X marry ing Y <> Y marrying X?

[Laurence Horn]

At 12:06 PM -0400 9/13/07, RonButters at AOL.COM wrote:
>In a message dated 9/13/07 11:53:30 AM, laurence.horn at YALE.EDU writes:
>
>
>>  >The spammers must know something about Larry that is not public knowledge.
>>
>>  e.g. that I distinguish between reduction and redaction?
>>
>*I* don't get any messages offering to eliminate my penis ... do you?
>
No, but that's not what redaction entails.
Here is AHD4:

1. The act or process of editing or revising a piece of writing;
preparation for publication.
2. An edited work; a new edition or revision.

What my spammers are offering me is definitely a new edition or
revision of my "work".

Similarly, OED includes 'revision, rearrangement' or their result in
'a new edition, an adaptation' as well as 'a shortened form'.

In context, of course, redaction could involve deletion or
elimination, but that doesn't (or at least didn't use(d) to) follow
from the meaning of the lexical item.  I wonder if the tendency to
restrict "redaction" to contexts of abridgment or elimination is
influenced by the resemblance to "reduction".

LH

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