Exercise

1. What is a similar expression to have a chinwag?

2. What does wag mean?

3. What does chinwag describe? 

Answers

1. Have a chat.

2. To move from side to side (a dog wags its tail).

3. The action of talking.

Read

You’re listening to British Council’s English Online and I’m Nina. Today on Language Snacks we take a look at the expression have a chinwag.

Let’s listen to the dialogue.

A: Hey Dan. Not seen you for a while.

B: I’m meeting Claire in 5 minutes, but are you busy next week? Let’s have lunch.

B: Sure, we can have a bit of a chinwag. Tuesday?

A: Works for me.

A: See you Tuesday then.

Well, have a chinwag is real British slang, can you guess what it means from the dialogue? Maybe you are more familiar with the expression have a chat. If we break down the expression we have 2 words chin and wag. Chin is your lower jaw and wag means to move from side to side, so I suppose chinwag describes the action of talking or chatting.

Oh that’s my phone - excuse me while I have a chinwag with my friend.

And that’s it for now – join us again for some more Language Snacks. You’ve been listening to English Online – the podcast for English learners in China.