On 11/19/06, Taraprakash <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Deaf and mute?
> It will need getting used to.
hmmm...
here is what wikipedia has to say:
"Deaf-mute was a term historically used by hearing people to identify
a person who was deaf and could not speak. This term first appears in
the Code of Hammurabi, an ancient set of laws from the near east, in
1700 BC. [1] It is also referenced in ancient Greek writing of the 7th
century BC. It continues to be used to refer to deaf people, mainly
within a historical context, to indicate deaf people who cannot speak,
or have some degree of speaking ability, but choose not to speak
because of the negative or unwanted attention atypical voices
sometimes attract."
> Rather than confusing these terms, the ideal situation will be to educate
> the society to use the words like blind and dumb only in their original
> sense. Dictionaries must remove the metaphorical meanings of these words and
> word blind should be used only for someone can't see and dumb only for
> someone who can't speak. There is nothing derogatory about these words
> unless we start making them so.
I beg to differ. Here is the word dumb in wiktionary:
"
1. Unable to speak; lacking power of speech.
His younger brother had been born dumb, and communicated
with a self-taught kind of sign language.
2. (informal, pejorative) Describing something, especially a
person, that is extremely stupid.
You big dumb oaf! You can't fix an engine by hitting it with a hammer!
3. (informal) Describing something unintellectual.
Harry had a dumb, brainless job moving boxes from one
conveyor belt to another.
4. (figurative) Pointless, or serving to create more problems than it solves.
This is so dumb! We're just driving in circles; we should
have asked for directions an hour ago.
"
You will note that definitions 2, 3 and 4 are all negative.
As opposed to this, "mute" in wiktionary has the following definitions:
"
1. A person who does not have the power of speech.
2. An acting part where no speaking (and in opera, no singing) is required.
3. In music, an object for dulling the sound of an instrument,
especially a brass instrument.
4. One refusing to speak;
5. An undertaker's assistant;
6. The deadening of an appliance's or musical instrument's volume;
7. In falconry, a mute is a hawk's or falcon's droppings.
8. In wine making, mute, from the French, is the grape juice from
pressed grapes kept aside in chilled stainless steel tanks and used at
later stages of wine making by adding to the dry wine base to achieve
the desired residual sugar level in the final product. (Usually
spelled "muté " in this case and pronounced "mju:te".)
"
Please note that definitions 1-4 and 6 have something to do with the
non-production of sound, none of which are negative. 5, 7 and 8, I
would wager, were unknown to us all before now.
While I would be delighted if the world stopped using many words in
negative ways, I am not holding my breath. Until that happens, I
prefer to use a word that is equally short, more precise and less
negative.
Just my $0.02...
Arun
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Arun Mehta" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> To: <[email protected]>
> Sent: Sunday, November 19, 2006 12:39 PM
> Subject: [AI] mute, instead of dumb?
>
>
> > We've just had a discussion on whether use of the word blind was
> > appropriate, and I do not wish to reopen it. However, this sort of
> > discussion is far more needed in the case of the word dumb, which is
> > commonly used to mean stupid.
> >
> > We have a much more precise word to indicate inability to speak, which
> > is mute. I would urge we use that, instead of dumb.
> >
> > Thanks,
> > Arun
> >
> > On 11/15/06, Vishal M Jain <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> >
> >> I happened to meat a Dumb and Def boy
> >
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