What Word Did You Learn Today?

[paul secor]

While reading Dorothy Sayers' Murder Must Advertise - Charabanc: A sight-seeing motor coach.

[BillF]

While reading Dorothy Sayers' Murder Must Advertise - Charabanc: A sight-seeing motor coach.

British usage of the past, common in my parents' era, i.e. the 1930s, sometimes abbreviated to "chara", e.g. "going for a trip in a chara".

[paul secor]

From the same Dorothy Sayers' novel - Perbend: To reflect on carefully.

edit: I guess I didn't learn the word very well at all. It's Perpend, not Perbend.

Edited October 17, 2014 by paul secor

[BillF]

From the same Dorothy Sayers' novel - Perbend: To reflect on carefully.

Never heard that one!

[A Lark Ascending]

'Trending'

Think this must be Twitterspeak or something.

Noticed it on a very rare visit into a record shop yesterday evening (I managed 3 minutes!). Huge display under the heading 'What's Trending?' Presume it helps you make sure you are buying what everyone else is buying.

As annoying as 'Awesome'.

Edited October 18, 2014 by A Lark Ascending

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

Not really learned, as I don't know what it means: 'insagrievous'

It's in a tune title - ‘The girl with the insagrievous walk’.

Anyone know what it means?

MG

[Leeway]

Not really learned, as I don't know what it means: 'insagrievous'

It's in a tune title - ‘The girl with the insagrievous walk’.

Anyone know what it means?

MG

Seems like a portmanteau word. "Insa" meaning "lack of" or "not." Kind of a slangy way of saying her walk was not painful or sad to look at, that is, her walk was nice to watch.

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

Not really learned, as I don't know what it means: 'insagrievous'

It's in a tune title - ‘The girl with the insagrievous walk’.

Anyone know what it means?

MG

Seems like a portmanteau word. "Insa" meaning "lack of" or "not." Kind of a slangy way of saying her walk was not painful or sad to look at, that is, her walk was nice to watch.

Yeah, you could well be right. The tune itself may throw some light on this. It's by Edgar Hayes.

MG

[GA Russell]

Apparently I was wrong, but I thought that "chyron" had to do with the optical trick used daily by TV weathermen, where they face a blue screen, and a second camera superimposes a map.

Nowadays, this is used on pro baseball telecasts. There appears to be a billboard behind the left-handed batter, when in fact it is a blue panel.

[BillF]

KIMCHI WESTERN

- which I suppose is a Korean equivalent of a spaghetti western. Nice one! Thanks Kinuta!

[Leeway]

I'm in the middle of Henry James' novel, The Princess Casamassima (perhaps not the best place to be). Last night I came across the word "lercaated."

I've never heard of the word, and the dictionary yields no clue.

The word appears in a sentence spoken by a French exile to the ostensible hero: "Remember my child, I am incapable of drawing aside any veil you may have preferred to drop over your lercaated personality."

I have two thoughts: 1) it's a printer's error for "lacerated" or 2) it is some sort of hybrid French-ism. Neither thought seems entirely satisfactory. I don't have alternate editions of the novel to check text (I'm using Penguin Modern Classic pb edition; it's in Chapter 21). Maybe someone else knows this word?

[JSngry]

"lacerated" it is.

http://books.google.com/books?id=1GRAAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA256&lpg=PA256&dq=Remember+my+child,+I+am+incapable+of+drawing+aside+any+veil+you+may+have+preferred+to+drop+ove&source=bl&ots=ES0yXJxoBk&sig=gRhp2TYMaa372iJkdrBHsSxswnM&hl=en&sa=X&ei=R6hJVOO4H47msATp1IKwDQ&ved=0CCAQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q=Remember%20my%20child%2C%20I%20am%20incapable%20of%20drawing%20aside%20any%20veil%20you%20may%20have%20preferred%20to%20drop%20ove&f=false

http://books.google.com/books?id=B6vjoQcgReMC&pg=PA169&lpg=PA169&dq=Remember+my+child,+I+am+incapable+of+drawing+aside+any+veil+you+may+have+preferred+to+drop+ove&source=bl&ots=8N3UEvu3Au&sig=0BV8fHRU2YaKRJfVljqxBT_q1lQ&hl=en&sa=X&ei=R6hJVOO4H47msATp1IKwDQ&ved=0CCMQ6AEwAQ#v=onepage&q=Remember%20my%20child%2C%20I%20am%20incapable%20of%20drawing%20aside%20any%20veil%20you%20may%20have%20preferred%20to%20drop%20ove&f=false

http://books.google.com/books?id=1vZ-OT1tFmsC&pg=PT377&lpg=PT377&dq=Remember+my+child,+I+am+incapable+of+drawing+aside+any+veil+you+may+have+preferred+to+drop+ove&source=bl&ots=f9FqgMUB1I&sig=hpRcZC39jwhtH_S5U7O1emBUGu8&hl=en&sa=X&ei=R6hJVOO4H47msATp1IKwDQ&ved=0CCUQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=Remember%20my%20child%2C%20I%20am%20incapable%20of%20drawing%20aside%20any%20veil%20you%20may%20have%20preferred%20to%20drop%20ove&f=false

etcc.

