Do you know a few Yahoos?

Tags

English Language, Gulliver's Travels, I wonder, Jonathan Swift, lout, Word Origins, words, yahoo

Yahoo! No, I’m afraid that’s not the yahoo I want to discuss today.  Nor is Yahoo! the search engine what I wanted to write about.

Yahoo as a term actually originated in Jonathan Swift’s Gulliver’s Travels (1726), believe it or not.  It referred to a race of brutes, who had the form and all of the vices fo humans, but not the virtues… Since Swift penned the term with that usage, yahoo has come to mean any uncultivated or boorish person.  In other words, a yahoo is a lout, a philistine, or a yokel.

The yahoo yelled, “Yahoo!” when he found what he was looking for on the Yahoo! website, even though he was in the library on finals week.

When reading the above sentence, do you use differerent inflections or pronunciations with each different version of yahoo?  And I know that Yahoo! the search engine was intending to bring up connotations of excitement and success when they named their product, but did no one on their marketting team say, “Hey, wait!  This could also mean a really rude person…maybe we don’t want that linked to our product.”

What do you think?

Thanks for stopping by today!

~Jules

Xeric

Tags

Beduin, deserts, dry, English Language, Etymology, Greek Language, horny toad lizard, letter x, Word Origins, words, xeric

Do you live in a xeric environment?  Xeric is an adjective that describes something that pertains to or is adapted to a dry environment.

If you were born in a dry environment you would be a xerarch. The Beduin tribes could be described as xerarchs.  The horny toad lizards are also xerarchs, as are thousands of other creatures.

Landscapers in the midwest of the US might actually practice xeriscaping, which is arranging a design that minimizes the need for water usage.  So when you see those houses that have nothing but rocks and cactus for a front yard, it might actually be a product of xeriscaping!

The origins of this word are from the Greek word xeros, meaning dry.

Hmmm… I wonder if you were to order a dry martini, could you do it with this term? Probably not, but it might be fun to try!

Thanks for stopping by today!

~Jules

Wangle vs Wrangle

Tags

cattle, con artist, cowboys, dishonesty, English Language, Etymology, German Language, letter w, manipulation, scheming, wangle, Word Origins, words, wrangle

Wangle and Wrangle are very similar words in several regards, but I when I found one, I figured I needed to take a closer look at the second.

Wangle is a verb that describes accomplishing or obtaining something by scheming or underhanded methods.  A con artist might wangle an invitation to a party to find a wealthier crowd to pick over.  Wangle can also mean falsifying or manipulating for dishonest ends.  A crooked lawyer might wangle his business records in order to keep his true finances hidden.

Wangle came about in the 1810s and 1820s as a combination of wag, as in wagging the tongue, and dangle, as in hanging about in someone’s vicinity for your own advantage.  So wag and dangle became wangle, henceforth to be used only with negative connotations.

Whereas the word wrangle has an entirely different primary definition.  The primary meaning for wrangle is the verb to describe rounding up cattle.  The secondary definition is still different yet.  It can also mean to argue or dispute, especially in a noisy and angry manner.  Following these definitions, wrangle can be considered a synonym for wangle.  Personally, I wonder if that didn’t come about because there is only one letter difference between the words and people just eventually blurred the definitions.

Wrangle’s word origins are from Low German, however.  It comes from the word wrangeln or wrangen, which means to struggle, to make an uproar.

So a cowboy or a farmer will wrangle the wrangling cows and steers, whilst the con artist will wangle the proceeds out of the town’s coffers.

Would you prefer to wangle or wrangle?

Thanks for stopping by!

~Jules

 

Did you eat Volauvent for Thanksgiving?

Tags

English Language, French Language, letter v, meat, meat pie, pastry, pie, Sweeny Todd, Thanksgiving, volauvent, Word Origins, words

Did you eat as much as I did for Thanksgiving?  And did you eat volauvent today?  Volauvent is a word for the large shell of a light flaky pastry, usually filled with vegetable, fish, or meat mixtures.

