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Intro C: Mini-FAQ on Words & Phrases |
Subject: Intro C: Mini-FAQ on Words and Phrases
Last Revised 2010-07-12 (12 July 2010)
* = recently revised
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Intro C: Mini-FAQ on Words and Phrases
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Questions on the meaning or origin of these words and phrases are asked
extremely frequently on alt.usage.english. There are longer answers,
with more examples, for most of these items in the full AUE FAQ (edited
by Mark Israel). Many of these topics cause much argument, and we
earnestly request that you do some research before deciding to post on
these.
CONTENTS OF THIS MINI FAQ:
General Words and Phrases
- American
- "beg the question"
* - "billion"
- "cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey"
- England, Britain, Great Britain, United Kingdom, etc.
- "exception proves the rule"
- "full monty"
- "O.K."
- "push the envelope"
- "whole nine yards"
Words Relating to alt.usage.english and Usenet
- "obaue" or "ObAUE"
- "pond," "pondian," etc.
- "rhotic" and "nonrhotic"
Miscellany
- What words are their own antonym?
* - words ending in "-gry"
* - Did Shakespeare invent a large number of words?
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GENERAL WORDS AND PHRASES
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
-------- American -------- Should US citizens call themselves "Americans"? The fact is: they do. And they call their country "America," among other terms. To modern speakers of the English language, both in the US and elsewhere, these are the most frequent meanings of the words "America" and "American." However, to many people outside the USA, the name "America" (with various spellings: Amerique, Amerika, etc.) can quite normally mean the entire "New World." That tradition goes back to the days of the first European explorers. We have heard complaints from time to time, especially from native Spanish speakers, that the citizens of the United States of America have commandeered the name, as if they were the only ones in the Americas. These attempts to convince US residents to start calling themselves something else, such as USonians or USans, in deference to the other inhabitants of the landmass, usually lead only to anger and bafflement, on both sides. However, when explaining why they call themselves "American," those in the US are hereby cautioned not to overstate the case and imply that any other use of the word is wrong, impossible, or obsolete. "American" has indeed been used for a very long time, as an English word, to mean "an inhabitant of, or pertaining to, the Americas." This meaning is supported by all major dictionaries, although many of us encounter it only rarely, in fixed combinations such as the American crocodile, the Organization of American States, and the Pan-American Games. ------------------ "beg the question" ------------------ Fowler defines "begging the question" as the "fallacy of founding a conclusion on a basis that as much needs to be proved as the conclusion itself." "Question" here does not mean "a sentence in interrogative form". Rather, it means "the point at issue, the thing that the person is trying to prove". Common varieties of begging the question are paraphrase of the statement to be proved ("Telepathy cannot exist because direct transfer of thought between individuals is impossible"), and arguing in a circle ("The Bible must be true, because God wouldn't lie to us; we know God is trustworthy, because it says so in the Bible"). More and more, one can hear people using "begs the question" where others would prefer they said, "raises the question." ------------ * "billion" ------------ "Billion" is a word which is somewhat ambiguous in U.K. practice, but not in American. For several centuries in Britain, it meant "a million million" (1,000,000,000,000 = 10^12 = US trillion), but in 1974, the British government announced that it would use "billion" to mean 10^9, the same as US usage. For the last several decades, English-language publishers have used "billion" or "thousand million" for 1,000,000,000 = 10^9 = US billion. The "old" use is still encountered just often enough (in speech, informal writing, and older books) to cause some Britons to be unsure of what the speaker or writer means by the word. The first few U.S. words for large numbers, and the corresponding traditional British terms, are as follows: U.S. Traditional British 10^6 million million 10^9 billion thousand million or milliard 10^12 trillion billion or million million 10^15 quadrillion thousand billion 10^18 quintillion trillion Scientists have long preferred to express numbers in figures rather than in words, so it is easy to avoid "billion" in contexts where precision is required. The plural, "billions", is still used freely with the colloquial meaning of "a very large number". Some articles with more history about these terms: http://www.unc.edu/~rowlett/units/large.html