Word of the week 27 11 2017: what do you call bad-tempered people?

First of all, forgive me this series of negatively loaded terms but maybe there is something in it that reflects the way I like to look at the world. The inspiration for today’s word is actually a Spanish word, which you may try and guess if you know the language. The answer will be posted next week. A perfect day for autumntime I guess when people tend to have their emotional ups and downs, can get moody and ever quarrelsome. One of my favourite words, because, again, it sounds pretty much like it semantics.

CANTANKEROUS /kanˈtaŋk(ə)rəs/

Defined as: bad-tempered/ill-tempered, arguing, picking fights. Used mainly to talk about older people, but, to be fair, there are loads of young human beings behaving this way, too, so no one can feel offended. Still, the Cambridge Dictionary does justice to steretypes and cites the following example of usage:

“He’s getting a bit cantankerous in his old age”

This is actually confirmed by the collocates in the COCA; old and nature being the most popular ones basically means that old people are often cantankerous by nature, at least linguistically. Amongst the 291 instances in the COCA, we can find real gems such as the following:

• “Or maybe she had thought in the year since he had been kicked in the head by a cantankerous milk cow that he had somehow become whole again.”
• “And then Democrats seem to be less noisy and cantankerous when their own president does it.”
• “She’s from Brooklyn. She’s Italian. She’s old and she’s cantankerous. And these are the sorts of things that bother her for some reason.”
• “This musical comedy features a cantankerous troll, persnickety chickens and other characters.”

 

The end. So do you know which Spanish word I mentioned at the beginning?

Word of the week 20 11 2017: how to describe a mess?

The word I have chosen for this week will come in handy when describing messy and confusing situations. Part of its appeal probably lies in its pretty self-explanatory form, quite transparent etymology and alliteration.

TOPSY-TURVY /ˌtɒp.siˈtɜː.vi/

The Cambridge dictionary defines it as “(in a state of being) confused, not well organised, or giving importance to unexpected things”. Merriam-Webster is less elaborate – “in utter confusion or disorder” and both dictionaries provide “upside down” as a synonym. The latter is confirmed by its etymology; whereas the first component means “the highest part” (top), the second comes from a now obsolete English verb to terve meaning “to turn upside down”.

Some examples from the COCA.

• but isn’t this kind of an upside down, topsy-turvy situation?
• The topsy-turvy layout is an unknown to many of the players…
• Yet even if things aren’t going to get topsy-turvy, you still need to buckle up.

It also collocates with words such as: world, everything (sic!), reality, industry, market, economy, logic and the verb turn (just like upside down).

I hope your week isn’t too topsy-turvy!

 

Word of the week 13 Nov 2017

“The night is dark and full of terrors”, if you know what I mean. Indeed, we all fear something and apparently psychologists/psychiatrists have been taking note of all the different nerve-wracking stuff that can haunt the human mind and so have come up with a series of interesting terms to describe phobias. This week, my favourite phobia term will become word of the day:

ERGOPHOBIA

defined as: ‘a fear of or aversion to work’ (www.m-w.com)

There is an alternative term ergasiophobia but it is less common as illustrated by the following Google Ngram:

Another interesting phobia is triskaidekaphobia ‘fear of number 13’. I’ve been making my students come up with definitions for this word for ages. Its etymology is quite transparent: Greek treis ‘three’ three and deka ‘ten’.

The etymology of ergophobia should be clear too to those who now the word ergonomics meaning the study of efficiency in the workplace, a coinage based on Greek ergon ‘work’ and economics (www.etymonline.org).

Unfortunately, a brief glance at the COCA shows it is not a commonly used word, just a fancy psychological term, as demonstrated by Google books, where most instances come from psychology textbooks and are actually definitions:

• “For example, you may hypothesise that ergophobia (fear of work) in psychology students increases throughout their courses.”
• “Ergophobia: Ergophobia, (derived from the Greek’ergon’ and ‘phobos’ (fear); also called ergasiophobia), is an abnormal and persistent fear (or phobia) of work (manual labor, nonmanual labour, etc) or finding employment.”

All that said, I still think it’s a term that may come in handy on a rainy afternoon when you really don’t feel like rolling out of bed and doing anything.

Have a good working week!

Word of the…

And again, the word of the year in the English language (or at least candidates therefor) is unsurprisingly linked to politics. So “fake news” it is, popularised by our beloved Donald. Yet, I always rebel against the word of the year being about grim political or social issues, so I have decided that sharing nice-sounding, not necessarily the most necessary (sic!) words would be a splendid idea. And as doing it yearly would not be enough, weekly posts are more than reasonable. Let’s call it… yes, you guessed: word of the week.

Let’s get started, then. The word of the week is… wait for it:

CALLIPYGIAN /,kalɪˈpɪdʒɪən/

defined as: ‘having nicely-shaped buttocks’

The word comes from Greek kallipygos, “name of a statue of Aphrodite at Syracuse” (etymonline.org), and is related to calligraphy and the name Callisto. There is one instance of it in the COCA:

• “arrested for presenting himself under false pretenses in the New Orleans offices of Louisiana’s callipygian Senator Mary L. Landrieu”

However, it’s probably Google books that gives you more evocative examples of usage:

• “I had a wonderful friend named Zelig who had a wonderful sailboat named Callipygian after his wife’s behind. Callipygian means “lovely ass.”;
• “callipygian males and females” – so there’s a modicum of political correctness.

Callipygian it is, then. Have a good start of week! Just please use it wisely and only to talk about art.