The idiom “go south” means something is getting worse. It’s a lighter way to talk about negative trends, and it may have originated from profit or sales numbers appearing to point south on a map. British English speakers used “going west” instead. In America, the west is associated with positives, which may have led to “going south” becoming more popular.
The English idiom “go south” has a distinct meaning related to something going wrong or getting worse. For example, an English speaker might say that a business is “going south,” meaning it’s headed for failure, or that profits are “going south,” meaning profits are declining. Speakers could also use the alternative phrase “south,” for example, saying that efforts to revive a company or product appear to be “heading south” or diminishing.
In general, using this idiom is a somewhat lighter way to talk about negative trends. It can be replaced by harsher language with words like “terrible”, “terrible” or “catastrophic”. Conversely, if someone hears someone say that something is “going south” or could “go south,” the listener usually has a sense of urgency, but the potential bad outcome somehow seems not as bad as it could be. .
In terms of the origin of this phrase, historians of the word have some pretty interesting thoughts as to why English speakers started using the phrase. One idea is that profit or sales numbers are good when they rise towards the top of a chart and bad when they flow down. When the map is placed on the wall, the worsening numbers may appear to, in fact, be pointing south from the normal orientation of a map. A further explanation for this phrase, which appears to be largely an American term, is the idea that after the American Civil War, the South seemed to be associated with negative elements, at least from the point of view of Northerners, although few others exist. idioms to support this notion.
By looking at the history of the phrase, linguists can see that, in the past, British English speakers did not use the phrase “go south” and instead referred to a worsening situation by “going west.” Explanations for this include the idea that the sun sets in the west, as well as stories of London prisoners traditionally heading west to the gallows. Over time, the American form of the phrase, “going south,” seems to have dominated the other. One reason this may have happened is that in America, largely through historical quotes such as “Go West, young man!” the west has been associated with positives, not negatives. This has resulted in the phrase “going south” becoming familiar to most English speakers around the world; perhaps oddly, “going north” is not typically used to indicate an improvement in circumstances.
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