World Wide Words -- 01 Mar 14
Michael Quinion
michael.quinion at WORLDWIDEWORDS.ORG
Thu Feb 27 23:01:00 UTC 2014
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WORLD WIDE WORDS ISSUE 871 Saturday 1 March 2014
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Contents
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1. Feedback, Notes and Comments.
2. Hypnopompic.
3. Wordface.
4. Blind Freddie.
5. Sic!
6. Useful information.
1. Feedback, Notes and Comments
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SPORTING WORDS J Hogan followed up a recent item: "Regarding verbs
learned from Olympic winter sports (aside from the curious usage,
'to medal'), one new to me is 'to ragdoll', referring to what a
slopestyle skier or snowboarder does when an edge goes just a bit
wrong and the contestant suddenly flops sprawled onto the hillside.
If he or she stays loose when this occurs, the athlete may escape
injury; but it's alarming to witness it."
HAYMAKER From Anthony Holt: "I believe that 'haymaker' was alive
and well in the 1950s when I was at school in Brighton. It was used
exclusively on the cricket field and was applied to a batsman who
made wildly reckless and risky strokes in his innings, trying to
knock every ball into the next county. The end result was usually
his dismissal, but it could also result in an exciting and match-
winning time." The Oxford English Dictionary's first example is from
1954 and I remember it from the same period. My impression is that
it has now fallen out of use.
Paddy Crean wrote, "Here in Ireland the term 'haymaker' has had only
one meaning to me, a very heavy thundery shower of rain in spring or
early summer, which would be guaranteed to produce plenty of green
grass in due course."
FAIN Jan Matthews commented: "Your example of 'fain' brought my
childhood flooding back. My father taught me to lisp the following
at a tender age as a party piece. 'Recite Twinkle Twinkle Little
Star' would produce:
Scintillate, scintillate globule vivific,
Fain would I fathom thy nature specific,
Loftily poised in the ether capacious,
Strongly resembling a gem carbonaceous
Memory-imprinted forever - and uselessly - of course!"
A memory of "fawn" came from D A Brown: "As a schoolboy many years
ago I overheard two women discussing parents' day interviews with
their daughters' teachers: 'Now, I like Miss ----. She doesn't
fornicate all over you.'"
NEKNOMINATE Margaret Neville countered my view of the origin of
this: "I disagree that the name is an abbreviation of neck and
nominate. I am confident that the 'nek' part was taken from another
recent social-media term, 'nek minnit' (next minute), used when
referring to an immediate consequence and made popular by New
Zealand street skater, Levi Hawken. Hence, neknomination definitely
means 'next nomination', as the purpose of the game is to film
oneself consuming a beverage and then issuing a challenge by
nominating the next person to do so."
RIVER RUN The biggest response by far in this week's postbag was to
a throw-away comment I inserted at the end of a Sic! item that
featured the sentence "As a native of drought-ridden Southern
California, the Colorado River has always loomed large to me." It's
a classic misplaced modifier, of course (the writer meant to say
that she is the native, not the river), and I tried to point this up
by saying that the Colorado River wasn't a native of California, but
of Colorado, in which state its source conventionally lies. Lots of
people sent me detailed descriptions of the route of the river to
show that it had connections with five states and Mexico. I meant
"native" in the sense in which I always use it, a person associated
with a place by birth (which I equated with source for the river),
not merely somebody who is a local inhabitant. Perhaps I was being
too literal, or too obscure.
2. Hypnopompic
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One of the curses of life today was outlined by the Times in 2013:
"Modern alarm clocks destroy dreams because they rip you through
your hypnopompic sleep state so fast."
The hypnopompic state is that drowsy, half-alert, comfortable state
you're in as you awaken slowly and naturally. It's the opposite of
the one you drift into as you gradually fall asleep, which is the
hypnagogic state.
Both words derive from Greek "hupnos", sleep. "Hypnopompic" combines
it with "pompē", sending away, while "hypnagogic" adds "agōgos",
leading. The former was coined by Frederic Myers, a philologist and
one of the founders of the Society for Psychical Research, while the
latter was the creation of Alfred Maury, a French researcher into
dreams. "Hypnagogic" came into English from French "hypnagogique".
