Word of the Week – Groggy

Word of the Week – Groggy

by | Nov 6, 2023 | Word of the Week

Groggy. When we claim it, we usually mean that we’re unsteady, weak, often from being tired. I’ve heard it used in a way that indicated some brain fog too, where you’re stumbling around, groping for the light switch or the cup of coffee, am I right? And that’s a use (the “weak, unsteady” definition, specifically) that dates from about 1832 and was first used of boxers in the ring when they’d taken a few too many punches.

But the history of the word is even more interesting than that. It starts with a cloak. Yep, a cloak of coarse texture, which the French called gros grain (literally “coarse texture”) was, in the 1700s, called a grogram. Now, this type of cloak was worn by the famous British admiral, Edward Vernon, who led troops in the Caribbean in that same time period. His men nicknamed him Old Grog because of his cloak. Well, in August of 1740, this admiral did something no one had ever dared to do before–he ordered his men’s rum ration (a veritable institution in the British Navy) to be cut with water.

Well, the men called the diluted rum grog after the man who committed such a daring act. And the name stuck. Grog was a common drink in the 1700s, though eventually the “diluted” part fell away, and it was used for any strong alcoholic drink (think liquor rather than beer). Taverns came to be called grog shops, even!

You can see where this is going. Groggy, then, was a word for “stumbling drunk.” Hence, later, just the “stumbling” bit.

As an interesting note, that same Admiral Vernon is the namesake for Mount Vernon, the Washington family estate in Virginia. George Washington’s elder brother served under Vernon in the Caribbean and respected him so much that he renamed the family lands in his honor. Let’s be glad he went with his real name and didn’t call the place Mount Grog, eh? 😉

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Word of the Week – Halloween

Word of the Week – Halloween

by | Oct 30, 2023 | Holidays, Word of the Week

Here we are again, back in the last days of October…which of course means HALLOWEEN (imagine me saying it in that exaggerated spooky voice, will you? LOL). So of course, I looked up what I’ve posted about it before. And yes, this is just last year’s post, recycled. But hey, why not? It’s a perfect post for the day!

And whether you are pro or opposed to Halloween (or something in between), one can’t ignore the fascinating history of both the word itself and the traditions surrounding it. I’ve blogged about it before in a post that combines all my recollection as I looked into the holiday for my own family’s celebrating, but today I want to focus mostly on the word.

We’ve probably all heard that Halloween is a shortening of All Hallow’s Even or All Hallow’s Eve, and it’s been called such since the 1300s, at least (though the single-word spelling, as we have it now, is recorded first in Scotland in 1781. Even or eve are of course, in turn, a shortening of evening. We most famously still use this, of course, on Christmas Eve, to denote the night or vigil of the sacred day itself.

But what about that Hallow? We know that word primarily from the Lord’s prayer–it means “holy” or, in this case, “ones who are holy”–saints. November 1 is All Saints Day or All Hallows Day, the day marked on the calendar for celebrating all the saints–a day so important that, in the Roman Catholic Church, it’s one of only six Holy Days of Obligation in the year. (Those are days when going to mass to remember the event is required.) Why is it given such honor? Because this is literally the day to remember all the Christians who have come before us, who are gathered now in heaven. This is a day to honor the Church as the Bride of Christ and remember each member, each cell throughout time.

In the post I link to above, I mentioned the very real spiritual warfare style traditions that sprang up as Christianity clashed with paganism in Celtic Ireland and Scotland, and those are a big part of the story. It’s also worth noting, however, that as Christianity took hold, this holy day was so important that children anticipated it as much as Christmas and went around their neighborhoods asking for donations of sweets so they could make “soul cakes” to remember the neighbors’ loved ones on All Saints Day…sometimes even dressed up as saints themselves.

As with many of our holidays, there’s a mix of the holy and the not-so-holy in today’s traditions…but no shortage of fascinating history to both the word and the day!

Do you or your family have any fun Halloween traditions? I’m feeling very nostalgic in general this year and have been remembering picking out my costumes as a kid and running through my grandmother’s neighborhood (I didn’t live in a neighborhood, LOL) with my plastic pumpkin. Some good memories there!

Word of the Week – Sophomore

Word of the Week – Sophomore

by | Oct 23, 2023 | Word of the Week

We know sophomore as “second”–second year of school, primarily, both high school and college…but it’s been extended to other “seconds” as well. One’s second book is called one’s sophomore work, and so on. That primary meaning has been in use in English since the 1680s, of university students.

But when you dig a little deeper into this word, you find a good laugh.

The word was originally sophume, which literally meant “arguer.” It traces it’s roots back to the Greek sophia, of course: “wisdom.” But more particularly, to sophist, which at its own root was supposed to be “a master of one’s craft, a wise or prudent man”…but which colloquially came to be seen as someone who argues a point, not much caring whether it’s right or not–they just want to win. They’ll say whatever sounds good. (There are quite a few ancient documents that delineate the difference between a sophist and a philosopher. By the time Plato wrote, sophist had a definite negative connotation among the learned.)

