Can I have a Word?

Words. Language. Linguistics. That’s my ‘thing’! Reading, writing, researching….’Google’ is my bestie! My curiosity and thirst for knowledge has no bounds and if I hear something I don’t know about and it interests me, I HAVE to find out more. It could just be a word I don’t know the meaning of, a historical event or a person who is either famous or infamous for a particular fact/event/circumstance. I have to be honest though, I haven’t got the greatest memory these days for retaining facts and I don’t always remember finer details. In fact, a lot of my googling comes from those conversations with fellow sufferers of menopausal brain fog that go something like this:

“Did you watch that series on TV last night?”

“Which one was that?”

“The one with that woman who was in that other drama. I can’t remember the name of it but it had that bloke in it, you know the one that was married to the woman from that film about something or other. It was on Netflix. Or maybe it was Prime or Paramount….”

Sometimes if there’s enough of you, you can get there with a collective effort and it’s such a triumph when you do! Or you can just ‘Google it’ with a few clues and work your way to an answer!

If you are naturally an enthusiastic reader this will always expand your bank of vocabulary. However, occasionally I come across a word or two that I have to look up. This happened to me very recently in fact. The first word I didn’t recognise or know the meaning of was ‘ameliorate’ – “to make or become better, more bearable or more satisfactory; improve” or synonyms “alleviate; lighten; mitigate”. It sounded a bit fancy for the context in the book if I’m honest! The second word was ‘obfuscate’ – “to make unclear or hard to understand, (especially deliberately), to confuse or bewilder; to darken” or synonyms “baffle; becloud; befuddle”. Well done if you already knew the meaning of these words!

I’m sure I’m also not the only one who sometimes can’t get off to sleep for trying to remember something and resorts to going through the alphabet in my head in the hope that it will trigger an answer! So not only is my memory deteriorating but my brain just won’t switch off and give me a break when I need it to!

“Language is the blood of the soul into which thoughts run and out of which they grow.” – Oliver Wendell Holmes (American physician, poet and polymath).

A dictionary definition of ‘dictionary’ is – “a book or digital resource containing a selection of words and information about their meanings, pronunciations, etymologies, inflected forms, derived forms, etc., in either the same or another language; lexicon; glossary.”

A dictionary definition of ‘thesaurus’ is – “a dictionary of synonyms and antonyms.”

A dictionary definition of ‘synonym’ is – “a word having the same or nearly the same meaning as another word in the same language, such as happy, joyful, elated.”

A dictionary definition of ‘antonym’ is – “a word opposite in meaning to another.” Fast is an antonym of slow.

“The English language is so elastic that you can find another word to say the same thing.” – Mahatma Ghandi (Indian Civil Rights Activist).

Whether you have to write reports/important emails for your job or you just write for fun (I do both) and you want your work to be succinct and articulate, a thesaurus may just be your best friend! I use an online one and find it is an invaluable tool. You may, for example, be compiling a CV (curriculum vitae) or a job application and want to make the text a little more interesting and descriptive, there’s no shame in referring to a thesaurus. If you have ‘brain block’ it can often prompt you to find the right word for your sentence to say exactly what you are trying to say.

Then of course there is also the urban dictionary which is a “crowdsourced English-language online dictionary for slang words and phrases. The website was founded in 1999 by Aaron Peckham. Originally, Urban Dictionary was intended as a dictionary of slang or cultural words and phrases not typically found in standard dictionaries, but it is now used to define any word, event or phrase (including sexually explicit content).”

Im sure like many other mothers of millennials, I am often confused by the ‘language’ of my ‘kids’. Their definitions of words you think you know can often be the opposite! It’s a whole new learning curve! Over the years I’ve heard them say words which have a different and new meaning to my understanding. For example:

Calm

Regular dictionary definition – “without rough motion; still or nearly still: a calm sea.”

Urban dictionary definition – “It’s cool, don’t worry bout it, that’s alright, yes mate, sweet.”

Bare

Regular dictionary definition – “without covering or clothing; naked; nude, eg bare legs.” Also – “scarcely or just sufficient; mere; eg the bare necessities of life.”

Urban dictionary definition – “a lot of; very; an exclamation used in disbelief. E.g The woman had bare cats; I was bare tired”

Sick

Regular dictionary definition – “affected with ill health, disease, or illness”

Urban dictionary definition – “cool. Eg that’s sick man”

Basically the complete opposite of the original definitions of the words ‘bare’ and ‘sick’! It’s almost like a secret code to confuse and fool an older generation!