http://www.numericana.com/answer/culture.htm#zillion http://www.sizes.com/numbers/big_numName.htm ----------------------------------------------------- "cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey" ----------------------------------------------------- We have examined various explanations for this phrase; some we reject as impossible, and others suffer from lack of evidence. In particular, the story that it relates to cannonballs stacked on a brass frame on board ship has no historic or scientific support. Without repeating the flawed theory in detail: the word used for a cannonball stand was "garland," not "monkey"; garlands were not brass; and it would have been most unlikely that balls were stacked in such a way that daily pitching and tossing of the ship would free them (which would have to have been the case if the tiny effect of metal expansion from the cold was thought to jar them loose). ------------------------------------------------------- England, Britain, Great Britain, United Kingdom, etc. ------------------------------------------------------- We are often asked what the difference is among these and similar terms. Two long and thorough responses can be found in the AUE FAQ Supplement; one written by John Davies and one by Don Aitken. http://www.alt-usage-english.org/english_british_uk_et_al.shtml http://www.alt-usage-english.org//whatistheuk.html ------------------------------- "exception proves the rule" ------------------------------- Interestingly, the old (some would say "real") meaning of this phrase is something like "the exception proves that there *is* a rule." The common misconception is that "proves" in this phrase means "tests". That is *not* the case, although "proof" *does* mean "test" in such locutions as "proving ground" and "The proof of the pudding is in the eating." The Dictionary of Modern English Usage explains this saying as follows: "'Special leave is given for men to be out of barracks tonight till 11.0 p.m.'; 'The exception proves the rule' means that this special leave implies a rule requiring men, except when an exception is made, to be in earlier. The value of this in interpreting statutes is plain." ------------- "full monty" ------------- This British expression means "the whole thing". Although it seems to be a fairly recent coining, none of the many theories about its origin has been verified. See full FAQ and Michael Quinion's good summary at <http://www.worldwidewords.org/articles/monty.htm> ------ "O.K." ------ This one has generated *lots* of folklore. "Oll korrect, popularized by Old Kinderhook" is what's given in most up-to-date dictionaries. The earliest known citation is from the Boston Morning Post of 23 March 1839. There is a whole string of other theories, given in the AUE FAQ. ------------------- "push the envelope" ------------------- "Push the envelope" is now used figuratively to mean "stretch the boundaries". The phrase has its origins in the world of aviation, where 'envelope' has, since at least the late 60s, had the meaning 'a set of performance limits that may not be safely exceeded.' Test pilots are often called on to 'push' a new aircraft's performance envelope by going beyond known safety limits, as in determining just how fast an airplane can be flown. The best-seller 'The Right Stuff' by Tom Wolfe did much to popularize the notion, using variations such as 'pushing the outside of the envelope.' ----------------------- "whole nine yards" ----------------------- This phrase, meaning "all of it, everything", is first attested to in the mid-1960s. The origin is a matter for speculation. Nine yards is not a particularly significant distance either in football or in the garment business. There is no record of it ever being used during the era of sailing ships. Another theory is that the phrase refers to the capacity of ready-mix concrete trucks, alleged to average about 9 cubic yards. However, industry literature on the 1960s shows that standard mixers held 4.5 or 6.2 cubic yards (see <http://tafkac.org/language/etymology/nine_yards.html>.) So far, no machine gun has been identified with an ammo belt nine yards long, although some may have been close. There are good summaries of the "whole nine yards" theories at: Michael Quinion's World Wide Words site http://www.worldwidewords.org/articles/nineyards.htm Evan Morris's Word Detective site http://www.word-detective.com/back-s.html#yards http://www.word-detective.com/072999.html#wholenine David Wilton's Etymologies & Word Origins http://www.wordorigins.org/index.php/site/comments/whole_nine_yards_the/ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ WORDS RELATING TO ALT.USAGE.ENGLISH AND USENET ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ------------------ "obaue" or "ObAUE" ------------------ This is derived from OBligatory and a.u.e (alt.usage.english). It is used to introduce a snippet of on-topic content in an otherwise off- topic posting, as in: {Posting about recipe for yak-flavoured ice cream} Obaue: "yak" is a slang word meaning "to talk incessantly". The "ob..." prefix is believed to have originated in alt.hack, with an obligatory piece of code being labelled "obhack". ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ "pond," "pondian," etc. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The "pond" is a nickname for "the Atlantic Ocean" that goes back to at least 1780. Because discussions here often turn to regional language differences between the English of the US and Canada, on one hand, and the United Kingdom and Ireland, on the other, we playfully invent and use terms like "pondian difference," "transpondental," "Leftpondia" (North America), "Antipondean" (Australian), etc. So, a "pondial difference" or "pondian difference" is an intercontinental difference in English usage. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ "rhotic" and "nonrhotic" ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ You will see a.u.e participants using these words to describe a major dialectal difference in English speech around the world. The word "rhotic" comes from "rho," the Greek letter whose pronunciation resembles our R. Basically, rhotic people do what is colloquially thought of as "pronouncing their Rs". Non-rhotic people do not pronounce Rs that appear at the ends of words or before consonants (though the R may affect the vowel sound). For example, non-rhotic people say "teachuh" and rhotic people say "teachurr." Both groups pronounce the R sound in "tomorrow" (between two vowels). Most speakers in the US (especially the West and Midwest), Canada, Ireland, Scotland, and some parts of the north and west of England are rhotic. The South of England (including RP, "received pronunciation"), Australia, and parts of the US East Coast and South are nonrhotic. ~~~~~~~~~~~~ MISCELLANY ~~~~~~~~~~~~ --------------------------------- What words are their own antonym? --------------------------------- Richard Lederer, in 'Crazy English', calls these "contronyms". They can be divided into homographs (same spelling) and homophones (same pronunciation). The full FAQ includes a long list of such words, including homographs dust = to remove fine particles, to add fine particles fast = rapid, unmoving homophones: aural, oral = heard, spoken erupt, irrupt = burst out, burst in ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ * words ending in "-gry" ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Questions like this belong in rec.puzzles, not here; consult the rec.puzzles archive. However, the short answer is: THERE IS NO COMMON THIRD WORD ENDING IN "-GRY". The full FAQ gives a long list of extremely obscure words which do. The real problem with this riddle is that it is a trick question, which only works with a spoken question. There are several possible forms of the original trick, one of which is: "Think of words ending in 'gry'. Angry and hungry are two of them. There are three words in the English language. What is the third word? The word is something that everyone uses every day." The answer in this case is "language" (the first two words being "the" and "English" -- the trick is that "the English language" is to be treated as if in quotation marks). A person who doesn't know the trick and asks someone else to try the puzzle will almost certainly change the wording, unwittingly making it insoluble. Wikipedia has an article with a small amount of history and a large number of variants: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/-gry ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Did Shakespeare invent a large number of words? ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The claim is sometimes made that William Shakespeare coined an unusually large number of words, because for centuries his plays and poems contained the first uses known to later generations. An example of this claim is the book _Coined by Shakespeare: Words and Meanings First Penned by the Bard_, by Jeffrey McQuain and Stanley Malless, 1998, and a list of examples is at: http://www.rhymezone.com/r/gwic.cgi?Path=shakespeare/coinages// However, the editors of the Oxford English Dictionary now say that by looking at texts written by less well-known sixteenth-century authors on Literature Online, we have confirmed our suspicions that in many of these cases Shakespeare was using words which were already current. http://www.oed.com/newsletters/2002-12/mining.html ------------------------------------------------------- ------------------------------------------------------- This series of seven "Intro Documents" is intended to aid newcomers to the newsgroup. The articles are posted frequently in the newsgroup and are installed at this Web site for your convenience, along with a menu of links to the seven Intro documents. Much of this document is taken from the AUE FAQ (edited by Mark Israel) and the rest was written by Albert Marshall and others. Suggestions for improvements in clarity, fairness, accuracy, and brevity should be e-mailed to me. -- Donna Richoux
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