And that connotation was rather purposefully drawn into this English version, too. It was chosen for second year students because they tend to argue and think they’re right. Evidence for that can be seen by the variation from sophume to sophomore. That -mor is an appeal to “moron.” Yep. Sophomore is a deliberate mash-up of “wise and prudent” and “moron.”

I can laugh because I’ve been a sophomore twice in school and as a writer too, and boy, do I see the truth in that! 😉

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Word of the Week – Cyber

Word of the Week – Cyber

by | Oct 16, 2023 | Word of the Week

Today’s word comes to us courtesy of my daughter, who texted me after a class in college to ask, “Have you ever done cyber as a word of the week? Mr. Schulman was just telling us about it! Look it up!” So, having trained my whole family to be so word-of-the-week minded, how could I do anything but obey? 😉

Cyber.

To us today, this word-forming element, usually used as a prefix, means one thing: the internet. Cyber– is reserved for things that live online or promise access to what is online. But…why? Ever pause to think of where this word came from? You’re in for a surprise!

Cyber- was coined by a US mathematician, Norbert Weiner, in 1948. Yep, you read that right. Looooong before the internet as we know it, we had the word. And it was actually coined as cybernetics. I confess I didn’t actually know what that means, not precisely. But upon looking it up, I see that it means now what it was created to mean 80ish years ago: “the theory or study of communications and control.”

Okay. So, knowing that was the starting place, we can see how the internet became THE means of both communication and control.

But let’s trace it back a little further. Why did Weiner choose this word? Best guess is that he based it on the French word, cybernetique, which means “the art of governing.” Makes sense, right? The art of governing IS communication and control. But then, where did the French get the word?

As it turns out, it goes all the way back to Ancient Greek (as so much does). The Greek word is kybernetes and it means “steersman,” or, metaphorically, “a guide.”

So from someone who literally steers and then metaphorically guides, we get the art of steering and guiding a whole people–government. And from governing, we get the study of what allows to govern–communication and control. And from the the means by which we moderns do that so instantaneously, we get anything that has to do with advanced technology.

A quote from New York magazine in 1996 calls cyber “the perfect prefix. Because nobody has any idea what it means, it can be grafted onto any old word to make it seem new, cool — and therefore strange, spooky.”

Yyyyyep. I think we’ve seen that borne out!

 

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Word of the Week – Autumn (Revisit)

Word of the Week – Autumn (Revisit)

by | Oct 9, 2023 | Word of the Week

Originally posted October 3, 2011

It’s that time of year again. The leaves are turning colors, the weather is turning cooler, and the pumpkin vines are taking over my yard. Okay it’s the first year we’ve planted pumpkins, so this is a first–and a lesson to us on where NOT to plant them next year! LOL.

So it seems like a fine time to talk about the roots of the words we associate with the season. =)

For a good while, British folk referred to this time of year solely as “harvest.” It wasn’t until the 16th century that the word “autumn” entered the vernacular. Taken from Old French and, in turn, Latin, there are also suggestions that it shares a root with August, and that the aug- implies severity.

Over the centuries, most “autumn” words have come to carry a meaning of “end, end of summer” or “harvest.” And unlike all the other seasons, we not only have several words for it, we also have several different start/stop dates in English speaking countries. In Britain, for example, autumn begins in August, while in America it’s September.

And of course, from “autumn” we get one of my all-time favorite words: autumnal (pronounced aw-TUHM-nl), which my best friend still swears I made up. 😉 As you can assume, it means “things pertaining to autumn.”

And then, of course, we have “fall.” Now used only in the U.S. as a synonym for the season, “fall” is short for “fall of the leaf,” and dates from the 1540s. So it’s nearly as old as “autumn,” but has for some reason fallen out of use (ha . . . ha . . . ha . . .) in other English-speaking parts of the word.

So here’s wishing everyone a beautiful, colorful fall filled with all the delightful, autumnal things that make you smile. =)

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Word of the Week – Barbarian

Word of the Week – Barbarian

by | Oct 2, 2023 | Word of the Week

When we call someone a barbarian, it has some definite tones of insult going on. But was it always that way? I remember reading in school about how really, the word was just from Barber, a foreign land to the Greeks and Romans.

And that’s true…but.

But even in the days of Ancient Greece, there was still a note of insult in barbarian–it not only meant “foreign,” it meant “foreign, incomprehensible, ignorant.” Even the Greeks considered those who didn’t speak their language or understand their ways to be inferior. Less so in truly ancient days, but after the Greco-Persian war–Persians being the ultimate barbarians to them–there was DEFINITELY negative connotations

Interestingly, Romans were considered barbarians to the Greeks as well…but then when Rome conquered Greece, adopted the word, and began to apply it to other areas. It’s traveled down through the centuries from there, arriving in English in the 1400s. It was used throughout the Middle Ages for pagans, foreigners, and especially those from the Barbary Coast. By 1610 it was used for any “rude, wild person,” but was still considered a step closer to civilized than savage.

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