Blog Categories
In which Hugh Grant film did he play a bookshop owner?
'I do not think it means what you think it means'
I love the film, The Princess Bride. Yes, it's a children's film and is probably best viewed in the company of children. But there's plenty there for an adult – enchantment, adventure, awareness of and subversion of genre, fun. They, well, Rob Reiner, managed to assemble a cast each of whom was not only near-perfect for her or his role (we really do need a possessive determiner for this context, singular and non-specific as to sex/gender) but who worked beautifully together.
It's become a bit of a family classic and 'As you wish' a family code - no spoilers, you'll have to get the DVD for yourself. Or read the book (better still, read it to a child) and you'll see how William Goldman's writing - he did the screenplay, too – gives the work its sparkle.
Favourite character – Inigo Montoya, artist with the sword and semantics (though perhaps not with grammar). He takes Vizzini to task for using the word 'inconceivable' in respect of something which has actually occurred – thus obviously being able not only to be conceived or imagined but also to be made real.
It's all too easy to mishear or misread a word or to make an error in interpreting the dictionary data, should your research get so far. Then, no matter how logical the connection you worked out or deduced from the word's context, you end up associating an incorrect meaning with a particular word.
Dictionaries often differ – 'enormity' is restricted to huge moral awfulness in one major title, while another of equal or greater reputation allows the simple 'great size or area' notion to be fully legitimate, rather than being an 'informal use'.
Nonetheless, one needs to be careful.
The commentator at the recent Winter Olympics was more likely to have been complaining about the outlandishness of the garments rather than appealing for a return to the customs of ancient Olympic competition when declaring the skaters' costumes were 'extraneous'.
'I do not think it means what you think it means'
The words "like" and "went" have suffered from the advent of "Pop-speak" and I find myself having to constantly bite my tongue and not correct those concerned!! In the currently popular context these words can be enough to almost drive one to destruction!!
One that makes my teeth hurt is "loose". Example: "loose the dogs of war" is far different from "lose the dogs of war". They are not interchangeable. Sigh. Don't get me started on homophones (their, they're, there) (affect, effect) etc. And so forth!
Sought/sort; have/of; drawer/draw............AARRGH!!!
Absolutely - meaning yes. Obviously - meaning this is what I think and I don't want you to think you can disagree with me. One morning on the radio I heard "obviously" used three times in one sentence.
I love the English language when spoken properly and I cringe when the words are pronounced wrongly.For example, Februry,sevendeen,librery and words that are clipped at the end.Ialso agree with rhve, word repartition.
I agree with vejay, words like brewery, pronounced as buery or bue-ery! I once heard a radio announcer chatting happily about "outism" and it's increasing "prelevance" in todays "societry"!! He came out with these little gems several times during the course of the broadcast and to the best of my knowledge no comment was made!!!
I'm not attempting a debate about language. I will just mention that I see the Princess Bride as a terrible movie because it offers a heroine who just sits and waits to be rescued. This is a poor role model for anyone and women have too often been offered only this.
I'll never forget the look on the face of one of my teachers at high school when I asked if he'd mind me "consumating" an apple during class!
That reminds me of the time as a pompous teenager I gave the class a paper on teenage proscimuity - and nobody laughed!
Coming home one day we found a weta (large NZ insect) lying on our drive. Hubby assured me I was safe, it couldn't fly towards me because "its legs have been decapitated".
One of my pet peeves is secretary pronounced as secetary - usually by those in the role! Overall cringe is the standard of broadcast English. I don't say we need to go back to the old BBC presenters' style, but slightly less mangling would be nice (not to mention "awesome" Kragsy). Also as a first generation New Zealander I get frustrated with presenters going into overkill on NZ Maori pronunciation and then totally failing to have the common courtesy to learn how to pronounce surnames and basic words in other languages. Given our multi-ethnic populations in all countries these days and the major (and genuinely awesome) effort new immigrants put into learning English it would be appropriate to make a small effort in return. I’ll get off my soap-box now!
This might not be very relevant to the subject, but I must say it gave me a good laugh when my teenage daughter texted me to say she was sitting behind a 'balled guy' on the bus. Probably not untrue, but almost certainly not what she meant.
the written word can be interpreted many different ways, the interpretation of the receiver can be totally different from the meaning of the sender. pleased for example can range in meaning from like to ecstatic.
I was recently listening (eavesdropping, really) to a woman complaining that a cd player did not come with 'badderies'. I wanted to leap up and hit her. My pet hate is your and you're constantly being used incorrectly. I like the Princess Bride too, but have to agree with kiturah, it's not a very good role model for young women. Andrea
Many characters in movies and books provide poor role models. Personally I watch movies and read books for the entertainment value. The Princess Bride falls into the entertainment category well. My personal word bugbears are Westminister and the American aluminum.
I've had many issues with people misusing: they're, there, and their. It is so annoying. Also, I have a younger sister and both she and her friends like to say "durrs" instead of "deer" whenever they happen to spot one on a hill. I just want to ask them if they really are from this country. Why must they abuse the english language so?
There's an excellent series being broadcast on Foxtel at the moment called "The History Of English". Simply amazing to see what the language went through right from the begining and the amazing misconceptions about its' formative processes. Can be a bit dry but the examples showing old to new are awesome. ;)
triathalon -recent commentator at the winter Olympics... "it was so fun"... incidences when it should be incident... orientated and oriented ... and as for the comments from some AFL commentators just too many to remember!...e.g he kicked a goal like what he did before...I love the Princess Bride and have watched it many times!Two biggest things to really 'bug' me are to hear of people being hung or "the person was laying down" .... at 67 I can still remember my english teacher saying pictures are hung and people are hanged and hens lay eggs and people lie down.
