Published on 12, July, 2020
Words fascinate me, I love them and I know so many and can even spell a few of them! I find different words give so much more texture and depth to what we say. I find the origins of words as interesting as the words themselves and the different uses for the same word although it can all get confusing when you have to work out which witch to use and weather/whether it will make a difference to waht you're saying.
Is English the only language to have so many similar words or words that change with context?
I also have a theory that that dialect words and accents follow the boundaries of the old Anglo-Saxon countries, if you look at a map of the original kingdoms pre Alfred the Great, then the variety of accents beccome more apparent. Of course i some areas such as the North East you have to factor in a large amount of Scandinavian words and accents too and along the borders of Wales.
Do you have favourite words and least favourite? I do't like the word "genre" mostly because it's hard to stop saying it and it ends up with a few extra "re-s" takcked on the end as you run out of breath whilst saying it.
I also gecome faascinated with "F" and "Ph", such as fantastic and phantasmagorical
In the distant past the British Isles were colonised by the Vikings, Romans, Danes, Jutes etc., and then the Normans arrived in 1066. The new arrivals added their words for "stuff" to those already in use. Latin and Norman French were used for legal and religious purposes. Then as a trading nation and colonial power, we used foreign words to describe our new foreign imports - potatoes, marmalade, pyjamas, kedgeree, etc.. Our military adventures brought us words like bayonet, beret, and aigulet. Then there were scientific and technical terms ...
In other words, our language was borrowed, purloined, co-opted, appropriated, looted, plagiarised, poached, or otherwise acquired from our friends and neighbours, and the occasional enemy, over generations.
I'm not a fan of the word cwtch, to me it sticks in the mouth rather than rolling around it, it's like trying to spit out a toffee thats stuch to the teeth. Ormalou is a good wrod that I don't get to use enough, it's both Crapulous and a source of Buggeration that language is so limited in everyday use, I thinks its why I like the written word so much
Kerfuffle
Fata Morgana
Petrichor
Malingering.
I rather like the following words, although I seldom use them:
Serendipity, Quintessential, Resplendent, Halcyon, Laconic, Boudoir, Burlesque.
I am also quite fond of the Welsh word 'Cwtch' (meaning a cuddle/hug).
discombobulated
Squadger, brilliant!
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Spikey, isn't it amazing though that we have so many words for the same things, obviously someone at some point in history has made up all the words we use, but I wonder how they did it? Presumably one person didn't go around naming everything they saw, it must of come about as some sort of collective interpretation and reasoning, or even because it was funny?
Brilliant! My brother has words for roadkill which make it more funny and less upsetting - Squadger, Squog, Squat, Squeagull. You get the point. It's so funny when you put Squ in front of your first and second name which I obviously couldn't do on here but if I was to be run over, my name here would become Squee Squirit. Heeee heee heee.
Doggery, thats a word that deserves a place in the English language!
I made up the term "becatted" to describe the temporary inability to get up and the need for someone else to fetch me something, because my lap is being graced with a sleeping cat.
Do I like words? Indubitably. Definitely. Incontrontavertibly. Long live Roget!
All words are made up, so I hope this catches on!
So is no one else biting??? I see that 'bugbear' is a real bugbear of yours... Sorry...
I made up the word 'doggery' recently.
Cattery - doggery.
Much more sensible than 'kennels'.
I'm not into words to the extent the rest of you seem to be, but when it comes to high range IQ tests I do best at the verbal ones. In a ideal world I would have loved to write a book, but pronounced EF deficits when it comes to organising and planning have kiboshed any hope of doing that.
Totally love words. Used to be obsessive about spelling, grammar and punctuation and would point out people's errors particularly in the early days of social media. Until I realised that people really didn't like that, haha.
I have always been fascinated by etymology and used to Obsessively look up word origins, especially while I was studying. It's just interesting for its own sake.
I hate the word "bugbear". Just flippin hate it. It's so clumsy.
I like 'sesquipedalian' but rarely get the opportunity to use it.
Ben
Sporadic Sparkly said:I do like words and considered English to be one of my favourite subjects at school. In fact, it was probably the only subject I genuinely liked and looked forward to.
It was the same for me-every other subject was meh for me but English, there was always something special about it. Despite school being awful from start to finish-English almost made it worth it lol.
I do like words and considered English to be one of my favourite subjects at school. In fact, it was probably the only subject I genuinely liked and looked forward to.
At the beginning of the GCSE years, my English teacher had strongly recommended to the class that we equip ourselves with a thesaurus. For years, I considered my chunky Roget's Thesaurus to be like a Bible, and one of my most-treasured books. As I've gotten older, I'm aware that I have slipped into bad habits... Instead of using different words that mean the same thing to make what I'm saying or writing not seem boring and repetitive, I have become lazy.
On the topic of words, whilst I have no issue with the word 'like', I have developed a dislike of how it is often used as a 'filler' word. An example of this being:
I like went to the surgery, and the receptionist was like really abrupt with me, so I got like really upset.
In terms of favourite words, I'm unable to think of any off the top of my head, or at least not any I could state here without being censored. From time to time I get enjoyment from making up words, which sometimes includes tweaking existing words.
I love the origins of phrases, be they Biblical, historical or nautical. Tons of phrases we use have got some fascinating origins.
The word quarantine, for example, comes from the time of the Black Death (not called until the 1800s), when sailors entering the port of Venice had to stay on their ships for 40 days, which in the venetian language of the time, was called a quarantina, meaning 40 days. Hence, quarantine.
Owl, is an interesting word, it comes from old English and is related to the sound owls make, but in Welsh a W is literally a double U sound, so I have my doubts as to it's old English origin.
English has so many loan words, you can almost travel around the world in English, skirt, is Scandinavian, algebra is Arabic, chutney is Indian. Welsh has many loan words too, which makes me think that the Romans introduced the idea of windows, (Welsh ffenetr) which is totally different to Scots Gaelic Uinneag. Nearly all our medical words are Greek, like Physician.
Q words are interesting too, some people pronounce it with K sound missing the W sound that goes with it, changing it from a KW sound to a soft K.
We have so many silent letters in English too, most languages pronounce all the letters in a word, I think the only person with really good pronunciation of the WH sound is Reeta Chakrabarti from BBC news, her pronunciation is sublime.