reanalysis of "mondo"

[Jonathan Lighter]

Lapp girls do that?  I thought they just did Lapp dances....

Anyway, today's trivia bonanza is that that's how they (used to?) castrate rams in Australia.  Except guy teeth are involved.  IIRC, Errol Flynn held down the job briefly before he decided to start a new life as a Hollywood zillionaire.

This - to me - mondo bizarro technique must be of truly ancient origin.

JL

Wilson Gray <wilson.gray at RCN.COM> wrote:
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Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: Wilson Gray
Subject: Re: reanalysis of "mondo"
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On Jul 12, 2005, at 12:38 PM, Laurence Horn wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender: American Dialect Society
> Poster: Laurence Horn
> Subject: reanalysis of "mondo"
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------
> --------
>
> Anu Garg's wordsmith list, , just sent out this
> nice example of reanalysis I hadn't thought of:
> =================
> mondo (mon-DO) adjective
>
> Huge; enormous; ultimate.
>
> adverb
>
> Extremely, very.
>
> [After 1966 movie Mondo Bizarro (literally "Bizarre World" but
> interpreted
> as "very bizarre"), where mondo is from the 1961 Italian movie Mondo
> Cane

" ... mondo is from the 1961 Italian movie Mondo Cane ..."

Who wrote this? Clarence Majors?

I saw both of these movies. They were worth whatever it cost to see a
movie in those days, but the scene showing the teen-aged Lapp girls
castrating reindeer by literally biting their nuts off could have been
left out. OTOH, I must admit that that scene was quite memorable. I
certainly can't recall anything else from either of these flicks, other
than their titles.

-Wilson

> (A Dog's World) and reinterpreted as an intensifier. More on this
> movie at:
> http://imdb.com/title/tt0188909/ ]
>
> "As Asia's productivity shakes the world, and as `just in time'
> inventory
> management keeps rolling along, air cargo has become one mondo
> important
> gig."
> Ed Stephens Jr.; Cargo Tells a Story; Saipan Tribune (North Mariana
> Islands); Jun 3, 2005.
> ==================
> Other than the odd pronunciation guide (does anyone, in either
> English or Italian, really stress "mondo" on the second syllable?),
> this seems right. "Mondo" provides a really nice example of
> reinterpretation through opacity, like "Wherefore art thou, Romeo?"
> or "chili" or even "bead". (Sorry if all this is in HDAS; I don't
> have my copy on me.)
>
> Larry
>

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