by Roseanna White | Sep 16, 2013 | Word of the Week
Thank you, Rachel Koppendrayer, for the inspiration for this week’s word in your comment last week. 😉
So cool has quite a fun history! Its primary meaning of “not warm” has been around since Old English days. No surprise there. And has also been applied to people who are unperturbed or not given to emotional demonstration for just as long.
But of course, we’re more interested in the slang uses. 😉 I had no idea that it’s been around since 1728 in its application to large sums of money to give emphasis–i.e. “a cool million.” And it’s also meant “calmly audacious” since 1825–had no clue about that one!
It’s modern meaning of “fashionable” is older than you might think, too, from 1933. It originated in black jazz circles but was in the common vernacular by 1940. Pretty cool, eh? 😉
But not as cool as this–check it out! Whispers from the Shadows was apparently one of the freebies given away at lunch yesterday at ACFW! Big thanks to all my friends who sent me texts and pictures of its appearances at conference, from the placard on the Harvest House table to this:
Makes me feel like I was there!
by Roseanna White | Sep 9, 2013 | Word of the Week
One of my historical writer friends asked about canteens a little while ago (namely, what they would have called them before they were canteens), which inspired me to look up the word.
Canteen is from the French cantine, which means “sutler’s shop.” Which I had to look up, LOL. Turns out a sutler is a person who maintains a store for the army, either by following them with provisions or having a shop within a camp. In this sense, the word entered English in 1710. There’s speculation that it’s a sense of the Latin canto, which means “corner”–that it’s a corner for storage.
The familiar sense of “container to carry water” evolved by 1744, also from a sense in the French, and used mainly by the military still, or campers. People on the move. The extended-from-the-first-definition sense of it being a “refreshment room on a campus or base” is from 1870.
Somewhat appropriate word choice today, as we’ll be traveling to Johns Hopkins for the last (hopefully) follow-up appointment for the elbow my little girl broke back in May. Prayers appreciated!
by Roseanna White | Sep 2, 2013 | Word of the Week
Leave it to Roseanna to browse through the dictionary for fun on the weekend. 😉 Sunday as I was beginning to think about the Word of the Week, I popped over to
www.etymonline.com and accidentally bumped the O section. Then thought, “Sure, go with it” and browsed through a few pages. Randomly clicked on page 11 and soon was learning something. =)
Operative as an adjective is from the 15th century, meaning “producing the intended effect.” The weakened sense of “important” (i.e., “challenge being the operative word in the speech”) is very new, from 1955. But it’s the noun version that intrigued me. =)
Since 1809 operative has meant “worker; one who operates.” Sure. No problem. But obviously the more interesting is its meaning of “spy.” I’d never looked up this one before, but it’s so right up my alley that I’m kinda surprised I hadn’t, LOL. This meaning came about around 1930, directly from the Pinkerton Agency. They would refer to their detectives as “operatives,” and since much of their work was undercover–spying–it was soon applied to any secret agent. Fun, eh?
by Roseanna White | Aug 26, 2013 | Word of the Week
I looked this up the other day just for the fun of it … and because I had never paused to think why PIs used to be called gumshoes. But according to etymology.com:
“plainclothes detective,” 1906, from the rubber-soled shoes they wore (which were so called from 1863); from gum (n.1) + shoe (n.).
Obvious, yes. But still fun. =) And a nice start to the week I plan on preparing my “History of Spies in Early America” home school group class. 😉 Got the Creative Writing one mostly done yesterday. Yay!
Hope everyone has a great week!
by Roseanna White | Aug 19, 2013 | Word of the Week
It’s the first day of school in our house, and the kids are rather excited. (Don’t worry, it’ll fade, LOL.) Their desks are organized (that won’t last either…), they made their “1st Day of…” signs last night for pictures this morning, picked out their outfits (no reason why homeschoolers shouldn’t have that joy too!), and demanded I wake them up early. Gotta love eager little students. =)
And I thought that today, I’d take a quick look at some school-related words in keeping with the occasion.
Student is an old one, from the 14th century. It comes to us from the French estudient, “one who studies,” which is directly from the Latin studiare, “to study.” No surprises there. Interestingly, student teacher didn’t join in until 1907, which is, I think, more a reflection of the educational and training system than language.
But I wanted to look up pupil too. I think to us, this word has fallen out of fashion and so sounds old-fashioned. So I was intrigued to see that while just as old as student, it didn’t have its current meaning nearly as long. Pupil literally means “orphan child, ward.” This too is taken from French and Latin and is a diminutive of the word for “boy.” It took about 200 years for the “student” meaning to come along. Which, yes, was still way back in 1560, LOL. But I didn’t realize it had ever meant anything else.
Now off to get some work done before my little students arise. 😉
by Roseanna White | Aug 12, 2013 | Word of the Week
I have frequently been accused of optimism. I confess: it’s a malady of mine. Why, after all, should I look at the dark side, when the bright side is right there? I just can’t do it. And so, my critique partners nicknamed me RO. It’s short for Roseanna-Optimist. I claimed once that Optimism was my middle name, and they argued that it was surely my first–at the least, it must be hyphenated, LOL.
So happy words have a permanent place in my vocabulary, and apparently they occasionally sneak into my writing even when they shouldn’t. 😉 I was reading through a proposal the other day and caught myself having used “upbeat” in a story that takes place in 1910. This stood out to me on the re-read like a sore thumb, so I looked it up.
Sure enough, upbeat as “with a positive mood” didn’t join our language until 1947. It had existed since the mid 1800s in its technical sense–the beat of a measure of music where the conductor’s baton is raised. Why did it take on optimistic tones? According to the experts, simply because it sounds happy. =) (That’s my kind of reasoning!)
And speaking of happy things, this is the week of my birthday, so don’t forget that I’m hosting an online Mary Kay party that ends on the day itself, 8/14 (Wednesday). If you’re a fan of MK, do hop on over to http://www.marykay.com/terriharr and put “Roseanna White Hostess” into the memo box when you check out. Mucho appreciated!
Roseanna M. White is a bestselling, Christy Award winning author who has long claimed that words are the air she breathes. When not writing fiction, she’s homeschooling her two kids, editing, designing book covers, and pretending her house will clean itself. Roseanna is the author of a slew of historical novels that span several continents and thousands of years. Spies and war and mayhem always seem to find their way into her books…to offset her real life, which is blessedly ordinary.