tump, again

[Herb Stahlke]

Sorry about the aborted message.  It shouldn't have gone out as it did, but I clicked on the wrong button.  Here's the complete message.

Sure sounds like a good acronym, but could it have deeper etymological roots in Germanic?  In Swedish, tumte is a good-natured but somewhat fractious goblin-like creature, sort of a troll on a good day.  You want to keep them happy or they can cause all sorts of problems, but they're basically friendly critters, not like trolls in that sense.  There's a great little shop in Stockholm's Gamla Stan that sells both.

The word tumte may be related to Sw. tum "thumb".  I don't know if there is any etymological connection to "tump", but could tump be a false acronym, like For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge?

Herb Stahlke

>>> lynnem at COGS.SUSX.AC.UK 05/08/00 01:01PM >>>
Here is my new favorite word:  TUMP.  I used to live with a TUMP (I
drove, I cooked, I mowed the lawn, I proofread), and I'm glad to see
that someone else (Wendy Cope, it seems) has noticed this interesting
demographic group.

Below is an in-context definition.  I first found the word yesterday in
a local newspaper's interview with McGough.  (McGough is British
Telecom's Poet in Residence.)  These are the only two instances of the
word I've seen (both in reference to the same person, but I assure you,
it is a needed generic term).  Am investigating whether Cope's used it
in print.  I encourage everyone to use it in a sentence today (if you
don't know a TUMP, you can use it in an analogy or something).

Lynne Murphy
Campaign Manager, TUMP for WOTY 2000


 -----

Roger McGough
British Telecommunications

MARCH 2000

Greetings from this technonovice dipping his toes into the www thanks to
BT.
In the words of fellow poet Wendy Cope, I am a TUMP..ie, a Totally
Useless Male Poet...one who can't drive, mend a fuse, type, or needless
to say, use a PC. However, in the interests of poetry and our mutual
desire for better communications, I will give it my all (or, at least
bits of my all).

----


Dr M Lynne Murphy
Lecturer in Linguistics
School of Cognitive and Computing Sciences
University of Sussex
Brighton BN1 9QH
UK

phone +44-(0)1273-678844
fax   +44-(0)1273-671320