anyone catch the Colbert Report tonight?

[Michael Adams]

All of what Larry mentions was taped and Colbert had some really funny
responses, too, but for whatever reason (timing, not being able to make
the segment "coherent" from what was taped) they went with what we all
saw (the proceedings were spliced up to the extent that I said on air
that I didn't know about the show, whereas I watch it frequently -- I
don't even remember the questions to which I answered "Ah, no.")

All in all, I think that the ADS should be pleased with the result of
our choice from the media perspective that Barry (with the best
intentions) derides -- we have had four nights of good ADS press (the
ADS gave the honor, I gave the insult) to the 18-36 demographic, many
of whom had never heard of the American Dialect Society or WOTY. Next
year, when they hear about WOTY, they'll know what it is, even if they
can't remember why. Also, though I understand others' reservations (had
Barry been at the meeting, he would know why we didn't choose Katrina
-- it helps to have participated in the discussion), the word is a good
choice: it is zeitgeisty and it participates in burgeoning use of -y
suffixed forms. Anatoly Liberman apparently endorses it among important
2005 words, and that's saying something.

-----Original Message-----
From: Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Sent:         Fri, 13 Jan 2006 00:09:17 -0500
Subject: anyone catch the Colbert Report tonight?

  featuring a(n apparent) phone conversation between Colbert and
 Michael Adams debating the question of who has ownership rights to
 the word "truthiness"? The former claims he pulled the word out of
 where the sun don't shine, while the latter points to the fact that
 it appears in the OED, to which Colbert could have chosen to (but,
 curiously, didn't) point out that the OED's "truthiness", with a sole
 cite from 1824--

 1824 J. J. GURNEY in Braithwaite Mem. (1854) I. 242 Everyone who
 knows her is aware of her truthiness.

 --is simply the nominalization of "truthy", meaning 'truthful,
 characterized by truth', which is not the "truthiness" we voted for
 in Albuquerque. The OED glosses *their* "truthiness" simply as
 'truthfulness, faithfulness'.

 Anyway, good theater all around, even if there was some dispute on
 whether one party to a dispute can felicitously accept an apology
 that the other party never actually gave...

 Larry, noting that at least the ADS got a bit more valuable publicity