Let's "Bant" About these New Words, "Bruhs!"

[AuntShecky]

The Oxford Dictionary has issued a list of new words (http://blog.oxforddictionaries.com/press-releases/oxforddictionaries-com-quarterly-update-new-words-added-today-include-hangry-grexit-and-wine-oclock/). (Scroll down the web page for all the definitions.)

A couple of the words, such as the two references to the Reddit website, are too “inside baseball” or over-specialized. Others, such as “Brexit,” “Grexit,” are a tad ephemeral and might not survive over the next news cycle. And even if you’re a frequent patron of restaurants rather than a cook-at-home person, you probably won’t use the new culinary terms - “cakeage,” “cat cake,” “barbacoa” every day.

Yet many of the new coinages are appealing: “”bant” “butt (or pocket) dialing,” and “weak sauce.” On the other hand, I’m not a big fan of “awesomesauce,” since “awesome” itself has been used almost as many times as we’ve had to listen to that ubiquitous song from “Frozen.”

Although it’s not included in the list, another term I dislike is “like” in the sense of “said.” Not too long ago, language purists used to get “butt-hurt” when kids used to substitute “go” for “said”: “He goes ‘I’m leaving,’ and I go ‘So soon?’ “ But now “go”has been replaced by “like.” “ He’s like ‘I’m outa here,’ and I’m like ‘WTF!’ “

Believe or not, I am actually relieved that we’re still creative enough to invent new words. That’s what keeps language alive. It helps me feel better to know that we haven’t yet become a post-verbal society. (http://www.online-literature.com/forums/showthread.php?82661-Are-We-Becoming-a-Post-Verbal-Society&p=1303639#post1303639)

http://blog.oxforddictionaries.com/press-releases/oxforddictionaries-com-quarterly-update-new-words-added-today-include-hangry-grexit-and-wine-oclock/

http://www.online-literature.com/forums/showthread.php?82661-Are-We-Becoming-a-Post-Verbal-Society&p=1303639#post1303639

[YesNo]

I've never been able to figure out how someone dial someone with their butt.

[Gilliatt Gurgle]

I was just getting a handle on fat with a ph and was recently chastised for being out of touch.


I've never been able to figure out how someone dial someone with their butt.

Well placed cellulite.

[MANICHAEAN]

Or as they say in Jamaica:
" I'mn duppy batty-boy, donn cum in me garden an steel me mango, like theef in de night. Lord ha mercy man."

[Tyrion Cheddar]

The Oxford Dictionary has issued a list of new words (http://blog.oxforddictionaries.com/press-releases/oxforddictionaries-com-quarterly-update-new-words-added-today-include-hangry-grexit-and-wine-oclock/). (Scroll down the web page for all the definitions.)

A couple of the words, such as the two references to the Reddit website, are too “inside baseball” or over-specialized. Others, such as “Brexit,” “Grexit,” are a tad ephemeral and might not survive over the next news cycle. And even if you’re a frequent patron of restaurants rather than a cook-at-home person, you probably won’t use the new culinary terms - “cakeage,” “cat cake,” “barbacoa” every day.

Yet many of the new coinages are appealing: “”bant” “butt (or pocket) dialing,” and “weak sauce.” On the other hand, I’m not a big fan of “awesomesauce,” since “awesome” itself has been used almost as many times as we’ve had to listen to that ubiquitous song from “Frozen.”

Although it’s not included in the list, another term I dislike is “like” in the sense of “said.” Not too long ago, language purists used to get “butt-hurt” when kids used to substitute “go” for “said”: “He goes ‘I’m leaving,’ and I go ‘So soon?’ “ But now “go”has been replaced by “like.” “ He’s like ‘I’m outa here,’ and I’m like ‘WTF!’ “

Believe or not, I am actually relieved that we’re still creative enough to invent new words. That’s what keeps language alive. It helps me feel better to know that we haven’t yet become a post-verbal society.

No, just a post-literate one, hence most of these "new words," which sound more like the prattling of stoners at a drum circle on 4/20 than any identifiable language.

I agree with your point that language is and in some sense needs to be a flexible, ever-growing thingy (there, see, I can be hip), but that doesn't mean all rules of grammar, spelling, etc. should be thrown out, along with the requirement--which any civilization that wishes to remain so must have--that its youth master said domain if they wish to be allowed entrance into the necessary and desirable arenas of adult life. (Which also means, of course, that teachers must themselves be sufficiently educated to provide such education, something increasingly uncommon.)

