Submitted by nizou2  •  December 6, 2004

Afraid not

Is the phrase “I’m afraid not,” such as in the below exchange, an idiom? It does not seem to make sense to me.

“May I please have the newspaper?” “I’m afraid not.”

Would that construction not indicate “I am not afraid?” To me, it seems that perhaps the phrase came from the shortening of “I’m afraid I can not” by dropping the “can” which completely ruins the ability of the phrase to make logical sense.

Even if I am correct in my assumptions, the phrase is still commonly used and understood. However, in formal writing, should I purposely avoid using this phrase due to my above concerns?

11 comments  •  Posted in Misc

Submitted by nizou  •  December 3, 2004

“Tilting at Windmills”

After doing a brief search and thinking a bit, I cannot come to an answer to the question of what “Tilting at windmills” means or where such a phrase may have come from.

What does “tilting at windmills” mean or symbolize? What are some usages?

Thanks.

35 comments  •  Posted in Misc

Submitted by chuck2  •  November 12, 2004

Is it sunday or sunduh?

My wife and I have this ongoing battle over the word sundae. She always pronounces it sunDUH while I say it’s sunDAY because when they were first made, one could only get the ice-cream treat on Sunday. She says I’m nuts - I say she’s kinda douchey. Who’s correct - anyone know?

9 comments  •  Posted in Misc

Submitted by marta  •  October 29, 2004

silent autumn

Does anybody know why the ‘n’ in the word ‘autumn’ is silent? May it be possible that the ‘n’ sound got lost somewhere at some point in the historical development of English? Or maybe our ancestors mispronounced this word and such is the case up to this day? Or is it just a matter of the English phonology system, which does not allow for pronouncing ‘mn’ clusters? Can any phonologist help?

57 comments  •  Posted in Misc

Submitted by marta  •  August 10, 2004

Proper Names

What’s the linguistic term for the words derived from proper names (e.g. Dianaphiles, Blarism, Clintonite, Ophranisation, MacDonaldisation)?

5 comments  •  Posted in Misc

Submitted by Dyske  •  July 18, 2004

Wiener Coffee

At a dinner last night, my friend at the table put a scoop of whipped cream on his cup of coffee. I then asked, “That’s called Wiener Coffee, right?” Everyone laughed, but I wasn’t joking. As funny as “wiener” may sound, “Wien” is the proper name for “Vienna”, and “Wiener” the proper adjective for “Viennese”. In fact the word “wiener” to mean a type of sausage came from wienerwurst, “Viennese Sausage”.

Then someone else at the table said that the word “India” is never used among Indians. The same goes for “Japan” too. The proper name is “Nihon”. It seems that every non-English speaking country has an alternative name that has nothing to do with the original. Why is this? Why are English speakers compelled to ignore the original and invent their own? (Or, perhaps, this has nothing to do with English.)

The reason why I knew about “Wiener Coffee” is because in Japan, they honor the original names of most countries.

16 comments  •  Posted in Misc

Submitted by yoko  •  June 18, 2004

Octo

If octo means 8, why is October the 10th month?

10 comments  •  Posted in Misc

Submitted by avery  •  May 12, 2004

Pronouns

Is there a non-gendered 3rd person singular pronoun that could be used in the place of that awkward he/she? If not, what about ze?

13 comments  •  Posted in Misc

Submitted by charlie  •  May 11, 2004

Will-Call

Try as I might I cannot find out anything about the origin of WILL CALL as in “You can pick up your theatre tickets at the WILL CALL window.” Any enlightenment will be deeply appreciated.

3 comments  •  Posted in Misc

Submitted by Dyske  •  April 10, 2004

Silk and Silkworm

Silk is made from thread of silkworms. The fact that the word “silkworm” contains the word “silk” would imply that the worm was named after silk, but without the worm, we would have no silk. Does this mean that when they first made silk, they had no name for the worm, and they named the worm after the fact?

6 comments  •  Posted in Misc

Submitted by henryix  •  April 9, 2004

Stress pattern in the word ‘totalitarian’

It occurred to me last evening that I pronounce the word ‘totalitarian’ with a major stress on all three [t] sounds. It seems as well that any people I have heard use the word say it that way.

I cannot think of any other English word that has triple major stress. Even double major stress is rare - I can’t think of an example just offhand.

Are there other words in English that have triple major stress?

6 comments  •  Posted in Misc

Submitted by jenga  •  February 15, 2004

It was the coup de’grace of et all!...or was it?

Over the years, I have seen the words “coup de’grace” and “et all.” One day fine day, I decided to look them up and see how they were to be correctly used; unfortunately, I could not find either of them! Perhaps I am spelling them wrong? (Which could very well be the case with “coup de’grace, but I am certain that is how I say “et all” spelt.)

Can someone please tune me in on if these are even words and if so the correct way of spelling and using them?

11 comments  •  Posted in Misc