The word is a cookery term that originated in France.  When translated, it means “flight on the wind.”  It makes me wonder if perhaps the original volauvent pies were meant to be “eat on the go” items.  Or perhaps it just refers to the flakiness of the crust.  Maybe the shell was so light and flaky that it was liable to crumble and fly off in the wind before you could lick up all the good crumbs.

However, should you find yourself somehow within the scenery of “Sweeny Todd,” I would not reccommend eating the volauvent pies from the bakery.  They might taste delicious, but the come with some mighty bad karma…

I hope you had a lovely Thanksgiving! Thanks for stopping by!

~Jules

Ugsome!

Tags

American Civil War, bandits, English Language, farmer, fun, General Sherman, horrid, kilt, letter u, loathsome, Old Norse, Robin Hood, Scottish, ubiety, ugsome, Word Origins, words

Today’s letter is “U,” and I just had to share this word with you!  Ugsome.  It just made me pause and look back at it again.  Ugsome is a word that originated in Scotland and Northern England.  And it is an adjective that describes something that is horrid and loathsome.  Isn’t it awesome!

The English root is that of uggen, to fear or cause loathing.  The Old Norse root is ugga, to fear and the dread.  And yes, it has the same roots as ugly! 

Can you imagine some Scottish man in a kilt telling tales of his enemy’s ugsomeness right before spinning a tale of how he soundly defeated the enemy?

Or how about a farmer, describing the look of an ugsome harvest?

Robin Hood was most certainly an ugsome bandit to the Sheriff of Nottingham.  (I love the story of Robin Hood!)

During the American Civil War, General Sherman burned a great deal of property in order to create ugsomeness and despair.

Do you know someone who behaves ugsomely?  I sincerely hope you don’t meet one while shopping this Christmas season!

It’s such a fun word!

I initially had a different word picked out for today, but it just wasn’t as entertaining.  I had “ubiety” highlighted for today’s blog.  Ubiety is the property of having a definite location at any given time, or the state of existing in a certain space.  But it just wasn’t as fun as “ugsome”.

Thanks for stopping by today!  See if you can slip “ugsome” into a conversation in the next couple of days!

~Jules

T for Tachygraphy

Tags

alphabet, English Language, Etymology. Letter T, Greek Language, Haley Joel Osment, High School, Kyra Sedgewick, learning, Michael Caine, Movies, Robert Duval, Secondhand Lions, Secretaries, shorthand, symbols, Technology, Word Origins, words, writing

Today’s word is tachygraphy.  If I had planned this out a little better I could have done T on Thanksgiving, but oh, well.  Tachygraphy is shorthand; writing that is used for rapid stenography.

Have you seen the movie “Secondhand Lions?”  The negligent mother (played by Kyra Sedgewick) drops her son off and says that she is going to learn tachygraphy so that she can get a job and afford to raise him properly.  Of course, she winds up not becoming a tachygrapher, instead she hooks up with a very shady character. 

If you haven’t seen it, it is a very worthwhile movie to watch.  Michael Caine, Robert Duval, and Haley Joel Osment are wonderful together!

The root of the word, tachy-, comes from the Greek combining form tachys, meaning “swift.”

I think most people develop their own forms of tachygraphy for taking notes in school or on the job.  There is a standard form of shorthand here in the US as least, but it is rarely taught anymore.  The original shorthand was created using symbols, and then Forkner’s Shorthand started to become popular in the 1960s because it used the alphabet.  In other words, you could memorize Forkner’s a lot easier than you could the original shorthand symbols, so you could be efficient at your job more quickly.

It’s kind of a shame, don’t you think? That they don’t teach it in high schools anymore? If I had been taught a tachygraphic writing style, just think of all the time and the hand ache I could have saved myself in school! 

