AWADmail Issue 248
February 11, 2007
A Compendium of Feedback on the Words in A.Word.A.Day
and Other Interesting Tidbits about Words and Languages
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From: Anu Garg (garg wordsmith.org)
Subject: Interesting stories from the net
Parrot's Oratory Stuns Scientists:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/3430481.stm
Found in Translation:
http://www.technologyreview.com/Infotech/18149/
French as a Legal Language:
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/02/07/europe/EU-GEN-EU-French.php
----------------------------
From: Delores Orcutt (igodo4him verizon.net)
Subject: Re: A.Word.A.Day--umbrage
Refer: http://wordsmith.org/words/umbrage.html
How appropriate to see this word shortly after the announced release date
of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Book 7). One of the most annoying
characters is Dolores Umbridge in book 5. Although spelled differently,
she does take umbrage at Harry's persistent declaration that Voldemort has
returned. I found myself having an umbrage that she might be a secret Death
Eater.
----------------------------
From: Peter Grilli (meditr mac.com)
Subject: Re: A.Word.A.Day--umbrage
The word also is related to one of the most important legal doctrines of
the 20th Century: the concept of "penumbral" constitutional rights first
discussed by the Supreme Court of the United States in Justice Douglas's
opinion in Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479 (1965).
Justice Douglas believed, and the Court enacted, the doctrine that rights
other than those explicitly enumerated in the Constitution exist in
"penumbras, formed by emanations" from Bill of Rights guarantees. This
doctrine became the underpinning of Roe v. Wade (legalizing abortion) and
Lawrence v. Texas (forbidding the criminal punishment of homosexual sodomy).
(Many liberals support the doctrine of "penumbral rights" from which many
modern privacy rights proceed. Many conservatives oppose the doctrine for
its vagueness, arguing that it allows a judge to enact his or her personal
policy preferences.)
----------------------------
From: Liza Levy (sparkydoc kyk.net)
Subject: Re: A.Word.A.Day--profligate
Refer: http://wordsmith.org/words/profligate.html
After Watergate, it became fashionable to append -gate to Washington
scandals. Wouldn't it be nice to see a scandal over wasted money dubbed
"Profli-Gate"?
----------------------------
From: John George (john.george enmu.edu)
Subject: quotation on stars
> If the stars should appear one night in a thousand years, how would men
> believe and adore. -Ralph Waldo Emerson, writer and philosopher (1803-1882)
Your quotation for Friday's word, below, reminded me of Isaac Asimov's
short story "Nightfall". His editor, John W. Campbell, Jr., saw the quote
and asked Asimov what he thought. According to Asimov, Campbell's opinion
was, "I think men might go mad." Asimov was inspired by that suggestion
to write the story of a world in which the stars only appeared one night
in a thousand years. It became his best-known story, and stayed in print
constantly in anthologies for decades thereafter.
Asimov later incorporated himself, and (advised not to name the corporation
after himself or any person for legal reasons) he chose his most famous
story, and all his stories from some point on were copyright by the
Nightfall Corporation.
----------------------------
From: Michael Truman (mike.truman lexisnexis.co.uk)
Subject: More obscure words please...
You obviously get a lot of emails from people who are into
self-improvement and want words that they can use; hence this week's
selection. Whilst, as you said, the etymology of some of them was
interesting, the words were rather tame.
So here's a plea for PROFLIGATE words on A.Word.A.Day. Phantasmagorical
words, erudite words, obscurantist words. Recondite, daedal and abstruse
words. Words for dilettantes, aesthetes and aficionados. Words that roll
around the mouth, tickle the tonsils and tumble off the tongue. Not
these quotidian, commonplace, practical, and worst of all USABLE words.
----------------------------
From: Jessica Jackson (jesjackson gmail.com)
Subject: Re: A.Word.A.Day--resistentialism
Refer: http://wordsmith.org/words/resistentialism.html
I remember very well the day "resistentialism" was the word and I remember
using it that very day! At the time I was a bartender...I had read the word
and then later on, at work, I had to change a keg. It was a particularly
busy moment so I tried to be quick. And of course, the keg just wouldn't
budge. There I was, in the beer cooler, straddling this giant keg, trying to
wrestle the tap free; so of course I cussed. At that very moment, my finger
got caught in the tap as if the thing had bit me! Imagine, a keg of beer
that dislikes impolite words! Anyhow, when I finally got it loose and
changed it, I made it back to the bar and told my colleague the story. I
told him it was a classic case of resistentialism!!
............................................................................
In the common words we use every day, souls of past races, the thoughts
and feel ings of individual men stand around us, not dead, but frozen into
their attitude s like the couriers in the garden of the Sleeping Beauty.
-Owen Barfield, author (1898-1997)
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