Today's Word

Yesterday's Word

Archives

FAQ

AWADmail Issue 671

Sponsor’s Message:
D’yew love your mom more than words? We do. Barely. Kidding: our best-selling One Up! is a no-brainer favorite because it’s devilish fun for quick-witted kids, while teaching them a valuable lesson -- stealing gets you ahead in life! Ha. It’s a fact that our cutthroat word game is the best way to get the zombieenagers out of the house ... and into the Ivy League. And it’ll make mother, as well as this week’s Email of the Week winner Phil Graham (see below) happy, and proud too -- which is the whole point, innit? Buy 2 x (tickets to Harvard) $25. Til midnight Monday.

From: Anu Garg (words at wordsmith.org)
SUbject: Interesting stories from the net

Mr, Mrs, or Mx? The Oxford English Dictionary Considering Gender-Neutral Honorific
International Business Times
WebCite

The Strange Titles World Rulers Give Themselves
The Guardian
WebCite

The Homophonic World of Chinese Internet Addresses
New Republic
WebCite

From: Mort Sheinman (mortone aol.com)
Subject: Re: A.Word.A.Day--scop

Department of Lexiconic Coincidence: This week’s theme -- words that become other words when beheaded -- was also the theme of yesterday’s crossword puzzle in The New York Times Sunday Magazine. The title of the puzzle was “Non-Starters” and the long answers were familiar phrases from which the letter “n” had been beheaded, but which still made sense in terms of the clue. For example: “Arctic hideaway” is the clue. The answer, “A NOOK OF THE NORTH”. derived, of course, from the legendary documentary “Nanook of the North”. Or “Like makers of one-way street signs”. The answer: “ARROW MINDED”.

From: Wot Blowers (dewyew daturas.fslife.co.uk)
Subject: Scop

Until I came to live in West Cumbria I had never heard the word scop. Here, however, it means something completely different, namely, to throw, as in ‘Scop it ower t’wall for t’craas’ (throw it over the wall for the crows). The Cumbrian dialect has a very rich vocabulary which includes words that may well be unique to the area, and while it is sadly dying out, many of its words are still in everyday use, often to the consternation of visitors and ‘offcomers’ (people who have moved in to the area from outside, like me).

From: Patty Parsons Andersen (via website comments)
Subject: junto

From Ben Franklin’s autobiography:

From: Andrew Pressburger (andpress sympatico.ca)
Subject: Hauteur

Is it possible that the word auteur results from a beheading of hauteur, given the admittedly imperious attitude of many a cineaste (as even the usage quotation itself suggests)?

From: David Silverman (silverman.david.m gmail.com)
Subject: astringent

Your example of the usage of quince doesn’t jibe with my experience here in Turkey where, astringency notwithstanding, it is a very popular fruit and eaten raw. My wife, who is Turkish, peels and sections the quince (aiwa in Turkish) and places a bowl of the raw fruit in the living room. Our friends prefer it to oranges or apples.

From: Matt McNally (mattmcn telkomsa.net)
Subject: Re: A.Word.A.Day--futilitarian

Your usage example paints Dante as a futilitarian, but remember, those words were inscribed above the portal to hell, and I feel sure Dante didn’t want us to go there... I’m sure he hoped we’d each find our own ‘Beatrice’.

Percy Shelley was the Supreme scop in the name of love.

“I’m a virgin revolutionary. Please be junto with me.”

An opera diva is often a colorhauteura.

The Neutrogena executive’s horoscope showed his moon to be astringent.

And since ‘futilitarian’ is sort of a pun in itself by being a blended word...

For the under-sized bellhop, lugging my portmanteau was futilitarian.

From: Anu Garg (words at wordsmith.org)
Subject: Limericks

There once was a brilliant young scop
Whose limericks were frankly, a flop
We know that he can
But they just wouldn’t scan
Because he did not know where the last line should stop.

If you want to be part of a junto
You can’t just be in it with one toe
“This isn’t a hobby
My dear kemosabe
Lone Rangers are full-time,” said Tonto.

“Is that lake vodka or gin?”
At Geneva young Wynne asked his twin,
Who replied with hauteur,
“Mais non, c’est wauteur,
And promptly pushed young Wynne in.

The barrister’s voice sounds astringent.
“Our winning this case is contingent
on swearing that we
disingenuously
know naught of egregious infringement.”

Marion, the librarian,
Was a futilitarian.
Said she, “No denying,
There’s no point in trying,
We’ll soon all end up as just carrion.”

From: Dr. Deborah De Vries (deedvee aol.com)
Subject: Thank you!

I assign your positive website for extra credit for my Freshmen English classes for extra credit. My students are enthusiastic about the growth in vocabulary and especially enjoy the quotations. About 80% of my students are first generation English speakers.