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Abuses of the English language

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https://sigforum.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/230601935/m/1390038834

March 09, 2018, 03:30 PM
pbramlett
Abuses of the English language
I'll be the first to admit to slaughtering words or phrases on occasion but it is rare. It seems though that society has accepted a phrase that just grates on my nerves.

"Because COLORS!" or "Because Friday" "Because xxxx"

the omission of a preposition or contraction is very irritating. Especially in commercials on TV or even the billboard I saw this morning that said "because colors"

I'm not going to buy the new Coke because of a colored can. Even less so if you just say "because colors"

I know it is silly for this to bother me but that is my issue today.

Oh, and "Because 10 mirrameter!" Smile




Regards,

P.
March 09, 2018, 04:02 PM
DrewR
I am reminded of a friend of mine that I met while working on an IT help desk who, when speaking over the phone, will sound like an Oxford professor. Everything is carefully enunciatedand and his sentence structure is correct. Frankly, everything just flows naturally without any accent or inflection and you have no doubt that he has both an education and an intelligent mind.

However, once he is off the phone and talking about something unrelated to work (usually firearms and how much he hates the government) you realize that he is a political refugee from New England who spent too many years in the Army (slang, mis-pronounced words, slaughtered metaphors, and a whole host of other complaints).

Truthfully, I hate calling to coordinate anything and I prefer communicating with him via text message because I am always caught off guard by the difference and it is disturbing.


Laughing in the face of danger is all well and good until danger laughs back.
March 09, 2018, 04:33 PM
bobtheelf
Because colloquialisms.
March 09, 2018, 04:38 PM
pbramlett
Smile




Regards,

P.
March 09, 2018, 05:15 PM
tatortodd
This morning, I listened to a fellow with a masters in engineering give a presentation to a room full of managers, engineers, and draftsman. Every time he said the word "ask" he pronounced it as "axe" and he said "axe" frequently enough in one portion of his presentation that it was distracting. SMH.



Ego is the anesthesia that deadens the pain of stupidity

DISCLAIMER: These are the author's own personal views and do not represent the views of the author's employer.
March 09, 2018, 05:48 PM
Rey HRH
Because intensified meaning!

It's a valid means of communicating more than words can convey. I doubt you hear that as part of a formal presentation or read it in a doctoral thesis. It's usually a criticism of the reason being given as the people who would give that reason are thought of to be so backward they can't speak English correctly. In addition to criticising the stated reason, they are also mocking those who would offer/accept the reason.

It's caveman talk. "food good. fire hot. Because aliens!"



"It did not really matter what we expected from life, but rather what life expected from us. We needed to stop asking about the meaning of life, and instead to think of ourselves as those who were being questioned by life – daily and hourly. Our answer must consist not in talk and meditation, but in right action and in right conduct. Life ultimately means taking the responsibility to find the right answer to its problems and to fulfill the tasks which it constantly sets for each individual." Viktor Frankl, Man's Search for Meaning, 1946.
March 09, 2018, 05:55 PM
sigfreund
quote:
Originally posted by tatortodd:
it was distracting.


That’s my beef about such things: I call them speedbumps, and I believe public speakers should be aware of the things that detract from their presentations.

I’m nevertheless more tolerant of pronunciation issues than written misuse because sometimes it’s simply a matter of dialect. I was always amused when people (usually leftists or members of the BSmedia who couldn’t think of anything else to criticize) got into a tizzy about how G. W. Bush pronounced nuclear. I remember that no one seemed to be upset when Johnson pronounced Viet Nam as veet naam (to rhyme with ma’am).




6.0/94.0

I can tell at sight a Chassepot rifle from a javelin.
March 09, 2018, 06:40 PM
9mmepiphany
quote:
I remember that no one seemed to be upset when Johnson pronounced Viet Nam as veet naam (to rhyme with ma’am).

I always thought that was just how Texans pronounced it




No, Daoism isn't a religion



March 09, 2018, 08:51 PM
elde
^^^^^^^^

I for one, still do. Smile


----------------------------------------
“The further a society drifts from truth, the more it will hate those who speak it.”
March 09, 2018, 11:02 PM
djpaintles
quote:
Originally posted by tatortodd:
This morning, I listened to a fellow with a masters in engineering give a presentation to a room full of managers, engineers, and draftsman. Every time he said the word "ask" he pronounced it as "axe" and he said "axe" frequently enough in one portion of his presentation that it was distracting. SMH.


Metathesis. Ask vs Axe is a perfect example. It is a common linguistic occurrence. Do you think "Butterfly" wasn't originally "Flutterby"? (Hint, it was originally Flutterby). Language is fluid and changes. It can be frustrating momentarily but in the end as long as your meaning is well understood the rest is pedantry.......


Remember, this is all supposed to be for fun...................
March 10, 2018, 02:26 AM
bobtheelf
quote:
Originally posted by djpaintles:
Metathesis. Ask vs Axe is a perfect example. It is a common linguistic occurrence. Do you think "Butterfly" wasn't originally "Flutterby"? (Hint, it was originally Flutterby). Language is fluid and changes. It can be frustrating momentarily but in the end as long as your meaning is well understood the rest is pedantry.......


