In the middle of the night a dog howls. Then another, then many others. Townspeople are awakened by the din. Gradually, one by one, they begin to howl too, and continue until morning.
“Now I understand my dog,” a local tells me the next day, “how deeply it has seen into reality without the curse of language.”
<END> … Copyright 2012 by Terence Kuch. Reprint OK if this blog is credited.
… Read Terence Kuch’s techno-thriller The Seventh Effect – for Kindle or paperback at Amazon.com.
Even our nouns tell of grief. This one, from a foreign tongue, means “death.” It’s the last thing the invaders left us, aside from raped wives and bastard children. And that one, home-grown, means “despair.” We speak it frequently.
– after Julia Kristeva
<END> … Copyright 2012 by Terence Kuch. Reprint OK if this blog is credited.
Read Terence Kuch’s Midnight Central: Erotic / Ironic Poems – for Kindle at Amazon.com.
It was such a wonderful trip, you know? We wanted to experience the place before it was spoiled by tourists yammering their civilized tongues. Yes, we had some language lessons, but we were still overwhelmed by the real thing. Imagine! names for five warmths of water, not just “warm”; unexpected kinds of irregular verbs; the tense that means “maybe”; six grammatical genders even though they still have only the same old two sexes that we have, ha ha.
In spite of the pills we’d brought, we were infected by the third day. We began to have thoughts impossible in our own language – thoughts that filled us with wonder – that raised questions.
Even now, back home, we still have occasional foreign thoughts, dangerous thoughts. But we should be completely cured in a few weeks. And then they will let us out.
<END> … Copyright 2012 by Terence Kuch. OK to link, or reprint if this blog is credited.
Coming soon from Ink Smith Publications: Terence Kuch’s second novel, See/Saw – a sci-fi gender-bender murder mystery in a setting of international intrigue.
Merriam-Webster will be happy to email you a word every day, with its uses, examples of use, and etymology. This is an informative service, and recommended. However, the pronunciations M-W recommends are often slovenly, at times too-obviously reflecting practices of ignorant people. This just encourages, and serves to justify, sloppy speech. It also bedevils new Americans (and our children, too) who are trying their best to learn our language. It’s no wonder that the English spoken by people who were educated in India, Africa, or the Mid-East, for example, is often clearer and more intelligible than that of native Americans such as myself.
Example: How would you say “exasperate”? The folks at M-W seem to pronounce it \ig-ZAS-puh-rayt\. Or perhaps they don’t actually say it this way, themselves; they just think that most Americans do, and therefore we all should.
There are several problems with “\ig-ZAS-puh-rayt\”:
(a) Where did the initial ‘i’ and ‘g’ come from? What’s wrong with ‘e’ and ‘x’ (\ks\), just as spelled? I’ve lived in six U.S. states (both coasts and in between); I don’t think I’ve ever heard “\ig-ZAS-puh-rayt\”.
(b) The derivation of the word is ‘ex’, plus ‘asper’, plus a common suffix. In English, we would split this word, if needed, both in speaking and in spelling, exactly that way: ex-asper…’. M-W splits the initial consonant between two syllables, resulting in a \ZAS\ that has no historical justification.
(c) If we must have \puhrayt\, at least split it \puhr-ayt\, giving a decent respect to the embedded ‘asper’, and the existence of ‘ate’ \ayt\ (not ‘rate’) as an English suffix with the required meaning.
(d) Any recommended pronunciation, such as \ig-ZAS-puh-rayt\, either respects the evolution of the word, or privileges the speech of one class or region. In the past, the speech of wealthy white people in the Northeast was privileged over the speech of, for example, whites in Tennessee or Idaho, and over racial minorities as well. The only way to avoid such snobbery is to base pronunciation on the structure of the word itself, and its evolution over time.
“Not a sermon; just a harangue.”
(References: See the discussion of “speak as you spell” in Modern English Usage, 2d edition, p.483; see also the analogous discussion in the 1st edition, p.466f. Fowler would have liked “\ig-ZAS-puh-rayt\”.)
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“Hoity toity” means “uppity”, or “pretentious”. It’s doubtful that there are any real products or services bearing this name. — And yet, a Web search on “hoity toity” produced the following ‘sponsored links’:
Hoity Toity game – $20. http://www.Boardgames4Us.com
Buy Hoity Toity for a great price. Free shipping on orders over $100.
Hoity Toity — Browse Our Huge hoity toity Selection. Shop Exava. www.exava.com
Hoity Toity at Amazon. Low prices on Hoity Toity. Qualified orders over $25 ship free. Amazon.com.
– I can’t wait !
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