[Air-l] Poll on annoying Internet neologisms

[Alex Halavais]

I ran into the issues of borrowed words while living in Japan; and
beyond that, many Japanese kids were shocked to find we have 7-11s and
KFCs in the States. I suspect, however, that in noted case, the word
(cul) is hardly a new one to French ears?

- Alex



On 7/2/07, Conor Schaefer <conor.schaefer at gmail.com> wrote:
> This made me grin. I'd just like to point out the obvious here and say
> that natural languages are often prescribed, too, given the power
> relationships around education capital (newspapers, textbooks,
> dictionaries, etc.).
>
> My knowledge of how the French prescription system works is even less
> than my knowledge of the language itself, but isn't it entirely possible
> that the it is the prescription paradigm more than the natural evolution
> of the language which led the youths in your anecdote to believe "cool"
> was a French word? They were accustomed to the fact that spoken words
> are canonical and thus "owned" by their culture heritage in some way. I
> think that speakers of a natural language (who are cognizant of the fact
> that the language is natural and evolves) would be used to fact that
> words are "borrowed" and thus foreign, yet appropriated and utilized.
> Don't you think?
>
> -Conor
>
> Alexis Turner wrote:
> > Even prescribed languages evolve.  I am reminded of a friend who was recently in
> > France and was being given a hard time because he knew no French and was trying
> > to get the locals to speak to him in English - unfortunately, he had just made
> > the mistake of using the word "cool" to describe something, and the youths he
> > was interacting with were under the impression that "cool" was a French
> > word...hence, my friend was lying and must actually know French.
> > -Alexis
> >
> >
> > On Thu, 28 Jun 2007, Peter Timusk wrote:
> >
> > ::Forgive me if I am wrong but French is a prescribed language.
> > ::
> > ::
> > ::
> > ::Peter Timusk,
> > ::
> > ::On 28-Jun-07, at 5:22 PM, Derek McMillan wrote:
> > ::
> > ::> Actually I think calling a URL "earl" is rather endearing.
> > ::>
> > ::> None of the top "annoying" neologisms annoy me however. It's a free
> > ::> country, people will develop the language the way they find most
> > ::> convenient and we can't lay down what words will or will not become
> > ::> current. Tell pupils a particular turn of phrase particularly
> > ::> annoys you
> > ::> and you are asking to hear it at every turn.
> > ::>
> > ::> McDonalds know this to their cost. They have tried to have the term
> > ::> McJob (a low-paid non-union job) removed from the Oxford English
> > ::> Dictionary (and forced their employees to circulate petitions). They
> > ::> only attracted adverse publicity and ridicule for their pains.
> > ::>
> > ::>
> > + --------
> >    redheadedstepchild.org
> >         ------- +
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