[Ads-l] guttural

[Ben Zimmer]

On Tue, Mar 10, 2015 at 8:01 AM, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
>
> CNN reports that racist chanting at OU has evinced a "guttural reaction."
>
> That means 'visceral.'  See, _viscera_ is just an exclusionary word for
> _gut_. So _guttural_ makes more sense. Unless you're over-educated.

Back in '05 I wrote a Language Log post about how "guttural" gets
reinterpreted as either "low-down, vulgar" (influenced by "gutter") or
"visceral, intense" (influenced by "gut").

http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/002628.html

--bgz

-- 
Ben Zimmer
http://benzimmer.com/

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