[Ads-l] WOTY? "berm"

[Benjamin Barrett]

I thought I had once posted about a current definition of “berm” not in the OED, but I don’t see it now.

I do see two postings on “berm” in the archives, one from Mark Mandel (http://www.americandialect.org/americandialectarchives/oct96.txt) and one from Barbara Hill Hudson (http://www.americandialect.org/americandialectarchives/nov95.txt). 

Benjamin Barrett
Formerly of Seattle, WA

> On 1 May 2016, at 10:29, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
> 
> I saw no mound. I saw a fairly level strip of dirt and grass behind a
> walkway formed by concrete barriers.
> 
> He just walked across the grass.
> 
> Maybe nowadays some people call a grassy divider or perimeter a "berm."
> 
> JL
> 
> On Sun, May 1, 2016 at 12:39 PM, James A. Landau <JJJRLandau at netscape.com>
> wrote:
> 
>> On  Sat, 30 Apr 2016 21:43:48 Zone+0000 Joel Berson <berson at ATT.NET>
>> wrote:
>> 
>> <quote>
>> Said and seen during an ABC-affiliate news broadcast, although I don't
>> see it in "print" (online):  To reach the venue for his Friday address
>> in California (to a Republican Party meeting?), Trump had to detour due
>> to a demonstration and climb up a "berm", as the announcer called it.
>> <end quote>
>> 
>> When I was in Basic Training at Fort Knox (summer of 1969), the dirt wall
>> on each side of a rifle range was called a "berm" (and I seem to recall
>> someone making a pun about "Berm-a Road").  I can't recall having heard the
>> word "berm" since then.
>> 
>> Trump is 69.  It's a little hard imagining someone that age scaling a
>> concrete wall, but climbing over a dirt mound should not have been a
>> problem,so I don't see anything remark-able about that news broadcast.  It
>> is quite easy to to throw insults at Adolph Trump without trying to work in
>> his fantastic border wall.
>> 
>> - Jim Landau

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