Though it's conventional to lose the final "o" from prefixes like
"hypno-" when they're put before a vowel, many users spell the word
"hypnogogic". That may be because "hypna-" is very rare in English
(the only other in the Oxford English Dictionary is "hypnaesthesia",
which in any case is now often spelled "hypnesthesia") and they're
swayed by all the others beginning "hypno-". And few people now know
the Greek root begins with a vowel.
The terms are most often applied to hallucinations during these
states that seem completely real to their subjects. They may hear
music or their name being called or see images of people. Repeated
or particularly vivid episodes may lead some to fear that they're
mentally ill. Such hypnagogic or hypnopompic experiences turn out to
be common, though the former occur more often. It's thought that
some reports of ghosts come from such experiences.
3. Wordface
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IMPULSIVE An article in last week's New Scientist included the
mildly alarming word ELECTROCEUTICAL. It's a device implanted in the
body that sends electrical signals along nerves for medical
purposes. Early research is beginning to show that nerve impulses
can control the body's immune system and that such generated signals
can tell organs to suppress infection or abnormal activity. The
article reports some success with arthritis and asthma and that one
pharmaceutical firm, GlaxoSmithKline, is hoping to find treatments
for other chronic diseases, including diabetes and hypertension. The
term, known in research circles since about 2007, belongs to a wider
field of study more generally called BIOELECTRONICS, which also
covers the use of nerve signals to control prosthetics such as
artificial limbs.
SMITH, SURROUND THEM! The Press Association reported on Tuesday
that two anti-fracking protesters had been convicted of BESETTING a
drilling site. The writer put the word in quotes, twice, to mark a
word he or she thought odd or unfamiliar. I had to stop and think
about it myself. "Beset" is common but almost always appears either
in the grammatical passive or referring to some agency that acts on
a person: "he was beset with worries"; "doubts and confusions that
often beset us"; "the hazards that beset early travellers". These
all come from the original sense in Old English of surrounding or
encircling, or of assailing on all sides, such as an army besetting
a fortress. What we don't often encounter is a single person, or
even two, described as actively besetting somewhere. It turns out to
be a legal term and - despite its etymological origins - it's indeed
legally possible for one person to beset a place.
4. Blind Freddie
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Q. A relatively common expression in Australia describes something
obvious as one that even Blind Freddy could see ("even Blind Freddy
could tell that their marriage wouldn't last"). I was wondering, has
anyone ever traced an actual visually impaired man by that name, or
is it simply unknowable? [Matthew Brand]
A. My feeling, from half a world away, is that the idiom is slowly
falling out of use and is now mainly found in the speech of older
people. But it's still easy to find examples in newspapers:
The proverbial Blind Freddie could have anticipated
these consequences as a result of callow policies designed
to appease public opinion.
[The Australian, 19 Feb. 2012.]
The first known use of the idiom I've found is this:
The present system has to go. There's no other way. It
MUST go. Even Blind Freddie can see that.
[The International Socialist (Sydney, NSW), 8 Mar.
1917.]
One candidate often put forward is the India-born Eton-educated Sir
Frederick Pottinger. He joined the Grenadier Guards but went through
a fortune gambling on horses and had to emigrate to Australia, where
he became a trooper in the New South Wales police force. Once his
title became known locally, he was promoted to inspector, seemingly
beyond his competence, though he was a dogged man who wanted to do
well in his job. He made several unsuccessful tries at catching the
bushrangers "Wild" Ben Hall, John Gilbert and Frank Gardiner, which
unfairly made him a comic incompetent in the press and among local
people. He featured in a satirical ballad, The Bloody Field Of
Wheogo, about the failed attempt to capture Gardiner, which contains
the lines:
But the Ranger proud, he laughed aloud,
and bounding rode away,
While Sir Frederick Pott, shut his eyes for a shot,
and miss'd - his usual way.
[Sydney Morning Herald, 23 Aug. 1862.]
