The return of the mononym

[barbara hawkins]

Clear! I need to sidetrack: What's interesting in Greek is that "dys" (spelled with an upsilon "y") as a prefix, denotes difficulty much as in the Latin prefix "in" e.g. in-ferno (contr. to bi-ferno). "Dys-tychi-a" in Greek means bad luck and not double luck. I don't know how far back it goes but I thought I'd pick your brain.

  cheers,
  barbara

Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
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Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: Wilson Gray
Subject: Re: The return of the mononym
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It's actually Greek "dis" and Latin "bis," both meaning, and related
to, English "twice, two times," The combining forms are "di-" and
"bi-," respectively. Cf. "twi-" in English "twin." The Attic Greek
word for "name" is "onyma." Cf. "[syn]onym." In, e.g., Homeric Greek,
the word is "onoma," in which "o[nom]a" more clearly shows the
relationship to Latin "[nom]en." And both of these words are likewise
related to English "[nam]e."

-Wilson

On 2/22/07, barbara hawkins wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender: American Dialect Society
> Poster: barbara hawkins
> Subject: Re: The return of the mononym
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> "bi" & "dio": They both mean two (2), right? Latin and Greek. "bi" denotes ability to move either way whereas "dio" just means double .... ???
>
> cheers,
> barbara hawkins
>
> Wilson Gray wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender: American Dialect Society
> Poster: Wilson Gray
> Subject: Re: The return of the mononym
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Not "binym," but "dionym."
>
> -Wilson
>
> On 2/22/07, Charles Doyle wrote:
> > ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> > Sender: American Dialect Society
> > Poster: Charles Doyle
> > Subject: Re: The return of the mononym
> > -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > Isn't there a significant difference between mononyms for individuals who have well-known second (usually sur-) names, like Hillary, Elvis, and Che, and those who don't (the ESSENTIAL mononymites), like Pele, Madonna, and Dagmar?
> >
> > Is "Ann-Margaret" a mononym or a binym?
> >
> > --Charlie
> > __________________________________________________
> >
> > ---- Original message ----
> > >Date: Wed, 21 Feb 2007 22:50:28 -0500
> > >From: Laurence Horn
> > >Subject: The return of the mononym
> >
> > >
> > >According to an Op-Ed in today's NYT, Hillary is running on "The Mononym Platform", although this seems to refer only to the fact that she bills (no pun intended) herself as "Hillary" and not as "Hillary Clinton" (or "Clinton" for that matter), thereby aligning her nomenclaturally, if not politically, with Madonna, Cher, Wynona, Elvis, Che, Pele, et al. "Mononym" is unlisted in AHD4 and its entry in the OED sports a death dagger as "obsolete" as well as "scientific", with no cites past 1899 and no proper name examples, but there are 1670 google hits, including the above individuals--chiefly singers, actresses, revolutionaries, and soccer stars--although no Hillary yet. There are but 10 hits on Nexis (Major Papers), including today's Op-Ed, dating back to 1981 (a reference in the Washington Post to a 14-year-old actress billed as "Louanne" who sang the role of Annie at the Kennedy Center). Is "mononym" a candidate for best revival, if it really did lapse for most of a c!
> en!
> > tu!
> > !
> > ry before coming back to life?
> > >
> > >LH
> >
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--
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-----
-Sam'l Clemens

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