You're yanking me, right?

[Chicken Sandwich]

A: We don't keep score. We think
it's healthier if the kids just play for fun.

B: You're yanking me, right?

Yanks means, according the Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English:

yank / jæŋk / verb [ intransitive and transitive ]

informal to suddenly pull something quickly and with force yank something out/back/open etc One of the men grabbed Tom’s hair and yanked his head back.
Nick yanked the door open.

yank on/at With both hands she yanked at the necklace.


— yank noun [ countable ] : He gave the rope a yank .

This definition however doesn't apply to the sentence I quoted above. "Yank" seems to mean here "to kid".





You're yanking (kidding) me, right?

Am I correct? Is this American slang?

 

[emsr2d2]

Yanks means, according the Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English:



This definition however doesn't apply to the sentence I quoted above. "Yank" seems to mean here "to kid".





You're yanking (kidding) me, right?

Am I correct? Is this American slang?

It does mean "joking with me", "kidding me". I think (but happy to corrected by an AmE speaker) that it comes from "You're yanking my chain" meaning the same thing.

Side note : I assume the spam message above mine will be deleted quite soon. ;-)

 

[Tdol]

Side note : I assume the spam message above mine will be deleted quite soon. ;-)

Yup

 

[BobK]

It does mean "joking with me", "kidding me". I think (but happy to corrected by an AmE speaker) that it comes from "You're yanking my chain" meaning the same thing.

....

:up: Or 'pulling my chain'. Presumably, the idiom refers to a sort of lavatory cistern - although the relevance of lavatories to kidding isn't obvious to me (except maybe by way of the possibly related 'pi$$ing me about'): http://www.salvoweb.com/images/userimgs/35719/44071_1.jpg. Or maybe it's the sort of chain tethering a slave or a performing animal - making it do things it doesn't want to.

b

 

[Barb_D]

In the US, we'd say "you're yanking my chain" or "you're pulling my leg."

To just say "you're yanking me" would sound odd to me.