English – Life and Lims

Brilliant! no, barmy. no, lovely. Ah, cheers.

So I’ve been vacationing in England for three days with my husband, and we’re getting the biggest kick out of British English and our lack of understanding of it, being American and all. You’d think that being somewhat of an Anglophile (I love reading books set in England; I watch foreign films, indies, what-have-you), I’d be a bit better prepared for the difference in vocabulary, let alone the accent. I mean, I already knew that “biscuit” really means “cookie” and that “crisps” are “chips” (and “chips” are french fries).

But it honestly takes us a couple of “excuse me”s to understand people’s meaning around here. The accent and dropped letters make it hard to clearly understand the meaning of words we actually do share, and then different words entirely make it extra-challenging.

We have observed that “brilliant” is a lovely all-purpose word to say that any service was great. Dinner? Brilliant. Sights? Brilliant. And the all-purpose word for anything else? Cheers. Hanging up? Cheers. Buy something? Cheers. Not sure what else to say to anything? Cheers.

Guess what these are. You'll never guess. Really. (Brits, no cheating.) — Guess what these are. You’ll never guess. Really. (Brits, no cheating.)

Food has been fun. I thought that it was a little challenging choosing food from the menu in Paris when we went there 9 years ago. But it’s been just as foreign ordering from British menus. Baps? Queenies? Bangers? And I finally had to ask, What the heck is treacle? I’ve read about treacle tarts for years. Then we went to a pub that served treacle bread. It was just a nice wheaty bread. Hm. What could treacle be if it’s in regular bread and tarts? The answer: it’s a sugary syrup of some kind. Huh. Okay. Then I bought a little collection of chocolates on the Isle of Man, and one was toffee that had treacle in it. My husband and I finally figured out what treacle really is when we popped the toffee in our mouths: it’s molasses, or something darn near like it. Huh. Molasses bread: fine. Molasses toffee: eh. Molasses tart? I’m not gonna try it.

Last of my observations: the Brits can sure conjure up some hilarious-sounding phrases. The one I’ve loved the best so far I saw on a sign in a train station: “lovely jubbly.” Lovely jubbly to you all, fair readers. Cheers.

A voice for vocabulary, aka, a rant on proper usage

The English language is tough and resilient and has evolved miraculously over centuries, but it takes a huge amount of abuse. Once every .003 nanoseconds, it is misused somehow, somewhere. It is time for someone to speak up on behalf of the voiceless, our lovely language, which, sadly, is unable to speak for itself, despite a slew of wise, wordy weapons in its arsenal.

Here I am going to take a stand on behalf of the proper use of vocabulary. It won’t be pretty, but I’m going to expose the improper uses of words and then show which words should have been used in their places. Brace yourselves. (These are in no particular order, mind you.)

“Unphased.” As in, “she was unphased by his poor use of the word.” The word that should be used here is “unfazed.”
“Reigned in.” I’ve seen this time and again. “She had to reign in her bad language.” “Reign” has to do with royalty. I do believe that those who have blue blood would be appalled at this improper use of “reign.” The word that should rightly stand here tall and stately is “rein.” When we talk about “reining in” a horse, we use a rein. Even queens do not “reign in” the animals that draw their carriages.
I heard something pretty funny in “The Hunger Games.” A character said something was “very lethal.” “Lethal” means something kills you. So if it’s “very” lethal… hm. You would be “very” dead. Brings to mind that the only way you can be somewhat dead as opposed to very dead is if you were Westley in “The Princess Bride…”: “mostly dead.”
“Bazaar.” Really, how often do people write about street fairs? Probably not as often as they desire to refer to something being “bizarre,” or really strange.
“Peddle.” More people find themselves needing to use the word “pedal” than its frequently used homonym “peddle.” “Pedal” as a verb means to move a bike along by pushing pedals with your feet. “Peddle” means to sell something. One could peddle pedals in a bizarre bazaar, if shoppers are in need of replacement parts for their bicycles.
Predominate. I rarely have need to use this word, and I rarely see anyone else need to use it or use it correctly. What I DO see, however, very often, is the use of this word instead of “predominant,” an adjective meaning “having influence or power” or being the “primary” focus of something. Just say the word out loud, folks. It has an “n” in it.

This is just a start, mind you. I expect to be adding lots more over time. Anyone care to weigh in?

OK, time to add some more.