Although we now have technology that will finish a word for us (autofinish) and correct a word or two (autocorrect, although it often makes mistakes) there is something to be said for actually writing out what it is you want to say.  Even if you write it tachygraphically.

Thanks for stopping by!

-Jules

Saccade

Tags

Choices, Decapitation, English Language, Eyes, French Language, Greek Language, Horses, Motions, Ponder, saccade, Sack, Violence, Wonder, Word Origins, words

Today’s word is saccade, which has two related meanings.  The first is the act of checking a horse quickly with a single strong pull of the reins.  The other is the series of small, jerky movements of the eyes when one changes focus from one point to another. So very strong, jerking motions are involved whenever this word should be used.

Saccade is also from the French language originally and copes from saquer, to pull violently.  It is also thought to have some relation to sachier, a word from a northern dialect of Old French, meaning to “withdraw from a sack.”

That makes me wonder what exactly they were pulling out of a sack… gold, foodstuffs, or perhaps decapitated heads of outlaws?  Hmm… What do you think they were pulling from that sack saccadicly?

Wouldn’t it just get a bit confusing, though if someone was riding a horse through a small town, pulled to a stop with a saccade, glanced around saccadicly, and then yanked a [your choice] out of his saddlebag in a saccadic motion? It can get a bit ridiculous, can’t it?

The English language is composed of 40% of words that were originally French in some form or another -according to my High School French Teacher- and I’m willing to believe that is a pretty good estimate. 

But tomorrow’s word will not be French in origin.  I’ve already picked out tomorrow’s word and it will be Greek in origin.  So make sure to stop by if you want to know what tomorrow’s word is!

Let me know what you thought of today’s word.

Thanks for stopping by!

Jules

Raconteur

Tags

chivalry, Cretien de Troyes, letter r, Shakespeare, Sir Walter Scott, storyteller, trobairitz, troubador, words

Since today is the 18th of November, I thought I would start this whole thing off with the 18th letter of the alphabet and go from there.  So the letter of the day is “R” and the word is “raconteur.”

A raconteur is a person who is skilled in relating stories and anecdotes interstingly.

It is an appropriate first word for this blog, as I am an aspiring author.  I am aiming to become a raconteur. 

Although, I should probably refer to myself as an aspiring raconteuse, which is the female counterpart to the male raconteur.

Both versions of the word originated in France and are based on the french word aconter, to tell or account.

It’s not really surprising that the French would have a word to describe someone who is skilled in storytelling.  The troubadours and trobairitz(the females) composing lyrical poetry is a well know tradition dating back to the High Middle Ages. There are several thousand examples of their works still in existance today.  The majority of their works focused on chivaly and courtly love, which eventually paved it’s way in literature to create it’s owl legends.

The stories of King Arthur and his knights of the round table that we know and cherish recorded, not by an Englishman, but by Chretien de Troyes, a Frenchman.  Sir Walter Scott used many of the elements of the traditional troubadour poetry when he wrote Ivanhoe. 

Shakespeare, the Great Bard, is a wonderful example of a reconteur who has become lauded and heralded over time until he and his works have become legends.

Oh, but the list goes on and on!  I love words and well told stories!  Don’t you?

Let me know what you think about raconteurs.  I’d appreciate any feedback you can give me!

Thanks for stopping by!

-Jules

Greetings from Jules

Salutations!

Welcome to the beginning of a grand new experiment!

I am an aspiring author(unpublished, as of yet) who has a love of words that is deeply ingrained in my soul.  I hope to share some of the strange and fun words that I have found, as well as find new friends-both in you and in new words.

My plan for this journal is to pick a letter of the alphabet each day and find a fun, interesting, or just plain funky word.  I will attempt to use said word correctly at least one time in the blog post, which may lead to a post going in a very strange direction, depending on what word we get. 

I invite you to play along with me whether you have a different fun word for the letter of the day or like the word we get and want to use it, too, please do so!

Thanks in advance!

-Jules