I love The Princess Bride and my children will often quote lines from the movie in their conversations with each other. My pet peeve re spelling is "congradulations". Its amazing how many, particularly young, people incorrectly spell "congratulations" using a "d" instead of a "t". My pet pronunciation peeve is "maintainence" instead of "maintenance". Makes my skin shiver!
My pet hate is when my husband (almost 60) pronounces th as an f no matter where it appears in a word eg.think, becomes fink, thought becomes fought, with becomes wiff or sometimes wiv weather becomes wevver ...it drives me insane. The only time he actually pronounces th correctly is when he says that or the or there. I often ask him why he doesn't say fe fen fere instead. At least that would be consistant. Did I mention it drives me insane.
A friend of mine told me about the time she and her neighbors were at her home; playing cards, having coffee and "CONJUGATING." I'm sure she meant "conversating," which (although I don't consider it to be a word) is a slangy term used in much of the USA. However, the vision of three or four women "conjugating" just boggles my mind!
Believe me as a Primary School teacher to use the vanaqular* lol you ain't heared nuff fink. Did you know the National song of Australia "Advance Australia Fair" is a tribute to Ostrichs? Yes truely I recently stood near a year 6 class who sang :Australians all are ostrichs, cos we are young and fwee". Why do we not teach our children to speak correctly like many other countries is it laziness or we just don't care anymore?
The english language is clomplicated !. It should have some easier way knowing meanings of the words ie- thier/there/theyre. It is so easy to muddle the word for the wrong meaning.
The complexities of the English add to its richness.We have words from Old French, Latin, Greek, Norse, and many other sources. Wonderful! Words are such interesting things. If it were a simple language then we would not have Cryptic Crosswords... and life would be barely worth living!!!!
Mondas, I've suffered enough rubbish from the ignorant about the "deficiencies" of the teaching profession over the last 36 years. Please refrain from giving them more ammunition, even in an anonymous "blog", through the use of poor punctuation, spelling, and grammar. It really doesn't take that much time to hold down a shift key for capitals, or use the comma key, or use quotation marks to indicate ironic misuse as in "vanaqular". Thanks also for fulfilling what would otherwise have been a disappointing rant-free day, and, no, I'm not a pedantic old *BADWORD* English teacher. My field of expertise is the sciences.
I know I'm far from perfect, however there are a few pronunciations that get to me - tune/tuna said as choon/choona, due/dew said as joo, dune said as joon, sandwich said as samwich or *cringe* sammich. I have even found some radio news readers to be guilty of this. How hard can it be to use the correct sounds? I know we have some difficult sounds in the English language (gh = f) but these ones are simple!
luddite, I haven't been near a school in over 40 years, but over the last decade or two, I have interviewed and assessed hundreds of people for a wide range of career positions. Finding someone under 30 who can express themselves in writing with correct spelling, grammar, and sentences longer than four words, is like finding a diamond in a desert. I know that teachers are increasingly being called upon to provide "life skills" that should be taught in the home, and that this detracts from the time which should be assigned to basic education such as language, mathematics, arts and sciences. I wholeheartedly sympathise with teachers who have to contend with lazy, selfish parents and the useless children they produce. I don't know what the answer is. Julia Gillard's national curriculum? Who knows? However, whether or not the academics and pedagogues agree, the sad fact is that out here in the market place, your average school leaver is almost unemployable in any role requiring written expression.
I should add, that you, as a Teacher, have my sincere admiration and gratitude. You carry one of society's greatest responsibilities and you deserve all the support we can give. I do not blame teachers for the educational malaise that I see each day - the problem lies not at the delivery point but within the content of what is required to be delivered.
It's an old truism that kids who do well at school are geniuses, but kids who do badly have lousy teachers.
What really has me mad is listening to reporters talking to some quite influential people who can only come up with "yu know" "yu know". No I don't know, I thought that was the reason I was listening to your garble - to perhaps find out what I "dunno..."
Goodness me! After reading all of these comments (which I mostly agree with), all I can say is "no wonder my 11yr old has so much trouble with her spelling and writing." Hats off to all of the wonderful teachers who all try so hard to meet the demands of EVERY child in their class.
I agree, Lillypop, our grandchildren really struggle with spelling and writing although they all read a lot. I notice someone mentioned th words being pronounced with a f sound. My ex son in law does this and so do the children. It must drive them mad, me telling them to put their tongue between their teeth to get the right sound. Then all my good work gets undone when they go to their father's place and hear him. Boy, you really have to watch your spelling and grammar in these replies.
Here, again, we can point the finger at our newsreaders. I know that they don't write the words that they read in a bulletin, but they obviously don't think about them either. Almost every night, when watching the news, I hear a sentence where the words, if taken literally, mean something completely different to the message that they were meant to convey. Thankfully I live alone, so the only 'people' to hear my rants are my dogs.
If you already have an account please sign in, otherwise please register.
OK, I'll be first. Awesome - I have not seen, recently at least, a person who describes something as awesome actually being struck with awe. Mostly they mean 'good'; sometimes they just should have said 'thanks'. Other examples, not associated with current pop-speak: 'expediently' confused with 'expeditiously'; 'aggravated' confused with 'agitated'. The list could go on forever.