homophonic slurs
Arnold M. Zwicky
zwicky at CSLI.STANFORD.EDU
Sat Jul 21 17:25:17 UTC 2007
On Jul 21, 2007, at 9:34 AM, i quoted:
> over on the Language Log, Mark Liberman reports on an Enertainment
> Weekly story about Isaiah Washington (late of Grey's Anatomy):
>
> http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/
>
> Washington was not asked to return to Grey's Anatomy next season
> after a turbulent year in which he was accused of calling co-star
> T.R. Knight a homophonic slur, which he then said publicly back stage
> at the Golden Globes in January.
mark noted:
According to my internal norms of English usage, you can call
someone a name, but you can't call them a slur. I wonder why not?
my judgment as well. you get
He called me a faggot/an idiot/a child pornographer/a liar/a hero/
a prescriptivist/etc.
[note: not necessarily negative, and if negative, not
necessarily via a conventional slur]
He called me a (bad) name/many (bad) names/some really bad
things. [negative, and suggests, but does not require, a
conventional slur]
He called me something really nasty/something I can't repeat/
something really congratulatory.
but i don't get
He called me a slur/an insult/a slight/an affront/a put-down.
even things like
He called me a dirty/bad/nasty word.
are borderline for me (though "dirty" and "bad" get *lots* of
webhits; "nasty" gets only 3). it looks like the more specific the
second object is, the less acceptable it is.
only two webhits for {"called me a slur"}. the first looks genuine;
the second is clearly a meta-use.
i think he got banned cuz he called me a slur. i thought it was
funny cuz i'm a girl made him look like an ass. ...
www.softballfans.com/forums/showthread.php?p=4109738
"The other day, a white kid called me a [slur] when I was walking
down the street. I wanted to kick him," Poindexter says. "You get
tired, so we have to ...
www.northjersey.com/ page.php?
qstr=eXJpcnk3ZjcxN2Y3dnFlZUVFeXkzJmZnYmVsN2Y3dnFlZUVFeXk2NDc5NDMz
only one relevant example for {"called me an insult"}:
... explained the meaning of a word used in a post directed to me
where the person was complaining about the camera and they called me
an insult in spanish. ...
www.hiway17.com/comment.php?comment.news.67
arnold
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