Top, bottom, front, back?

[Ken W]

Maybe its the sunshine outside today or maybe its the heated but passionate and thoughtful posts that have dominated the forum in the past couple of weeks, but I feel that it might be time for a more light hearted, but serious question. Here goes:

Most things that have a top also have a bottom (think two-piece swimsuit or floors of a building) and most things that have a front also have a back (think doors or lawns of a house). So...why does a uke (and guitar for that matter, but a guitar is not a uke) have a top and a back?

 

[Pete Howlett]

Beats me? Don't the Spanish call the top/front the 'plantilla'? Also does it matter? I think wierd names for the neck (where does that come from) are amusing but equally without 'sense' - I'm thinking 'arm' and 'handle'.... Here's hoping for humorous replies

 

[ukulian]

Here's hoping for humorous replies

I'm splitting my sides!!

Let's face it, with the shape of a Uke (or that other instrument), if you called it a bottom, it would probably get X-rated

 

[Allen]

One of my students from a few years ago kept referring to the neck as the handle. He'd ask me a question about the handle, and I kept stumbling trying to figure out what the heck he was talking about.

 

[Sven]

English is a second language to me so I might be disqualified. But I'd say the top is mounted at the front. It works in a different way and the sides and back form the structure on which the top is mounted. At the front.

In Swedish we call it lid. And a lid sits on a jar, it's not one of the sides of the jar.

(No intentional humour, but feel free to laugh anyway...)

 

[Pete Howlett]

Scandinavia has it right - English is taught mainly as a second language and is spoken well by most of the population. Most Finns i know absolutely despised their compulsory Swedish lessons and yet...

 

[Liam Ryan]

I've got a bottom half way up me but no top....................

 

[maclay]

This Matsuda uke doesn't have a back or bottom or sides for that matter.
I think it belongs in a museum....beautiful piece

\http://www.fretboardjournal.com/blog/michihiro-matsudas-experimental-ukulele