AWADmail Issue 304
Apr 27, 2008
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 (words at wordsmith.org)
Subject: Interesting stories from the net
Crazy English:
http://newyorker.com/reporting/2008/04/28/080428fa_fact_osnos
A Crusade to Edit America:
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/dannywestneat/2004367117_danny23.html
When Language Can Hold the Answer:
http://nytimes.com/2008/04/22/science/22lang.html?ex=1366516800&en=6a075d8b20d17eb8
Chat Slang Creeps Into Teens' Assignments:
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/nationworld/2004372500_teenwriting25.html
Centenarian Columnist's Californian Comeback:
http://english.ohmynews.com/ArticleView/article_view.asp?menu=A11100&no=382388&rel_no=1
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From: Adam Field (adam fieldmusic.net)
Subject: Re: A.Word.A.Day--suspire
Refer: http://wordsmith.org/words/suspire.html
I just have to point out one thing - the problem here is *not* just that
there are other ways to do the same job. The problem here is that these
verbs were formed out of nouns that were, in turn, formed out of verbs.
Thus, in each case, the best verb for the job is exactly the original
verb the new one came from. Verbs formed from nouns formed from verbs
are fine, but when the new verbs mean the same as the old ones, they're
entirely redundant, and that's the problem.
On the other hand, when verbs are formed from nouns that were formed
from verbs, and they end up with *new* meanings, it's all kinds of
interesting, as seen in this Pinker essay:
http://pinker.wjh.harvard.edu/articles/media/2000_03_landfall.html
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From: Jessica Bibbee (bibbeejessica yahoo.com)
Subject: Re: A.Word.A.Day--suspire
I am currently studying Mandarin in Beijing, and just this morning a
Brazilian colleague asked what the verb offspring of dirt was. With my
English worsening by the day (as my Mandarin improves by the night) I
was quick to respond "dirtify" -- which is even more complicated than
"to dirty" (this came to me only hours later.) It seems I *verbify*
nouns in moments of desperation, when my brain knows quite well that
the word does not exist, but is equally unwilling to cooperate and
produce the right word!
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From: Donatella Fedrighini (fedriciac yahoo.it)
Subject: Re: A.Word.A.Day--suspire
"Grating on the ears" is a perfect description of what certain "Latinate
constructions" -- as you call them -- are to me. I'm Italian (Roman, to be
more precise), but I am a conference interpreter and I SUFFER when I have
to translate such words (simultaneously; that's my job); not because it's
difficult (Italians are even worse than Americans at the game of coining new
words that they think show how learned they are); but because certain words
are absolutely "grating on my ears". I think "neologizing" is a horrible
word and, I dare say, a horrible thing. But then some people tell me that
if everybody were like me, we would still be speaking like Dante or
Shakespeare. (Well, so what?)
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From: Shanthy (shanthy_tv yahoo.com)
Subject: Re: A.Word.A.Day--yammer
Refer: http://wordsmith.org/words/yammer.html
My five-year-old daughter was constantly whining today on my way to work and
I asked her to stop whining. She said "I am not whining. I am just talking"
and continued. Now, I can say "Please don't yammer" and she will surely keep
quiet not knowing what yammer means!
Thanks for introducing a new word. I am sure ten years from now, my daughter
will talk proudly about how early she came to know about the meaning of this
word.
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From: Andrew Pressburger (andrew.pressburger primus.ca)
Subject: Re: A.Word.A.Day--indurate
Refer: http://wordsmith.org/words/indurate.html
Derivatives of the Indo-European word deru- / dreu- (such as tree or druid)
are echoed in the myth of Philemon and Baucis in Ovid's Metamorphosis
(Chapter VIII), where the two lovers, at the end of their lives, are turned
into trees with intertwining branches so as to render their love enduring;
and in the story of the man enclosed in a tree who cries lamentations as the
tree is about to be cut down in Canto XIII of the Inferno in Dante's Divine
Comedy.
Recently we read of a tree discovered in Sweden with an estimated life span
of ten thousand years. That is considerably more than the years of Methuselah.
Does not the mythological story of lignification convey a greater hope than
the image of "dust-to-dust"? Should we hasten to dismiss the druidic
assumptions as humdrum superstition rather than a vision of the endurance of
life?
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From: Adam Britton (abritton crocodilian.com)
Subject: Re: A.Word.A.Day--extirpate
Refer: http://wordsmith.org/words/extirpate.html
Conservationists also use the word "extirpated" to refer to animal and plant
species that have been eliminated from an area or country, but where other
populations still remain. This usage differs from "extinct" where all known
populations have been eliminated.
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From: Rudy Rosenberg (rudyrr att.net)
Subject: Re: A.Word.A.Day--extirpate
Good old Adolf! After the German bombers completely eradicated Coventry, UK,
Hitler coined a new word for "extirpate" -- Koventrier: To Coventry. He then
broadcast to the English people that Germany would erase all their cities.
I can still hear the roars of approval from the gathered crowds.
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From: Peter Norton (norton xyz.net)
Subject: Verbification
A word in fairly common use, at least in these parts and particularly in
the school district, is "certificated". It seems to mean the same thing as
"certified", but perhaps I'm missing a subtle distinction. Can it be that a
body certifies a person's fitness to teach, or perform some other certifiable
function -- that is, vouches for that person if anyone asks -- but
certificates that person when it actually issues the certificate? I can but
marvel.
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From: Lowell Larsson (lowell.larsson gmail.com)
Subject: Gratuitous "verbification" of nouns
Today I read the following quotation from a local college administrator
talking about a parking rate increase. "Once you've stayed eight hours, it
was the same rate, so it was meant to not disincent students who participate
in extracurricular activities."
My first thought was, at least they are just "disincenting" students and not
"disincentivizing" them. But then, after reading your comment this evening
about the "verbification" of nouns in a modern workplace exchange I was
wondering what is worse: to create a verb by "sumoizing" a noun or by
"anorexiaizing" one.
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From: Raj Bhrugushastri (rbhrugus hotmail.com)
Subject: feedback: suspire
I had a similar introduction to verbification when I first moved to
the US 15 years ago. I was always confused with the verb "train".
Because of being educated in India with British English, I was never
introduced to "train" being used as a reflexive verb. So when I heard
someone say "I am training to become a nurse", I didn't know who the
trainee was! Now I have trained myself to such (mis)verbification!
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From: Anthony Flavell (aflavell mac.com)
Subject: Verbing!
It goes on in all its macabre glory, making us squirm with outraged delight.
This is going to be a hot topic.
My current "favourite" business concoction is laddered, but sportscasters
have some exquisite examples of blatant verbing: medalled, podiumed, and
personal-bested (or P-B-ed, for an even more disgusting alternative). Then
the military have their say with ruggedized and adjacentized. For a switch
on verb misuse, NASA are now able to orbit a satellite, a manoeuvre
magically contravening Newton's laws.
............................................................................
The music that can deepest reach, / And cure all ill, is cordial speech.
-Ralph Waldo Emerson, writer and philosopher (1803-1882)
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