Archive for the ‘language’ Category
31
Oct
Posted by John S in "We Take, Among Other Things, Umbrage", language. Tagged: language, nba finals, Yankees, cliff lee, Los Angeles Angels, world series, 2009 ALCS, must-win, linguistic abuses, probability differences, forgettable NBA Championships, 1986 Boston Celtics. Leave a Comment
Tim and I have each spent time challenging the uses and abuses of the English language. Josh, for his part, has highlighted words the make him cringe. It’s not unfair to say that we are sticklers for linguistic precision here at NPI.
So it is with this in mind that I take umbrage with the overuse [...]
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10
Oct
Posted by Tim in "We Take, Among Other Things, Umbrage", Social Norms, language. Tagged: ammon shea, barenaked ladies, blazing saddles, error-proof, ezra pound, generalizations of otherwise idiosyncratic preferences, jane austen, joan osborne, new york times magazine, r.e.m., rick reilly, samuel johnson, Strunk and White, The Elements of Style, The Simpsons, we miss william safire, what if God was one of us, xkcd. 5 Comments
Hi, I’m Tim, and I’m a language pedant.
I’m a corrector; you know, one of those guys that corrects you when you say something incorrectly. Think you can get away with disinterested/uninterested mishaps around me? Just ask Rick Reilly. Use reference as a verb when you mean refer and you’ll get a scolding. Same goes for [...]
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26
Jul
Posted by John S in Sunday Book Review, language. Tagged: Authority, E.B. White, Geoffrey Pullum, grammar, language, OED, Oxford comma, ripping off david foster wallace, Strunk and White, The Elements of Style, William Strunk. 3 Comments
Who died and put Strunk and White in charge of the English language?
If you talk to anyone who takes the rules of grammar and usage seriously, the names Strunk and White are bound to come up. The Elements of Style, the “little book” that was originally self-published by Professor William Strunk, Jr. at Cornell University [...]
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19
Jul
Posted by Josh in Social Norms, language. Tagged: no problem, norms, OED, possibly unjustified generalizations, thank you, you're welcome. 4 Comments
I find social norms interesting especially when it isn’t entirely clear why they exist. One I was pondering in a state of half-sleep last night was the norm of saying, “You’re welcome” after “Thank you.”
Why do we say it? The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) cites the first documented usage in W.W. Jacob’s 1907 Short Cruises. [...]
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15
Jul
Posted by John S in Symposium, language. Tagged: Carlos Mencia, david foster wallace, ethnicity jokes, George Lopez, Hamlet, Infinite Jest, Mencia Apologism, Plagiarism, Shakespeare, the aristocrats, the happy birthday song, Thomas Kyd. 1 Comment
Josh, first of all I agree that there is a wide spectrum between unoriginality and theft; perhaps I was a little too Manichean in my wording.
With that said, though, I think intent is often hard, if not impossible to determine. Take the Mencia/Lopez examples. The jokes in question are pretty standard “Mexican-culture-is-funny” jokes. I think [...]
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13
Jul
Posted by Josh in language. Tagged: blog, drawer, filmic, interaction with NPI readers, interwebs, irregardless, language, preggers, the new york accent, tummy. 1 Comment
In a past Monday Medley, we linked to a list of the most beautiful words in the English language. Tyler Cowen lists the words that make him wince based on this article:
“Some contenders:
pulchritude
chillax
hubby
no-brainer
webinar
staycation
any word starting with “mommy”
What can you add to this list?”
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