I make it a policy never to vote for anyone who says “repasennative.” If you can’t properly say they name of the office you’re seeking, you don’t need to be running.
Know Tea
You take the banana out of the freezer, dip it in the chocolate, and roll it in the nuts.
12 responses so far ↓
1 Sara // Oct 3, 2007 at 20:28
Hey, I just wanted to say I’m really sorry to hear about your church being broken into…
2 RevJATB // Oct 3, 2007 at 21:05
Thank you.
3 Matt // Oct 4, 2007 at 8:09
You leave no wiggle room for local dialects? Must every English-speaker around the world conform to one standard?
4 RevJATB // Oct 4, 2007 at 15:20
You have a problem with standards? Must be a postmodern thing.
But I’m not talking about “every English-speaker”: I’m talking about someone who is running for public office and thus must be able to put a good face on our state, not confirm the “50th place in education” reputation we have–a deserved reputation, since it actually is 50th in education. So yes, someone who puts forth a little effort not to sound like a yahoo will get my vote.
We are not talking about accents here. It is possible to have an accent and not sound ignorant at the same time. This is especially true if someone is desiring to “repasent” me in Washington: I expect him/her to be able to communicate clearly and without distractions to people from all parts of the country.
Jimmy Carter has a southern accent. So does Bill Clinton. Both are well-spoken. When we are talking about public discourse, we should all be able to speak one common language so we can all understand one another.
5 cancerman // Oct 4, 2007 at 17:18
Although Carter’s inability to correctly say nuclear was a liability.
6 Sara // Oct 4, 2007 at 18:22
Well, that’s one thing he and The Shrub have in common…
I don’t know what’s worse, “repazennutive” from someone running for said office, or signs at Bed, Bath, and Beyond promoting a sale on “Chester Draws”. People, you work for a furniture/housewares company. A major national chain, at that. Chest. Of. Drawers. Is it really that hard?
7 RevJATB // Oct 4, 2007 at 19:13
Sara, that is hysterical! Did you have a camera with you?
Cancerman, the nuke-you-ler thing is annoying, but it seems quite prevalent not only among politicians, but also among people in the military. I’m not sure where that comes from. I’ve heard it said that Truman first pronounced it that way and military brass followed suit, but that sounds like a made-up explanation.
It’s not like “nuclear” is hard to say, either. Strange.
8 Sara // Oct 5, 2007 at 10:04
well linguistically, there’s a strong tendency to reverse blends that involve L and R. For instance Brad Bourgeois and I had a teacher in high school who always said “modren” instead of “modern”. It’s one of those classic shifts you see when you look at how languages have changed over time. in 200 years, “nukeular” will probably be standard.
9 RevJATB // Oct 5, 2007 at 13:01
I think sometimes, too, these sorts of things occur because people are talkers, not readers. For example, I said “marscapone” for a long time, even after reading it several times on the package. It took someone saying, “You know, it’s mascarpone, not marscapone,” for me to take a good look at the package and discover, lo and behold, it is mascarpone!
I think the same is true of other words we’ve talked about on here before, such as “chipolte” (or even “chipoltle”) for chipotle, “sherbert” for sherbet, or “calvary” for cavalry. People see the word written and, because they’re so used to hearing it pronounced one way, they never take a good look at the word to see that the letters aren’t exactly in the order that the reader thinks they are.
(And mascarpone is cultured cr?me fra?che, not cheese per se, so “mascarpone cheese” is a bit of a misnomer, but I digress.)
10 Sara // Oct 10, 2007 at 20:14
I have trouble with “revelation”, actually. I always want to say “relevation” for some reason, maybe having to do with the ballet step called “relev?”, which I dunno, maybe I learned the same week I had “revelation” as a vocabulary word in school?
I have to remind myself before I say it (or even write it) that a revelation “reveals” something. This makes me thank the goddess every day that I didn’t grow up to be a fire and brimstone fundamentalist preacher…
11 Sara // Oct 10, 2007 at 20:18
Oh, and not to be pedantic, but Mascarpone is, in fact a real cheese. It’s a creme fraiche based curd separated from the whey with rennet. It’s neither pressed nor aged, but neither are ricotta, mozzarella, chevre, cream cheese, and a great many other soft young cheeses.
12 RevJATB // Oct 10, 2007 at 20:46
Ooh. Wish you hadn’t told me about the rennet. I may have to swear off it now. I don’t do rennet if I can help it.
On the revelation/relevation thing, I’ve heard a lot of people get tripped up trying to say “relevant” or “irrelevant”: they want to say “revelant” or “irrevelant” instead.
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