Another reason the 70's were hilariously awful

This logo won a design award in 1973. Prescient, though. Really.

TL; DR Files - Word Geekery Edition

This has been a point of contention in Da 412 for a while, so it seems perfect to introduce so early in the blog's history.

The ever-awesome Arts & Letters Daily linked to an article, "In Defense of Common English" by U. of Delaware English prof Ben Yagoda. Yagoda springs to defend the supposed abominations that get injected into our language on a daily basis. As an example he cites the complaint of a grammar snob on the abuse of the third person plural (they). Yet when the grammatical grumble is offered to a panel of linguists and lexicographers, the response she receives is unexpected:

"My thing is when people use 'they' as a singular — like, 'Everyone should have their eyes examined once a year.'" Actually, there was no question: The audience member merely stared at the panelists, expecting universal tsk-tsking and rueful shaking of heads. But she wasn't about to get any love from this group. One of the linguists pointed out, as gently as possible, that there was nothing wrong with using "they" that way, that in fact it made perfect sense — as writers from Jane Austen to the authors of the King James Version of the Bible had realized — and that the prohibition against it was the legacy of a small group of nitpickers who, in the late 18th and early 19th centuries, basically invented a bunch of usage rules that unaccountably persist.

The stare turned into a glare.

BA-ZING! YA BURNT!

Srsly tho, Yagoda's piece gives voice to my position: contra many traditionalists, there has never been a period of halcyon homogeneity (I'll stop with the alliterations) in the use of our language. We're a mutt tongue, stitched together from the words of dozens of languages and cultures. Rarely do you see a language that coins neologisms and technical vocabularly as easily and quickly as ours (coughcoughblogcoughsnarkcoughcoughdownloadcough). We have so many linguistic forefathers, each of debatably-sized heredity, that we could be on Jerry Springer.

So when an educated grammarian, whether he be professional or amateur, comes out strongly against a modern phrase that breaks all the previously established boundaries, I can't help but shrug. I just can't seem to gin up the passion to defend my language from the Attacks of Rubes.

I'd also like to post that I think this blurb is particularly insightful:

A sizable group of people is partial to attending discussions and reading books about language. But what this group wants to hear is antithetical to what scholars of this subject want to say. [emph. mine -- S] Thus the most successful language book of the last decade, by far, was the journalist Lynne Truss's Eats, Shoots & Leaves, which took, in the words of the subtitle, a "zero tolerance approach" to misused punctuation.

By my lights, most of the people who are insistent upon manning English's ramparts are the type who feel their input is underappreciated by the Boorish Public. Books like Eats, Shoots & Leaves give these men and women affirmation that they are the elite, the self-anointed few who have been self-intrusted with the knowledge of True English. Were they to ignore their jobs, goes the grammar snobs' thinking, our Glorious Tongue of Shakespeare would devolve into so much Neanderthalic "gur-gurk ooga-ooga" patois.

And to that I say: whatevs.

What Geico doesn't want you to know

A Sick, Sick Mind

I actually wrote this down in my notebook not long ago: "I got into an argument with my mom over whether or not German was a race. I threatened to gas her. I win." Not only did we really get into that argument, but for whatever reason, I felt the need to record that fact for posterity. And then make a Holocaust joke about it. I'm not sure if that makes me immature, insensitive, or German. But I repeat myself. Don't judge me just because I happen to look phenomenal in black.

Wait...What?

I've spent my entire life neck-deep in the evangelical movement. I bow to no man in my knowledge of the Life of the Modern Evangelical*. And I have no idea what-in-the-holy-hell this means:



(H/T: Will Wilkinson who H/T's Andrew Sullivan)

*And by "Modern Evangelical" I mean the broad overarching label. I have too much of a brain and too much respect for individuals to ever believe that a group of millions could be effectively lumped together. That said, there are commonalities between the people who subscribe to Focus on the Family publications, attend CCM concerts, and find Brian Regan "too blue" for their children.

Tabs On My Firefox, Window To My Soul

At this very moment, what tabs do I have open?

- MGoBlog. Always and forever, I shall belong to you.

- A Wikipedia page on the relationship between Anarchism and anarcho-capitalism (remnant from some late night browsing)

- Gmail

- A music-stealing site, where I am currently downloading the OST to Cabaret.

Read into that what you may, but I'm gonna be the first to say that I outwardly appear to be a fey revolutionary who enjoys the 1930's Germany and brawny young men groping and grappling each other in front of 110,000 fans.

I'll take it.

Strip Generator

Just found Strip Generator today. I know I'm late to that party, but whatever. Here's my first salvo against the aged and ironclad wall of three-paneldom.




Check out my strip blog though, I'm actually more enchanted by my own commentary on the strip than the strip itself. In writing that, I've realized how strangely fascinated I am with my own creations, like a child staring fixedly into the toilet and seeing his first doodie, or poopie, or whatever children these days call their feces.