The urban dictionary is very entertaining and a great time-waster! Once you start browsing it gets more and more intriguing! It’s actually just very interesting reading about how the dictionary evolved, the rules, the selection and some of the controversy. Here’s an interesting fact I found on Wikipedia:

“For the first five years, the site generated revenue but did not make a profit. In 2003, the website gained wider attention after a news article revealed that a judge of the High Court of Justice in the United Kingdom had used Urban Dictionary to assist interpreting slang lyrics in a case involving two rappers.”

Just three more urban dictionary definitions for the fun of it that I love:

Trumpologist (n): “one whose paid job is to surf social media and forums ridiculing any and all critisism of Donald Trump with the aim of making it look like he has supporters. Origin – Trump Apologist – someone who argues in defense of a controversial truth, usually but not always associated with Christianity. During slave times in the United States, an apologist would defend that slavery was all right, by citing portions of the bible where God’s favorites owned slaves.”

Fuckwit: “A person who is not only lacking in clue but is apparently unable or unwilling to acquire clue even when handed it on a plate in generous portions.”

Phat: “pretty hot and tempting. Eg Girl you are phat”

“Language is a process of free creation; its laws and principles are fixed, but the manner in which the principles of generation are used is free and infinitely varied” – Noam Chomsky (American author and Laureate Professor of Linguistics).

There is also an online etymology dictionary. . Etymology is the scientific study of the origin and evolution of a word’s semantic meaning across time. Etymologies are not definitions They are explanations of what our words meant and how they sounded 600 or 2,000 years ago.

The search for meaningful origins for familiar or strange words is far older than the modern understanding of linguistic evolution and the relationships of languages, which began no earlier than the 18th century. A dictionary for history enthusiasts as well as linguists.

You could think of etymology as tree roots. As language develops, all the individual roots of a word come together to form a sturdy foundation, the tree representing the current form of the language. Understanding that words have root meanings is important, because it can allow us to expand and reinforce our vocabulary, by highlighting all the different elements that make our language.

“Language is very powerful. Language does not just describe reality. Language creates the reality it describes.” – Desmond Tutu (South African Anglican Bishop and theologian).

I love board games linked to words and language, like ‘Scrabble’, ‘Boggle’ and ‘Countdown’. Our family favourite is ‘Balderdash’ which was originally based on a TV panel game show called ‘Call my Bluff’. The show aired from October 1965 to December 1988. Two teams competed to identify the correct definitions of obscure words. The teams took turns to give three definitions, one true and two bluffs, while the other team attempted to determine which was correct. Both teams took turns bluffing and determining definitions.‘Balderdash’ is described as “a bluffing trivia game where guessing the answer that sounds right probably isn’t” A later version of the game ‘Absolute Balderdash’ added extra categories which are chosen by an arrow spin wheel. The categories are:

• WORDS – what is the definition of this word?

• PEOPLE – what is this person known for?

• INITIALS – what do they stand for?

• MOVIES – what is the basic story line?

• LAWS – complete the law!

Everyone has to write their own (made up) answers on a piece of paper and the ‘dasher’ (question master) copies the correct answer from the card on to an identical piece of paper therefore disguising which one is correct when they read out all of the answers together. If a player thinks they know the correct answer (extremely rare!) they can put that for extra points. It’s such good fun and often the answer you think is so ludicrous it is surely made up is the correct answer! It’s fun to delve into the minds and imaginations of your friends and family and it’s really exciting if players are convinced by your own answer, making you feel quite clever and smug! Sometimes you can be fooled into thinking an answer has to have been written by someone in particular because it seems so obvious – like grandad always writing about military and war, dad about cars and motorbikes, and the kids about fashion, pop culture and anything shockable! I highly recommend this game, it has been the source of much laughter and amusement over many years in our household.

I love a good TV quiz show, ‘Wheel of Fortune’, ‘Catchphrase’ and Countdown’ with its word conundrums. A conundrum is a puzzling question or problem but can also be a riddle where the answer is a play on words. For example, what is black and white and read all over? Answer: a newspaper. In ‘Countdown’ it is a nine letter word which is jumbled up and you have to rearrange the letters to guess the correct word.

