Vacuum(ing) Or hoover(ing)

[alexhoovers94]

This has been a wonder of mine for a while, I am thinking maybe it is just a British collector thing calling it vacuum and most "other" people say hoover (non-collectors).
I am asking probably, obviously the British collectors what you call it when you go to vacuum.
Do you call it vacuum cleaner or a hoover and what do you call it when you actually go to to use it - vacuuming, vacuum, vac up, vacing up, hoovering, hoover, hoover up, hoovering up?
I personally have allways callled it a vacuum cleaner, a vacuum or a vac, and I usually say it needs vacuuming in here or I am gonna vac up.
I have never called it a hoover or hoovering up, it just sounds a bit silly to me and all my family (bar my sister) call it a vacuum or a vac so it is not something I have ever really heard while growing up.
If I am with other friends (non-collectors) I usually say hoover as they tend to know what I mean, they would look at me weird if I called it a vacuum all of my friends seem to call it a hoover and I guss that verb goes back decades but like I said, I never usually call it a hoover.

You may of also noticed that I spelled "hoover" in lower case letters, that is because I am saying it as a verb, where normally I spell it with a capital "H" so Hoover, to specify it as a name, a brand name. I think spelling it those two different ways helps people distinguish which one you are talking about.

So, anyway, speak your views as you may so please.

 

[tolivac]

Guess like the term used for power saws-SkilSaw is a brand name for a hand held circular saw.Skil originally came up with this-then other tool makers made their versions-so the term Skilsaw was used for any hand held circular saw.Then "Kneenex" for nose tissues-other brands often called "Kleenex".

 

[turbo500]

Growing up it was:


 


"go n get t'oovah out n run it round 'ouse will ya?"


 


These days, it depends with whom I am speaking. If I'm talking casually to a friend who isn't interested in vacuums, it will usually be the "hoover". If I'm talking with vacuum collector friends, it's the vacuum . 

 

[thekirbylover]

i call it the vacuum or vacuum cleaner, and i say im going to vacuum the sofa or vacuum downstairs 

 

[strongenough78]

Absolutely Fabulous

Granted it's a 3 minute video, but the best part for this thread happens at the start of the video. Edina's assistant Bubble "hoovering" lol.

 

[whirlpolf]

seeing this from here

I might want to dare say: It doesn't matter to me, both are fine.

Electrolux tried to introduce a similar thing here in the German and Northern languages: In the 70s their manuals showed the phrase: "Luxen Sie ihre Polstermöbel wie folgt:" (Lux you upholstery as follows). THIS again sounds more than odd to me, it sounds "produced/made up" and it has not naturally grown in the language.
Should probably induce something like 'luxuriate your upholstery" or similar - no idea. Bad stuff. Marketing blah to me.

Hoovering sounds natural to me: Hoover is the British vacuum company, there is the Queen, there is that little "approval badge" on Hoovers, so fine to me.

We have "Tempo" fo paper towels, "Zewa" for kitchen towels, we have "to kärcher something" for to pressure-wash it, so what...

More odd to me (as a non-native what comes to English) is the term "vacuum cleaner" (As far as I know a vacuum is the absence of air, not a lower pressure zone).
So "vacuum cleaning" sounds like "void sweeping" or "nothingness purification" to us, rather than air stream driven sweeping / suction by pressure imbalance (what it actually is).
There is this faint glow of exaggeration in the English word to us (seeing it from German of course, so we may well be inaccurate on this).

"vacuum" = nothing, free of air
Consequently a vacuum cleaner would be the absolute zero-pressure cleaning device (which it isn't).
(Star wars technology: Hyperspace multi-dimensional particle constriction black hole /time warp elimination)

Many other languages simply go for "dust sucker" (as what it is) (not meaning sucker as an idiot but just to pick up dust as in "to suck"/ Latin: "aspirare = to breathe in, to suck air")
aspirapolvere
aspirateur
stofzuiger
dammsugare
Staubsauger
pölynimuri
etc.

