Talk:Bum steer

Australian English?

Eugene on The Walking Dead used it this week. You sure it's not American, too? --92.75.216.0 (talk) 12:52, 27 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Says in the article that "it reached the United States in the 1920's" IdreamofJeanie (talk) 12:55, 27 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

How did an Australian phrase get affected by "19th century American maritime humour"? Seems a bit of a stretch. 203.13.3.89 (talk) 04:54, 7 September 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Evaluation from a student

I am new to the wonderful world of Wiki-editing and evaluation. I found this article to be interesting and relevant. I have never heard this expression before and I am sure I will have plenty of opportunities to use it given the rise of so-called fake news. The article seems to include reputable sources though I had a hard time finding the actual source material themselves. This could be more about my inexperience with research than anything else. There did not seem to be any bias in the article. In doing some of my research I came across several articles about Bum Steer Awards. Texas Monthly looks for the Texan "Steer of the Year" (typically to people who brought embarrassment to their state.) I thought it might be a good idea to add a section about that. What do you think? Gingerpeachy2000 (talk) 01:25, 1 February 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Unlikely origin

The article suggests an origin for the term and its usage, but it doesn't look convincing: several of the assertions are true or plausible but don;t support the main point, that the term comes from the difficulty of steering when going astern.

The cited source (Day, 1958) is difficult to track down. It appears to have been a periodical in the first years of the twentieth century, so that p.73 is inadequate and the date 1958 appears wrong.

If Day does indeed support this derivation, it would be helpful to know if bum is used to mean the stern of the ship; although this is British English usage for the rear in human and animal anatomy, it looks odd for a ship, particularly as mariners have their own very specific language.Afterbrunel (talk) 16:47, 23 February 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Denver Evening Post

The earliest citation given in the Oxford English Dictionary – "bum steer, n.". Oxford English Dictionary (Online ed.). Oxford University Press. (Subscription or participating institution membership required.) – is from the Denver Evening Post for 23 September 1898, p. 8: "They were going to get even with her for giving them the bum steer." So it looks as if much of this article is inaccurate speculation. I don't have the time or energy to do anything about it now. GrindtXX (talk) 19:09, 25 June 2021 (UTC)[reply]