Call me old-fashioned and a purist ("You're old-fashioned! And a purist!"), but I experience the constant degradation of the English language with actual pain, and cringe when I hear new -isms from the world of gaming incorporated into mainstream usage. Example: Hi, spelled 'hai'. 'Fail' replacing 'failure', being used now as both noun and verb. Gawd almighty.

At this juncture I could dazzle you all further, but I must shower and go to the orthopedist to see if he can relieve the gout in my right knee. Try not to be jealous.

[Ecurb]

I just hope nobody thinks beer-o-clock is 4:20 pm.

[Clopin]

Weak Sauce

The OED is about ten years late on this one. I'm pretty sure nobody says this anymore. What an epic fail!

[North Star]

No, just a post-literate one, hence most of these "new words," which sound more like the prattling of stoners at a drum circle on 4/20 than any identifiable language.

I agree with your point that language is and in some sense needs to be a flexible, ever-growing thingy (there, see, I can be hip), but that doesn't mean all rules of grammar, spelling, etc. should be thrown out, along with the requirement--which any civilization that wishes to remain so must have--that its youth master said domain if they wish to be allowed entrance into the necessary and desirable arenas of adult life. (Which also means, of course, that teachers must themselves be sufficiently educated to provide such education, something increasingly uncommon.)

Call me old-fashioned and a purist ("You're old-fashioned! And a purist!"), but I experience the constant degradation of the English language with actual pain, and cringe when I hear new -isms from the world of gaming incorporated into mainstream usage. Example: Hi, spelled 'hai'. 'Fail' replacing 'failure', being used now as both noun and verb. Gawd almighty.


fail (n.) late 13c., "failure, deficiency" (as in without fail), from Old French faile "deficiency," from falir (see fail (v.)). The Anglo-French form of the verb, failer, also came to be used as a noun, hence failure.

Or, as Shakespeare (or J. Fletcher) wrote in Henry VIII: How grounded hee his Title to the Crowne Vpon our faile.

Here's an interesting video of Mark Forsyth talking about some rules of the English language, teachers of the rule 'I before E', that being their mistake, and probably not the first one, either. More like their eighth one.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v0bds2vFg0M

[North Star]

The OED is about ten years late on this one. I'm pretty sure nobody says this anymore. What an epic fail!

And Forsyth covers this, too. The OED tells how language has been used, not how it is used at this precise moment.

[Clopin]

Isn't I before E meant to cover situations where there might be some confusion over the spelling regarding the pronunciation? I can't imagine anyone confusing a word like Eight with Ieght, because that simply makes no sense phonetically. Likewise 'Being' would be harder to confuse with 'Bieing' than, for example, 'Believe' with 'Beleive'.

[Clopin]

i before e,
Except after c,
Or when sounded as "a,"
As in neighbour and weigh

There are exceptions to this obviously but I don't know that it's fair for Forsyth to say that "only 43 words obey the rule while over 900 except it" when the rule is only applicable to words where the spelling/pronunciation could cause confusion.


On the same blog in 2009, Geoff Pullum wrote, 'The rule is always taught, by anyone who knows what they are doing, as "i before e except after c when the sound is 'ee'."'

[Methinks]

There is a legitimate argument for language as a construct defined by constant evolution, based off of common use, and context. Yet it still hurts me to read about this latest development.

[North Star]

Isn't I before E meant to cover situations where there might be some confusion over the spelling regarding the pronunciation? I can't imagine anyone confusing a word like Eight with Ieght, because that simply makes no sense phonetically. Likewise 'Being' would be harder to confuse with 'Bieing' than, for example, 'Believe' with 'Beleive'.
"Keith, seize one of the deities before either eats a weird protein bar and thinks about eigenfrequencies."

[Lykren]

Wow cool! I misspell 'eigenfrequencies' all the time, now I never will again.

[Clopin]

"Keith, seize one of the deities before either eats a weird protein bar and thinks about eigenfrequencies."

Yes, there are exceptions.

[North Star]

Wow cool! I misspell 'eigenfrequencies' all the time, now I never will again.
Just make sure your heirs know how to spell it too.


Yes, there are exceptions.
So, the rule should be:
i before e,
Except after c,
Or when sounded as "a,"
Or when it should obviously be e before i,
Or in various other reasonably common exceptions.

[Clopin]

Heirs is sounded as 'a'! Phonetically it would make no sense if it were spelled Hiers and pronounced 'airs'. The rule only applies to words where there could be some confusion of spelling due to the pronunciation; science, for example, is not an important word for discussing this rule, and neither is vein (well it sounds as A at least).

Seize is a real exception, as is Weird. In both cases they can be confusingly flipped around and still seem to make some phonetic sense: Sieze and Wierd.

[Eiseabhal]

You would expect weird to be an exception.