Regional Dialect

“Dialect words are those terrible marks of the beast to the truly genteel.” – Thomas Hardy

When I read The Professor and the Madman, by Simon Winchester about the making of the Oxford English Dictionary, I learned that putting together a dictionary was no easy task. I recently read about another equally daunting project—Dictionary of American Regional English, also known as DARE.

I thought, aha, this is a book I’d like to own! Well, it’s not a book. DARE is books. And the last volume, S to Z, is not even out yet. According to an article on npr.org, “Regional Dictionary Tracks The Funny Things We Say,” the final project will be released next year.

The article went on to say that the man who started the project in the 1950s, linguist Frederic Cassidy, passed away before the end of the project. His tombstone reads, “On to Z!”

Also according to the article, Mr. Cassidy “…sent field workers out across the country in "word wagons" to interview people. Cassidy's catalogers talked to nearly 3,000 people over six years, making recordings along the way in order to capture pronunciations.”

“The DARE also helps capture obscure expressions before they fade away. Stephanie Grayson, the founder of CorporateSpeechTrainer.com, says in some ways, American language is becoming more uniform, and television and the Internet are giving us all a common vocabulary.

"We're living in a world of 140 characters or less on Twitter," Grayson says.

The article is not only interesting, it's also full of examples, including this one used by President Clinton at a news conference. “He doesn't know me from Adam's off ox." It means he doesn’t know me at all. I've heard of doesn't know me from Adam but never with the off ox added and I've lived in the South.

The use of ‘devil’s strip’ in a ransom note helped capture a kidnapper. Evidently the term is used only in a tiny section of Ohio. It means the strip of grass between the sidewalk and the street.

Other terms I’d never heard of and found fascinating were:
mulligrubs (n) A condition of despondency or ill temper; a vague or imaginary unwellness. (Usage: scattered, but especially the South)
nebby (adj) Snoopy, inquisitive. (Usage: chiefly Pennsylvania)
pungle (v) To shell out; to plunk down (money); to pay up. (Usage: chiefly West)
rantum scoot (n) An outing with no definite destination (Usage: scattered)
say-so (n) An ice-cream cone. (Usage: scattered)

By the way, if you are interested in owning the four volumes currently available, you’ll find them on Amazon. Be prepared to pay over $400.00 though.

Do you or your characters use regional dialect? Do you have a favorite word or phrase that you only hear in a certain section of the country?

Thanks for stopping by.

Tags: Thomas Hardy, dialect, DARE, Cassidy, Amazon, Clinton, >, Professor and the Madman, Simon Winchester,

National Punctuation Day

“Cut out all these exclamation points. An exclamation point is like laughing at your own joke.” – F. Scott Fitzgerald

Today is the day to celebrate commas, semicolons, em dashes, ellipses and all those other little marks whose proper use continues to give most of us headaches.

Do I hear some of you mumbling, “Why do we need a National Punctuation Day?”

I think the following example, thanks to basicjokes.com, will demonstrate how much we take these little characters for granted and how important they truly are.

Dear John:
I want a man who knows what love is all about. You are generous, kind, thoughtful. People who are not like you admit to being useless and inferior. You have ruined me for other men. I yearn for you. I have no feelings whatsoever when we're apart. I can be forever happy - will you let me be yours?
Gloria

Move the punctuation a tad and you have…

Dear John:
I want a man who knows what love is. All about you are generous, kind, thoughtful people, who are not like you. Admit to being useless and inferior. You have ruined me. For other men, I yearn. For you, I have no feelings whatsoever. When we're apart, I can be forever happy. Will you let me be?
Yours,
Gloria

So now that you understand the need to celebrate, you are probably wondering how. Jeff Rubin, on his aptly named site, National Punctuation Day, has come to the rescue. According to him, the following are the appropriate activities for this momentous occasion:
Sleep late.
Take a long shower or bath.
Go out for coffee and a bagel (or two).
Read a newspaper and circle all of the punctuation errors you find (or think you find, but aren’t sure) with a red pen.
Take a leisurely stroll, paying close attention to store signs with incorrectly punctuated words.
Stop in those stores to correct the owners.
If the owners are not there, leave notes.
Visit a bookstore and purchase a copy of Strunk & White’s The Elements of Style.
Look up all the words you circled.
Congratulate yourself on becoming a better written communicator.
Go home.
Sit down.
Write an error-free letter to a friend.
Take a nap. It has been a long day.

Be sure to visit his site for more information on this day and to buy punctuation gifts for your loved ones.

If you’re still are not sure we need a special day set aside to honor punctuation, I’ll leave you with one more case in point from a post on wayodd.com.