Pottinger died in 1865, having accidentally shot himself with his
own pistol while trying to board a moving coach. Many of the stories
told about him are later elaborations, as is the belief that he was
the original Blind Freddie. If he was, it's strange that the first
written reference should have appeared half a century later.
A more plausible origin was put forward by the famous Australian
lexicographer Sidney Baker:
According to Sydney legend, a blind hawker named Freddy
operated in the area bordered by Market, King, Castlereagh
and George Streets in the 1920s, selling ties, razor
blades, hair oil and other items. Although blind, he is
reputed to have been able to find his way around with
great ease and to have recognised scores of customers by
their voices.
[Australia Speaks, by Sidney Baker, 1953.]
The creation of a huge collection of searchable historic newspapers
by the National Library of Australia, appropriately called Trove,
has led to my being able to find out much more about this man. He
must surely must be the one described in this newspaper article,
which contains the first recorded use of the nickname:
One of the best known identities of the Sydney boxing
game during the past quarter of a century is 'Blind
Freddie,' who never misses a fight of even minor
importance, and whose ears assist his mind's eye to such
an extent that exciting situations work him up and he can
laugh as heartily as anyone else at amusing occurrences.
'Blind Freddie' is not an old man; he lost his sight 28
years ago, when 11 years old. The sightless sport enjoys
life as much as most men, and feels many a hearty hand
grip and hears many a cordial greeting as he roams round
the city alone, for 'Freddie,' who follows the calling of
a general dealer, is popular with everybody.
[The Referee (Sydney), 12 Apr. 1911.]
Although the evidence is circumstantial, there can be little doubt
the idiom originated with this man, partly because early appearances
of the term "Blind Freddie" are in and around Sydney and partly
because later reports reinforce that he was a well-known character.
The next reference in print to a person called Blind Freddie came in
1933, when newspapers reported him as being seriously ill and said
that his real name was Frederick Solomons. The funeral notice posted
by Solomon's family in the Sydney Morning Herald on 4 December that
year identified him as Blind Freddie.
An article reporting his illness described him as "one of Sydney's
most remarkable characters", in part because his acute senses
allowed him to undertake seemingly impossible feats:
Mick Dunn, champion fighter of bare fist days, told
today how about 35 years ago this blind man drove a hansom
cab from Bathurst street along Pitt street to the railway
station without mishap. He has been known to tell whose
horse was approaching by its trot. His senses of touch and
smell are two of his greatest assets. He can identify
people by the touch of their hands or their clothing.
[The News (Adelaide), 21 Aug. 1933.]
Another article reported his death with the comment,
He could walk to any business house in the city,
unaccompanied and without hesitation, and it is said that
one day finding another blind man waiting at a corner he
led him across an intersection.
[The Cumberland Argus and Fruitgrowers' Advocate
(Parramatta), 14 Dec. 1933.]
Though few people remember him as a real person, his nickname lives
on. I am delighted to have rediscovered the individual behind it.
5. Sic!
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Pattie Tancred found this sentence alongside a copy of the Rosetta
Stone in the Egyptian Museum, Turin: "Written in three different
scripts, (hieroglyphic, demotic and Greek), the French scholar J-F
Champollion used the Greek text to decipher hieroglyphics."
The Brunswick News of 25 February, Joel T Keys tells us, had a story
about the local submarine base headlined, "Kings Bay prepares for
possible terrorist attacks with drills."
A photo caption in a story in CTV News online could have been better
worded: "In this Sunday, Feb. 23, 2014 photo taken with a cellphone
camera, an Indian policeman tries to charge a leopard with a stick
that was spotted at a hospital in Meerut, India." Thanks to Silas
DeRoma for that.
Tony McCoy O'Grady found this in the Sky TV programme guide for 21
February: "Fred Dineage examines the murders of Peter Manuel who was
hanged for killing seven people in Scotland in the 1950s. He later
confessed to killing many more."
Department of unnecessarily redundant superfluity, via Bob Lee from
the Calgary Herald of 19 February. In reporting the investigation on
a homicide, it said that "The couple's children are not suspected
suspects at this time."
6. Useful information
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