Ravish. Most of the time people use this word in writing, they mean “ravage.” Ravish is generally associated with rape, or just a lusty man taking a woman strongly in a bodice-ripper book. But ravage is about wreaking havoc or destroying. Ravage a town, and the buildings are destroyed, the people scattered. Ravish the people of a town, and outsiders will feel particularly outraged.
Tenants. Whenever I see this word used, the writer invariably is talking about the belief system of a religion or just some kind of way of life. Today, fittingly enough, I read an article on HLN.com about “11 words adults just can’t spell.” I agreed with a few as being common errors (the others just didn’t seem to be the most-screwed-up ones, in my opinion), and then I clicked over to another article on HLN about Alanis Morissette giving her opinion about attachment parenting. Naturally, the article spoke of the “tenants” of that way of raising kids, when what it needed to say was the “tenets” of that philosophy. So I clicked right over from an article on spelling errors and found a biggie on MY list right there on another one. I couldn’t refrain from posting a comment on that one.

An ode to words

Aren’t words wonderful? Some may argue (and rightly so) that the English language is crazy and difficult and full of rules that are just as often broken as they are adhered to. But I’m in awe of just how much can be said with all the delightful words that our language contains. We’ve adapted and co-opted words from all kinds of places and times and made them work for us. I have an utter reverence for what can be conveyed with the right use of vocabulary.

I think of our language as a toolkit full of a variety of tools, each just the right size and shape and weight to fit any job. But what dismays me is that most of our society today only carries around a mini-kit with a few basics (hammer, screwdriver, a few nails) which they use for every single need. I try to lug around the jumbo version of the toolkit (even the whole garage full of cupboards and shelves, sometimes) so I’ll be able to fit just the right tool to whatever I need to accomplish.

That’s what makes me particularly enamored of certain authors’ writing. Some authors are great storytellers, with vivid imaginations and tons of neat ideas for stories, but they’re not great writers (Stephenie Meyer has said this about herself, for example, and she’s absolutely right). But some authors can tell any story but make it compelling and beautiful because of the words they select from their kits and how they put them together in seemingly fresh ways.

I love to use my thesaurus. It’s full of options to help find just the right word to convey the perfect meaning. But as with any tool, it must be used correctly. Many people have the mistaken notion that they can take out a thesaurus and pick willy-nilly any word out of the synonyms listed. Wrong. Each word in our language has a very precise meaning that, if the writer or speaker and the reader and listener both know it, can communicate meaning as well as is possible with language (of course, communication is a whole other topic; let’s just say that spoken or written language is only a small part of communication, so since that’s the case, we’d better be sure to be careful with the words we do use so we can communicate as effectively as possible). The ideal use of the thesaurus is to stimulate our thinking and allow our brain to go through its options and then select the best one. We still must know the exact meaning of each synonym, because synonyms are merely similar words, not usually exact matches. Even identical twins have slight differences in appearance, voices, and certainly personalities, don’t they?

So as a writer, I like to look at the thesaurus when I have a general idea of what I’m trying to express. Glancing through the list of synonyms of any given word can help my brain to make connections and eventually say, Aha! That’s exactly what I’d like to say. As an editor of other people’s writing, I have to use the thesaurus to help them come up with the word that’s going to say what they obviously mean to say in the context of their topic and sentence or paragraph. I often think as I’m reading someone else’s raw work, I do not think that means what you think it means (thanks to Inigo and Vizzini of “The Princess Bride”). Sometimes their efforts are unwittingly comical; sometimes they could even be potentially offensive, egregiously misleading or just plain wrong.

Given that I do a lot of editing, then, and I see many misuses of language, I am so appreciative of the writers who have honed their craft and lovingly put to use the full toolkit of the language. Each word, carefully chosen, can instantly create a picture in my mind, complete with emotions and sensations. Every word has nuances and layers of meaning, and used well can convey those layers in just one perfect word, allowing a writer to write concisely but elegantly. A writer with a shallow portable toolkit will have to use many more simple words to get a message across that could be portrayed nicely with one or two words in the hands of a skilled writer with an excellent grasp of vocabulary.

I’m not saying that we should all use “hoity-toity” vocabulary at all times or words that are just rarely used and never understood. But there are so many options that are rich in meaning that can communicate effectively that people don’t bother to use. As a parent, I’ve always used my regular vocabulary to speak to my children, rather than trying to “dumb down” what I say in baby talk. I might rephrase something in simpler language so they can understand, but then I’ll also use the richer words so they can hear them in context and learn. And as they read, just as I did growing up and still do now, they (and I) can learn new words just through context and, if they’re so inclined, looking them up in the dictionary.

Even as I write, I’m now self-conscious about how I wrote. Did I convey exactly what I wanted to express? Did I use just the right words? I hope so. I’m not one of the most gifted writers out there, but I hope that I can at least say what I mean to say. And my hat’s off to those amazing writers who have transported me because of their judicious use of language.