you yahoo

[Amy West]

>Date:    Mon, 31 Mar 2008 21:30:51 +0000
>From:    Tom Zurinskas <truespel at HOTMAIL.COM>
>Subject: Re: 'Top Words from 2007': _hybrid_, _surge_, _climate change_
>
>>  NPR's people aren't stupid or yahoos. It might be fruitful for several of us
>>  to write to them.
>
>Main Entry: 1ya¬
hoo
>Pronunciation: \ÀàyŸÅ-(Àå)hˆº, Ààyˆ§-\
>Function: noun
>Inflected Form(s): plural yahoos
>Date: 1726
>1capitalized : a member of a race of brutes in
>Swift's Gulliver's Travels who have the form and
>all the vices of humans
>2[influenced by 2yahoo] : a boorish, crass, or stupid person
>’Äî ya¬
hoo¬
ism  \-Àåi-z ôm\ noun
>
>Strange entry here by my favorite word source, m-w.com.

What's so strange about it?

>Strange first pronunciation; I never heard yahoo pronounced that way.

Well, that doesn't mean that it isn't pronounced
that way. The pron. editor is paid to collect
prons, a la Wilson reporting what he hears.
Perhaps instead of "strange" you should say
"unfamiliar" or just "I'm unfamiliar with the
first pron..."

>Strange definition 2; because one could be
>boorish and crass while not being stupid.  They
>probably mean "and" stupid.

No, they don't. If they did they would have said
"and". They use the "or" because it can be
applied to someone who has only one of those
qualities, not all of them. Definers are quite
conscious of their wording.

>I thought the word "yahoo" was just a happy
>exclamation of western roots like yippee.  But
>that's not in the definition above.

No, because that's a different entry. That's
yahoo[2] because it serves a different
grammatical function. Note the much later date.

Get a clue!

---Amy West

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