The m-word

[Laurence Horn]

At 1:10 PM -0400 10/25/07, Charles Doyle wrote:
>Thanks for the links, Jesse! I'm still mystified by the evident
>aversion to the word (even out of context)--and the vehemence of
>that aversion--but at least I'm reassured that my students are
>consonant with the times.
>
>I'll now remember to compliment the cook by describing her cake as
>exquisitely "wet" or "damp"!
>
>--Charlie

Very interesting; I had no idea of the existence of this phenomenon,
much less its breadth and depth.  It looks to me as though the source
is (as so often in language) an effect of the combination of sound
(in particular the /oi/ nucleus exacerbated by the following
voiceless sibilant) and meaning (in particular the collocational one,
as a modifier of panties).  So neither "choice", say, nor "damp" have
any particular aversive effect.  Is it, as it appears to me, only
women who are "moist"ophobic?  So it would appear from the evidence
presented on the Language Log posts, along with Charlie's post.

LH

>_____________________________________________________________
>
>---- Original message ----
>>Date: Thu, 25 Oct 2007 12:49:32 -0400
>>From: Jesse Sheidlower <jester at PANIX.COM>
>>
>>On Thu, Oct 25, 2007 at 11:42:23AM -0400, Charles Doyle wrote:
>>>
>>>  A student in my Shakespeare class announced that the word
>>>  "moist" (which I had uttered to describe Egypt in _Antony &
>>>  Cleopatra_) is offensive to women. Some of the other women
>>>  in the class concurred (not hostilely--just as a matter of
>>>  information for a clueless male professor). I was somewhat
>>>  flabergasted, and nobody would articulate a reason for the
>>>  offensiveness--except for one male student's eventual
>>>  suggestion that the word reminds women of sexual
>>>  arousal. That association is not at all beside-the-point of
>>>  my description of Egypt in the play--but why would such a
>>>  connotation make the word offensive per se? As far as I
>>>  could ascertain, "damp" and "wet" don't carry whatever
>>>  stigma attaches to "moist." What am I missing here?!
>>
>>This has been discussed in several recent posts on the Language Log:
>>
>>http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/004835.html
>>http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/004896.html
>>http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/004993.html
>>
>>Jesse Sheidlower
>>OED
>
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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org