“Gaia visited her daughter Mnemosyne, who was busy being unpronounceable” – Stephen Fry (English actor, broadcaster, comedian, director, narrator and writer).

Currently my favourite TV quiz show is ‘The 1% Club’. The show is styled as an IQ test and the questions are based on logic and common sense rather than general knowledge. You don’t need to know the answers, you just have to work them out. In essence it is a series of riddles and gets progressively harder throughout the show.

For example: A man who was outside in the rain without an umbrella or hat didn’t get a single hair on his head wet. Why?
Answer: He was bald.

Sometimes contestants get caught out by what we might call a trick question, such as What month of the year has 28 days? The answer of course is ‘all of them’ but some people might assume the answer is February. Or There’s a one-story house in which everything is yellow. Yellow walls, yellow doors, yellow furniture. What color are the stairs? Of course there are no stairs as it’s a one-story house.

They can certainly drive you mad at times!

Anagram: a word, phrase, or sentence formed from another by rearranging its letters, such as night/thing, elbow/below and dusty/study. Some anagrams are cleverly relevant to the original word. Such as debit card/bad credit. Other examples are:

Astronomer – moon starer

Schoolmaster – the classroom

The Morse code – here come the dots

Then there are the ones for famous people’s names:

Madonna Louise Ciccone – one cool dance musician

Clint Eastwood – old west action

William Shakespeare – I’ll make a wise phrase

George Bush – he bugs Gore!

I love a crossword, particularly ones with cryptic clues. From an early age I remember my mum doing newspaper crosswords and getting to know some of the regular clues and the use of anagrams or hidden words. Sometimes a clue can seem impossible until you break down a cryptic one.

There are three main elements to look out for in a cryptic clue – there will always be a straight definition plus either an anagram or a hidden word.

Here are some simple examples:

Month derived from charm

Month is the straight definition; charm is an anagram of March, i.e. the answer.

Raptor upset a talking bird

Talking bird is the straight definition; raptor is an anagram of parrot (the answer). In addition to this ‘upset’ indicates the word is jumbled up (an anagram).

Melon disguised as a hidden fruit

Hidden fruit is the straight definition; melon is an anagram of lemon (the answer). As above, ‘disguised’ indicates it is jumbled up.

Colour found in bizarre door

Colour is the straight definition; in this case it is a hidden word (‘found in’) not an anagram. The answer is red – bizarre door.

Cryptic crosswords are very satisfying to do. Sometimes you can even work out an answer to a word you’ve never heard of. So you shouldn’t assume you can’t do one if you don’t know lots of complicated and obscure words!

Most mornings I do what I think of as a series of brain training! I do ‘Wordle’ (6 guesses to find 1 word), ‘Quordle’ (9 guesses to find 4 words) and ‘Octordle’ (13 guesses to find 8 words)! My first word is always the same for all of them and I rarely use a different one. It’s a word that contains three vowels so a good place to start. I also use a free app called ‘Mindpal’, a daily brain trainer that challenges 7 key cognitive areas – memory, attention, language, maths, flexibility, speed and problem solving. It features over 40 games and 1000 levels to train your brain in different skills. In an attempt to improve my weak numeracy skills I also do daily ‘Numble’. It is like the numbers game in ‘Countdown’ where you are given 6 numbers and a target to reach using only those numbers but not necessarily all of them. That one doesn’t keep a tally of your records but I do okay. Im not so good when the answer requires double brackets though! Maybe a step too far for my non-mathematical brain!

‘Wordtrip’ is another good app. It’s not a daily game, just ongoing. I’ve been playing it for years and about four years ago I reached the top level (solved by 0.01% of players) but I’ve just carried on for the fun of it! Letters are presented in a circle and you swipe to find hidden words. This game tests your vocabulary, spelling skills and puzzle solving ability. Just one I play from time to time.

I’ve recently started playing a game called ‘Contexto Me’. I’m wary of actually recommending this game because it is actually frustrating and infuriating! It is so random but strangely I do get it most of the time. I sometimes get ‘hints’ but they don’t always help either! Occasionally I give up and see the answer when my sanity is severely at risk….!

I’ll just finish here with one last word, my current favourite, as I believe it describes me, and one last fabulous quote!

Thalassophile (n): a lover of the sea; someone who loves the sea, ocean.

“I thought: pity the poor in spirit who know neither the enchantment nor the beauty of language.” – Muriel Barbery (French novelist and philosophy teacher).