[Ads-l] "ultracrepidate" and "anti-ultracrepidationism" & the OED

[Laurence Horn]

> On Feb 28, 2015, at 3:18 PM, Dan Goncharoff <thegonch at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
> 
> I wonder ... Did Mary Norris reinvent "ultracrepidate" and the associated
> noun form? There was no Latin word "crepidare". The more common adjectival
> form is "ultracrepidarian". It comes from the saying ne supra crepidam
> sutor judicare ‘let the cobbler not judge above the sandal’, or in
> Brooklynese, mind your own business.

An early version of recusing yourself from whatever you deem to be above your pay grade? (And those sandals are nice and low.)

LH

> 
> This is the second question I have about this fabulous piece of writing.
> On Feb 28, 2015 2:40 PM, "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at att.net> wrote:
> 
>> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>> -----------------------
>> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Poster:       "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET>
>> Subject:      "ultracrepidate" and "anti-ultracrepidationism" & the OED
>> 
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> 
>> There is a fancy word for "going beyond your province":
>> "ultracrepidate." So much of copy editing is about not going beyond
>> your province. Anti-ultracrepidationism. Writers might think we're
>> applying rules and sticking it to their prose in order to make it fit
>> some standard, but just as often we're backing off, making
>> exceptions, or at least trying to find a balance between doing too
>> much and doing too little.
>> 
>> 2015 Mary Norris in The New Yorker Feb 23; see
>> https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__www.newyorker.com_magazine_2015_02_23_holy-2Dwrit&d=AwIFaQ&c=-dg2m7zWuuDZ0MUcV7Sdqw&r=wFp3X4Mu39hB2bf13gtz0ZpW1TsSxPIWYiZRsMFFaLQ&m=jEQ2hc1UwEMwKP_xAlIl7wKi7hIYravOTwV4EwNdTHg&s=GoJZHGugVt-ddwqF2JXveMimYptl57OhL4Ix5yuUVtM&e= 
>> 
>> "ultracrepidate" postdates OED2  --1882.
>> "anti-ultracrepidationism" not in OED3
>> 
>> Joel
>> 
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>> 
> 
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