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Butterfly#Etymology
March 10, 2018, 07:18 AM
tatortodd
quote:
Originally posted by djpaintles:
quote:
Originally posted by tatortodd:
This morning, I listened to a fellow with a masters in engineering give a presentation to a room full of managers, engineers, and draftsman. Every time he said the word "ask" he pronounced it as "axe" and he said "axe" frequently enough in one portion of his presentation that it was distracting. SMH.


Metathesis. Ask vs Axe is a perfect example. It is a common linguistic occurrence. Do you think "Butterfly" wasn't originally "Flutterby"? (Hint, it was originally Flutterby). Language is fluid and changes. It can be frustrating momentarily but in the end as long as your meaning is well understood the rest is pedantry.......
Bullshit. At some point in the speaker’s life he was trying to sound more street with ebonics and it became a bad habit that doesn’t serve him well professionally. Bobtheelf’s post addresses your butterfly aspect.



Ego is the anesthesia that deadens the pain of stupidity

DISCLAIMER: These are the author's own personal views and do not represent the views of the author's employer.
March 10, 2018, 08:25 AM
sigmonkey
quote:
Originally posted by djpaintles:... It is a common linguistic occurrence. Do you think "Butterfly" wasn't originally "Flutterby"? (Hint, it was originally Flutterby)....


Incorrect.

Butterfly is the original term

Old English as far back as the 700s used the word/spelling "butterfleoge".

It is more than a stretch to believe that it started out as fleogebutter, and was somehow transposed and stuck.

More likely a play on the word with some mother and child. Anyone who has been around an adult and a small child or children will hear all manner of such things.

For example some in our family:

Grinny pig or Grinnies for guinea pig.
Hoggermole for Ground hog (long story on that one).

Shnoppie for schnauzer.

Heckalopper for helicopter. And since that is what one can do, "Heck a lopper" probably was the original word, but someone must have mixed it up in a news journal or something.

And yes, flutterby for butterfly.




"the meaning of life, is to give life meaning" Ani Yehudi אני יהודי Le'olam lo shuv לעולם לא שוב!
March 10, 2018, 08:34 AM
JR78
Roll up in the hood, I only get about every third word.


______________________________
Men who carry guns for a living do not seek reward outside of the guild. The most cherished gift is a nod from his peers.
March 10, 2018, 05:07 PM
Gutpile Charlie
I would have absolutely no respect for someone that said "axe" instead of "ask". That's pure bullshit. It doesn't sound cool, it sounds like you are a damn fool. Using incorrect words when you know better just shows what kind of clown you really are.



"If you think everything's going to be alright, you don't understand the problem!"- Gutpile Charlie
"A man's got to know his limitations" - Harry Callahan

March 10, 2018, 08:47 PM
mr kablammo
Keep calm and conversate like adults about this.


"It is only with the heart that one can see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye". The Little Prince, Antoine de Saint-Exupery, pilot and author, lost on mission, July 1944, Med Theatre.
March 10, 2018, 10:30 PM
Orguss
quote:
Originally posted by tatortodd:
Bullshit. At some point in the speaker’s life he was trying to sound more street with ebonics and it became a bad habit that doesn’t serve him well professionally.

I'm assuming you're talking about the pronunciation of "axe" for ask. I'm interested to know why you contribute it to ebonics. The first time I heard it said like that it was by some Italian mobster on television.



"I'm yet another resource-consuming kid in an overpopulated planet raised to an alarming extent by Hollywood and Madison Avenue, poised with my cynical and alienated peers to take over the world when you're old and weak!" - Calvin, "Calvin & Hobbes"
March 11, 2018, 12:03 AM
tatortodd
quote:
Originally posted by Orguss:
quote:
Originally posted by tatortodd:
Bullshit. At some point in the speaker’s life he was trying to sound more street with ebonics and it became a bad habit that doesn’t serve him well professionally.

I'm assuming you're talking about the pronunciation of "axe" for ask. I'm interested to know why you contribute it to ebonics. The first time I heard it said like that it was by some Italian mobster on television.
1. First time I heard it was from an African American and that was 20+ years ago
2. Ask is one of the examples given in ebonics on Wikipedia
3. Ask OR aks OR axe ebonics gets 200,000 hits if you Google it.



Ego is the anesthesia that deadens the pain of stupidity

DISCLAIMER: These are the author's own personal views and do not represent the views of the author's employer.
March 11, 2018, 12:38 AM
Orguss
Cool. I still heard it from an Italian character before ebonics was even a word.



"I'm yet another resource-consuming kid in an overpopulated planet raised to an alarming extent by Hollywood and Madison Avenue, poised with my cynical and alienated peers to take over the world when you're old and weak!" - Calvin, "Calvin & Hobbes"
March 11, 2018, 12:43 AM
Kevbo
I have a buddy that hates it when people add the “s” to saving in daylight saving time

He will spend all day tomorrow telling people it is daylight saving time not daylight savings time


I’m tempted to send him a link to the topic in this very forum to see if he will join just to make the correction

I used to do that..send him various places where it was said incorrectly just to see if I could get him to blow a gasket


The hilarity is, with this exception, he is a normal, standard father of three


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If the meek will inherit the earth, what will happen to us tigers?