 

[ned_flanders]

My father has referred to the vacuum sometimes as a 'rug mower'. While I like the word vacuum, I think the European words are more correct. Perhaps electric suction sweeper/cleaner is the clearest in English (but then that's too many words)? It's funny to think that some of us could Shark up a mess in the kitchen, Fantom the living room, and then Rainbow out the car.

 

[alexhoovers94]

Granted, Hoovering the living room sounds more natural to me than saying Dysoning the living room, that just sounds silly but then again they probably both sound silly! haha.

 

[pinkge]

Hoovering

Is what I say,when I'm going to clean the house.
Michael

 

[alexhoovers94]

well, really

You've gotta have a Hoover! No compromising "Hoover. Who Better?" right

Do you like my sarchasm

 

[tolivac]

A good freind of mine calls my NSS "Pig"--"THE BAG"So he asks me to bring "The Bag" when one of his transmitters or studios needs cleaning out.So between us we use the term "Bagged out the transmitter" after vacuuming it with the NSS.

 

[davetranter]

Central England

I regularly hear both terms in use. I suppose we should congratulate Messrs. Hoover for becoming the 'Generic' brand. There is a great deal of 'Kudos' attatched to having one's name adopted as a verb, I understand.

I agree with 'Whirlpolf' that 'aspirator' would probably be a better term than 'Vacuum Cleaner', but who are we to argue with a Century or so of usage??

I tend to refer to any of mine as the 'Getter' when I use it, since (as Tolivac and a few others will know) that is something which makes vacuums 'cleaner' (sorry, but I have a WEIRD sense of humour)
(I think 'vacua' is the 'proper' plural, but that is probably too pedantic)

All best

Dave T

 

[petek]

My parents emigrated to Canada only a few short years before I was born here. Oovering was the term they used and even though we had a Kenmore it was called the oover or mom was oovering. I think it wasn't until I got to Kindergarten that I found out it was called a vacuum cleaner and people vacuumed not hoovered.

 

[djtaylor]

I had a friend from a region of Ohio that she called 'a strange hill billy land', her words, not mine. She called her vacuums 'Vacuum Sweepers', or sometimes just 'Sweepers'. Since I have had cats all my life I prefer to call my vacuums, or at least those with headlights 'One-Eyed Kitty Eaters'. When I got my Kirby G6 I called my friend and told her that I got a brand new 'One-Eyed Kitty Eater'. She rushed over to my house to see it, but she only heard 'One-Eyed Kitty'. She was very dissappointed to see a 'vacuum sweeper' standing in the middle of my living room and me with a great bid grin on my face.
What's in a name? A rose, by any other, would smell as sweet.
Justin

 

[gottahaveahoove]

My family in Ireland always say HOOVER or 'hoovering&#39

There are 400? HOOVERS here in my house, so it really doesn't change things at all.

 

[whirlpolf]

the emotional side of it

While most terms in all those different languages describe but a tiny differentce what comes to "vacuum cleaner" (who cares what is considered lower or lowest pressure?) - I still like the French phrase for vacuuming the best: "passer l'aspirateur" (la passe = the path) --> to run the vacuum cleaner, to guide it along its streaks.

In most languages it is just to "vacuum"/ to "hoover" (to suck some dust as was found out before), but in French it is a real reminescence to the appliance itself: "To guide the machine along its path" / "to steer the cleaner along".

I love it, it takes all the thoughfulness of the inventors into a bow down for using these machines and taking advantage of their ingenuity.

"Jean-Luc hasn't done the vacuuming yet" - "Jean-Luc n'a pas passé l'aspirateur" (John-Luke hasn't done the vacuuming yet", litterally:"John-Luke has not done pushing the vacuum cleaner yet")
"steering THE vacuum cleaner" - now isn't that a respectful phrasing?

 

[gottahaveahoove]

Well, it certainly beats

"I have to run my sweeper"!