[Leeway]

Thanks Jim, I should have thought of plugging that sentence into Google. Google conquers the world and all that. ( Maybe I was secretly plugging for "lercaated" ).

[Leeway]

Came across this word, which sent me to the dictionary:

OSSEOUS

In the sentence, the character finds the current butler osseous, whereas the previous butler was rotund.

The medical dictionary states: "of, relating to, or composed of bone." So, bony.

[Matthew]

Alterity.

Use in sentence: To do some work is to go the way which leads into alterity.

Wikipedia says: It is a philosophical term meaning "otherness", strictly being in the sense of the other of two (Latin alter). In the phenomenological tradition it is usually understood as the entity in contrast to which an identity is constructed, and it implies the ability to distinguish between self and not-self, and consequently to assume the existence of an alternative viewpoint.

Which clarifies absolutely nothing!

[BillF]

The Latin that I had to slave away at at school in the 1950s got me both osseous and alterity.

[GA Russell]

cissexism

A debate at Oxford on abortion was cancelled because of objections by feminists who accused some people of cissexism. Had to go look it up.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cisgender

Edited November 20, 2014 by GA Russell

[BillF]

cissexism

A debate at Oxford on abortion was cancelled because of objections by feminists who accused some people of cissexism. Had to go look it up.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cisgender

Have heard cisalpine.

Had to look up extirpate. Read it many times, but didn't know the meaning exactly.

Edited November 20, 2014 by BillF

[Leeway]

Came across this in a Nabokov novel:

SOUGH- a sigh or deep breath, make a moaning, whistling, or rushing sound (as in the sea or forest).

This is an Old English/Middle English word, probably known to our UK contingent, but I found it hard to place at first glance, although context was indicative. I suppose it is related to, or a variant, of SIGH, or vice versa.

[alankin]

"Peripeteia /ˌpɛrəpɨˈtaɪ.ə/ (Greek: περιπέτεια) is a reversal of circumstances, or turning point. The term is primarily used with reference to works of literature. The English form of peripeteia is peripety."

This is the name of the 4th piece of Schoenberg's "Five Pieces for Orchestra", which I was just listening to.

[Matthew]

Bricolage: Construction or creation from a diverse range of available things.

Reading a biography and the sentence goes: "But Whitefield was not averse to a kind of spiritual bricolage in his reading habits."

[BillF]

Bricolage: Construction or creation from a diverse range of available things.

Reading a biography and the sentence goes: "But Whitefield was not averse to a kind of spiritual bricolage in his reading habits."

I think it's French for what we call DIY. Do you say DIY in the States, too?

[Matthew]

Bricolage: Construction or creation from a diverse range of available things.

Reading a biography and the sentence goes: "But Whitefield was not averse to a kind of spiritual bricolage in his reading habits."

I think it's French for what we call DIY. Do you say DIY in the States, too?

We do use that acronym, not really in an education sense (at least, that's how it seems to me). I think we would use the word eclectic to describe DIY referring to education.

[BillF]

Bricolage: Construction or creation from a diverse range of available things.

Reading a biography and the sentence goes: "But Whitefield was not averse to a kind of spiritual bricolage in his reading habits."

I think it's French for what we call DIY. Do you say DIY in the States, too?

We do use that acronym, not really in an education sense (at least, that's how it seems to me). I think we would use the word eclectic to describe DIY referring to education.

People use DIY here to refer to doing household jobs - such as painting, decorating or repairs - yourself, rather than call out - and pay - a specialist.

[jeffcrom]

Bricolage: Construction or creation from a diverse range of available things.

Reading a biography and the sentence goes: "But Whitefield was not averse to a kind of spiritual bricolage in his reading habits."

I think it's French for what we call DIY. Do you say DIY in the States, too?

We do use that acronym, not really in an education sense (at least, that's how it seems to me). I think we would use the word eclectic to describe DIY referring to education.

People use DIY here to refer to doing household jobs - such as painting, decorating or repairs - yourself, rather than call out - and pay - a specialist.

That's how we colonists use it as well.