, that is). Many people including me listened to the recording of his words. The consensus of opinion was that he does in fact say 'bigly', e.g., "I'm going to bring the jobs back to America bigly!"

They're Brits, unused to his Queens accent. Plenty of Americans hear "bigly", too, but I quite clearly hear him say big league. The difference is very subtle, but our Dear Tweeter does end the second vowel with a glottal stop.

Trump mangles our language freely, frequently, and unforgivably, but he doesn't do it bigly.

 

[andrewg927]

Trump only has a very slight accent. Quite a surprise for someone born and raised in Queens.

 

[emsr2d2]

I've never had any trouble understanding him (his accent, not the content!) I would never have known he was from Queens.

 

[GoesStation]

A Queens accent is a variety of New York City accent which is widely heard in films. Think of Christopher Walken as a prime example. It's not difficult to understand for most Anglophones (if any), but it does have certain attributes. I'm not a linguist but I think a softening of final consonants may be one of them.

Be that as it may, a linguist has actually performed an acoustic analysis of Trump saying the disputed word. You can see the glottal stop, even if it's hard to hear. It's labeled "stop burst" here:

 

[andrewg927]

What is distinct about his Queens accent is not the accent itself but rather the voice. He wants to sound macho and his accent certainly helps cultivate that image. And of course his signature "yuge".

 

[Phaedrus]

I woke up big-time about money.

In addition to such adverbial uses of big-time, it can be used adjectivally, as in I had a big-time wake-up call about money.

This thread surely wouldn't be complete without mention of Peter Gabriel's 1986 song hit "Big Time": "I'm on my way to making it, big-time."

 

[GoesStation]

"Yuge" is, I think, a typical pronunciation of "huge" for someone from Queens.

 

[andrewg927]

Perhaps, but he certainly made it famous.