[Ads-l] subversive, adj.

[Jonathan Lighter]

Unlike the older sense, the critical connotation is typically positive,
btw.  For example:

https://www.yahoo.com/entertainment/movies/articles/devils-earns-nc-17-rating-192448271.html

Seeing the full version [of The Devils]  in all its NC-17 glory, only adds
to the feeling that Russell made perhaps the quintessential piece of
subversive cinema.

My 2011 suggestion of "defiantly unconventional" seems to fit here.

JL


On Sun, Feb 6, 2011 at 10:04 AM Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>
wrote:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: subversive, adj.
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> And another ex.  Here it's closer to "purposefully unconventional":
>
> 1995 Peter Kuch _Bruce Dawe_ (Melbourne: OUP) 2: By calling his first book
> of poems _No Fixed Address_, Dawe chose to introduce himself as an
> intinerant in the Republic of Letters. Characteristically, it is both a
> disarming and a subversive self-image.
>
> (The upper-case style led me to expect "Republic of the Congo.")
>
> JL
>
> On Tue, Mar 2, 2010 at 5:51 PM, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com
> >wrote:
>
> > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> > -----------------------
> > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Poster:       Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
> > Subject:      Re: subversive, adj.
> >
> >
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > An "early" example: "critical of convention or complacency."
> >
> > 1963 Albert J. Guerard _Hardy_ (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice -Hall)
> 1:
> > A
> > subsversive writer without intending to be one, he was honored at the end
> > by
> > the Establishment, with burial in Westminster Abbey and the Prime
> Minister
> > as a pallbearer.
> >
> > Thomas Hardy, "subversive."  "Without intending" it.  See what I mean?
> >
> > JL
> >
> > On Thu, Feb 18, 2010 at 7:53 PM, Jonathan Lighter <
> wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com
> > >wrote:
> >
> > >
> >  > OED defines this solely as "Having a tendency to subvert or overthrow;
> > > tending to subversion."
> > >
> > > But anyone who's had the misfortune to read much postmodern critical
> > theory
> > > over the past, say, ten or fifteen years, knows that _subversive_  is a
> > > favorite word of praise in the much diluted sense of "transgressive"
> > (also a
> > > fave) or "defiantly unconventional."
> > >
> > > A random ex. from Google Books, 2005: "The Los Angeles Times's Kenneth
> > > Turan recognized the arrival of a major, if subversive, talent within
> the
> > > heart of the studio system."
> > >
> > > JL
> > >
> > > "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the
> > truth."
> > >
> >
> >
> >
> > --
> > "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the
> truth."
> >
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> >
>
>
>
> --
> "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."
>
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"If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."

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