Who is Rosetta Stone?

[Wilson Gray]

Gottenu! You're right, Dennis! ;-)

-Wilson

On Sat, Sep 6, 2008 at 3:25 PM, Dennis Baron <debaron at illinois.edu> wrote:
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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Dennis Baron <debaron at ILLINOIS.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: Who is Rosetta Stone?
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Gee, Wilson, I always thought that Rosetta Stone was the woman who got
> on the bus after Rosa Parks, and her first language wan't Anglish, it
> was Yiddish (her name had been Stein, and believe me, she couldn't
> sing for bupkes).
> ____________________
> Dennis Baron
> Professor of English and Linguistics
> Department of English
> University of Illinois
> 608 S. Wright St.
> Urbana, IL 61801
>
> office: 217-244-0568
> fax: 217-333-4321
>
> http://illinois.edu/goto/debaron
>
> read the Web of Language:
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>
> On Sep 6, 2008, at 1:46 PM, Wilson Gray wrote:
>
>> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>> -----------------------
>> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Poster:       Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
>> Subject:      Re: Who is Rosetta Stone?
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> You're wrong, Dennis. Rosetta Stone was a founder of the National
>> Association of Colored Women's Clubs. Though born in a sharecropper's
>> shack in the Mississippi Delta, by listening to recordings of the
>> speeches of Eleanor Roosevelt, she managed to lose her Southern-Negro
>> brogue and train herself to speak Proper Anglish, to the extent that
>> she was often mistaken for an upper-class white woman when she spoke
>> to the colored masses over the radio, thereby commanding their
>> respect, attention, and admiration. Hence, her connection with
>> language-learning by the use of recordings and the fact that the
>> company doesn't use her likeness in its ads.
>>
>> Little-known fact: The late, great Gospel-songstress, "Sister"
>> _Rosetta_ Tharp[sic] was named in her honor.
>>
>> -Wilson
>>
>> On Sat, Sep 6, 2008 at 12:36 PM, Dennis Baron <debaron at illinois.edu>
>> wrote:
>>> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>>> -----------------------
>>> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>> Poster:       Dennis Baron <debaron at ILLINOIS.EDU>
>>> Subject:      Re: Who is Rosetta Stone?
>>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>
>>> I thought Rosetta Stone was one of the early organizers of the ILGWU,
>>> a labor leader who fought for the rights of exploited acronym makers
>>> in the early 1900s.
>>> ____________________
>>> Dennis Baron
>>> Professor of English and Linguistics
>>> Department of English
>>> University of Illinois
>>> 608 S. Wright St.
>>> Urbana, IL 61801
>>>
>>> office: 217-244-0568
>>> fax: 217-333-4321
>>>
>>> http://illinois.edu/goto/debaron
>>>
>>> read the Web of Language:
>>> http://illinois.edu/goto/weboflanguage
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Sep 6, 2008, at 11:28 AM, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
>>>
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>>>> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>>> Poster:       Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at YAHOO.COM>
>>>> Subject:      Re: Who is Rosetta Stone?
>>>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>>
>>>> I notice that in=A0the latest commercial, Michael Phelps (always)
>>>> and the a=
>>>> nnouncer (predominantly) both favor the "Coretta King" stress
>>>> pattern.
>>>> =A0
>>>> Since a tiny Rosetta stone is the company's emblem, I can only
>>>> presume that=
>>>> they've abandoned their project of underestimating the knowledge of
>>>> the Am=
>>>> erican people.=20
>>>> =A0
>>>> Look for: future ads with=A0a lady=A0in Sarah Palin glasses ("flying
>>>> off th=
>>>> e shelves," according to Fox) saying, "Want to learn a language
>>>> fast? Hi! I=
>>>> 'm=A0 Rosetta Stone...."
>>>> =A0
>>>> JL=0A=0A=0A
>>>>
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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.
>> -----
>> -Mark Twain
>>
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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.
-----
-Mark Twain

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