Cat's pyjamas
French literary institution Bernard Pivot – who, in addition to his many accomplishments, has a very impressive set of eyebrows, though nowhere near as distracting as this TV lunkhead’s – has published a new book on 100 French words that need to be saved.
In it, he laments that every year so many “perfectly good and useful” words are removed from the much-perused desktop dictionaries, and relegated to the largely ignored but look-great-on-the-shelf, unaffordable multi-volume sets – ne’er to be lingered over and slipped into conversation again.
Among the words are: carabistouilles: blunder, mildly dishonest trash talking; cagoterie: zealous, bigoted devotion; fla-fla: self-consciously pretentious, à la keeping up with the Jones’s, and suivez-moi-jeune-homme: (literally: follow-me-young-mans) the ribbons on women’s bonnets.
(Naturally, the lexicographers rebut with the fact that language is a living thing… get over it, B.P.)
Unfortunately, it is a rather futile (and pedantic) call to quills – there being little chance of force feeding these words back into the language (the magazine Lire has asked several popular writers to adopt an outmoded word of choice, and include it in a future work). Gobbledegook.
That being said, I do occasionally get the feeling that the average vocabulary is shrinking – and, as a kid, was always baffled at sitcoms where it was an automatic laugh when a character said a word with over three syllables, while everyone else rolled their eyes and smirked – and confess that I sometimes lament the inexorable fade of fiddlefaddle, slattern, feminal, dandle, codswallop (not to mention, codpiece), balderdash, fusty, cock-a-hoop…
Though I hear that the bee’s knees is making a comeback.
Bonnets, not so much.
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Comment
- Hmm. Shouldn’t that be “keeping up with the Joneses”, not ”...Jones’s”?
— Peter Marquis-Kyle Mar 16, 2:28pm # - I have no shame in admitting, I’ve been using “the bee’s knees” and “the cat’s pajamas” for years now. My daughter’s friends think I’m a riot, which is better than being thought a jerk, I suppose.
— roggey Mar 16, 2:39pm # - I hold the I-think-not-contradictory perspective that linguistic change is (a) inevitable and (b) always to be resisted.
As to whether the average vocabulary is shrinking: it’s possible that the rediscovery of epistolary discourse via blogs and email is actually increasing the connected – if not the average – reader’s vocabulary. [previewing: Is that a programmatically created en-dash I see above? Nice work!]
I find I’m still disovering new words
(“rutilant” in DFW’s Infinite Jest, although I’ve yet to find the gumption to use it in conversation) in better fiction. I suspect, however, that most people aren’t reading “better” fiction.
— Michael Honey Mar 16, 3:08pm # - I, too, am a resister—I want to retain words and the traditional ways of saying things: simply, a linguistic conservative.
And, yes, I know that language changes, and that this is not something one approves or disapproves of. It’s simply a fact.
The “anything goes” crowd always gets the plaudits, because liberty is an easy ace, while the resisters get labelled pedants and worse. But think about this: if conservatives and conservative tendancies didn’t exist, change would be so rapid that communication would break down and wrds wld grljg blk djjjj all!
When you go to the cupboard where the Laphroaig bottle was, you want it to be there still. At least, I do.
— Simon Fodden Mar 16, 3:57pm # - “Feminal,” I note, is now the brand name of a female urinal. So take heart! There’s always hope.
— Kip Manley Mar 16, 5:08pm # - I try to reduce my vocabulary, make my sentences shorter, my words plainer. Simplify. And use only the present tense. In this way, I will be ready when the audio-only version of Windows is released. Click preview. Forget. Click preview.
— eeksypeeksy Mar 17, 1:50am # - My husband and I are doing our part for keeping two of your favourites alive. I hear him use the word “dandle” more often than you think he could, and I, for one, am fond of “fusty”.
— schmutzie Mar 17, 11:50am # - Authochthonic numinous recension gone cattywhompus – atrophied in avizandum.
It’s them fustean-clad cenobites done it, is what it is.
— msg Mar 17, 2:00pm # - For what it’s worth, there’s a local band I know who use “balderdash” in one of their songs.
— cmb Mar 18, 3:07pm # - I don’t think I am a linguistic “conservative” because I try to help us remember good words. I am not, after all, trying to prevent the use of new terms – just to sustain the mass and memory of our language.
There is a practical problem caused by piling archaisms on each other so sense is lost. But as long as context still indicates meaning, they are part of the delight of words.
And that is the drum.
— David Tiley Mar 19, 4:32am # - Language has to change with everyday experiences around us changing, but it does delight me when my driving teacher (an older woman) scolds me: “Stop milking the cow! You are milking the cow again!”
— Aet Mar 22, 2:30am # - For what it’s worth, I do use the word “carabistouille” from time to time, as in “qu’est-ce que c’est que ces carabistouilles”... I grew up hearing that from my parents so often, it stuck with me!
— clotilde Mar 23, 9:42am # - After dinner game:
Take it in turns to enunciate with relish favourite words. Words that sound good and make the tongue and lips feel nice. Note with winey sadness how many of these words are no longer in common parlance—as if the commoners ever parled anything delightful!—and make the most of them. There are no prizes except those provided by the other players, in the words you have never heard or had forgotten. If you have trouble coming up with a really good word, try ‘languid’. It’s the dog’s bollocks!
— John Hudson Mar 23, 9:38pm # - Well, John, you’ll be pleased to learn that Dean equips all of our French friends heading to the UK for hols with the phrase “the dog’s bollocks,” and instructions on usage… and the very special ones are offered the bonus phrase: “up your kilt.” With a recommendation to use it whenever the mood strikes them.
— gail Mar 24, 10:41am # - Speaking of British argot and kilts, can anyone offer an explanation for the current phrase of approval ‘It’s pants!’ Pants?
— John Hudson Mar 25, 12:48am # - Great post. I think in so many curliques and loops I don’t know if I could function without a myriad and eclectic selection of words.
I believe in preserving strange folkisms, like “Slicker ‘n owl snot on a door knob” and all the variants on “Not the sharpest knife in the drawer/brightest bulb in the batch/roundest wheel on the bike.” It keeps life interesting.
— Rana Mar 25, 6:09pm # - I am trying – rather unsuccessfully, thus far – to keep the beautiful word ‘valise’ alive. It’s so much prettier than ‘suitcase’ or ‘luggage’, although after a recent trip to my home town, I really do think ‘luggage’ has its place. ahem
— maddy Mar 29, 12:32pm # - I think people’s vocabularies have probably remained about the same size – or possibly increased somewhat – over the past century. First, I believe there was a big increase in literacy during the early part of the 20th century. Second, I think a large number of new, mostly tech-related words have been added to people’s working vocabularies in recent decades. Words may come and go, but I don’t notice dictionaries – not even desk dictionaries – actually getting smaller in terms of the number of words they include.
— Bunny-Pig Mar 30, 7:06pm #
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