“For example, Truss publishes an item on a restaurant menu gone wrong. What was supposed to be "Goat Cheese Salad ... tomato, onions, goat cheese" turned into something else entirely with a couple of extra s's and an erroneous additional comma: "Goats Cheese Salad ... tomatoes, onions, goats, cheese."

Best wishes for a happy National Punctuation Day. Thanks for stopping by.

Tags: F. Scott Fitzgerald, National Punctuation Day, Jeff Rubin,

Introducing Barbie and Ken

“Our appearance may not resemble the dolls, but our relationship is as plastic as they are.” – Barbie Anderson from The Ride

If you were expecting a post about the dolls with the perfect bodies, matching accessories, a pink Corvette and perfectly designed three-story house, I’m sorry to disappoint you. The Barbie and Ken I’m referring to are the Anderson’s—two characters from The Ride.

They are, I think it’s fair to say, the complete opposite of the dolls. Ken works for a company that designs amusement park rides. Here’s a brief description of him from Chapter One.

Neither young, virile, nor gorgeous, Ken had occupied the same spot every night for the last twenty-three years. His hairy midsection protruded from under the sheet. He wore his thinning gray hair long on top in a futile effort to disguise a shiny bald spot that began to plague him a couple of years ago. Now the strands lay inert on the pillow like lifeless snakes.

Barbie stays at home and makes lists. Here’s a description of her from the same chapter.

Petite or delicate did not exactly describe Barbie’s 5 feet 9 inch, big-its boned frame that carried more than its share of extra weight. Holey white cotton underwear mysteriously clung to her hips by one tiny elastic thread that managed to stay intact through endless wash cycles. Her twenty year old “st ll craz aft all these ye rs” tee shirt provided a sad commentary about her wardrobe and her state of mind. Though some letters had worn off, the sentiment was accurate.

In a previous post I mentioned that though I was fond of my main character, Barbie, I wouldn’t want to be her. Well, she took offense to that. To make it up to her, I promised to introduce her and explain that she was operating under unusual and adverse conditions.

“How would you feel if you woke up one morning and learned your mother was not the person you’d thought of as your mother for over 40 years?” she asked me.

Yes, even my published characters still talk to me. What can I say?

“It wasn’t exactly an easy revelation to adjust to, you know,” she continued. “I already had insecurities and self-esteem issues to deal with…and an estranged daughter. There’s also the fact that Aunt Pat’s dead and Ken’s behaving like a raving lunatic and he’s building that monstrosity in our backyard. Then there’s Michael.” A fleeting smile passed her lips as she said his name. “And there’s the money issue.” She paused, looked at me in an accusatory way and said, “I’d like to see you handle the mess any better.”

I admitted I’d probably make a mess of the situation, too.

Barbie has had the opportunity to vent. I have publically announced that I did give her a lot to deal with in a short period of time which may have affected her decision making process. Now, I hope she will allow me to get on with my life.

On a different topic, I'm excited to say that I was the featured author on VBT - Writer's on the Move yesterday.

Thanks for stopping by.


Tags: The Ride, Barbie, Ken, Barbie and Ken,

Great Expectations

“Life is so constructed that an event does not, cannot, will not, match the expectation.” – Charlotte Brontë

After reading Monday’s post by Helen Ginger, “The Lost Book,” on Straight From Hel, I found myself wondering what it must be like to be Dan Brown, his agent, or his publisher this week.

As a fiction writer, I think I have a fairly good imagination. However, I simply can’t conceive of how it must feel to have a book released to such fanfare. The book became available on the 15th and has been a regular news item on local and national stations both before and after the release. Some bookstores opened at midnight so people could grab their copy immediately.

Is Dan worried that with all the hype his book won’t live up to readers’ expectations? Does it keep him awake at night? Since it’s already a best seller, and will probably stay that way for weeks if not years, does he care about whether or not he meets someone else’s expectations? Has he already put this book out of his mind so he can work furiously on his next blockbuster? Maybe if he had his own blog, I could find the answers to all my questions, but my limited search did not come up with one.

The article, “Dan Brown’s ‘The Lost Symbol’: Why is the book biz so scared?” appeared in EW.com last month. The following is the first paragraph.

"There’s been much fulminating in the books world lately that The Lost Symbol, Dan Brown’s eagerly anticipated follow-up to The Da Vinci Code, is bad for publishing. This week, former Publisher’s Weekly editor Sara Nelson even dubbed Brown a “Book Killer.” The theory is that Brown’s readers will only troop into stores (or go online) starting Sept. 15 to buy Symbol, probably at a deep discount, and they won’t buy anything else. Worse, the critics argue, the hubbub surrounding Symbol will drown out media coverage of other books — and eat into sales of those books too. So publishers have supposedly been shuffling the release dates of various titles so they don’t have to go head-to-head with the Dan Brown juggernaut."

I agree with Thom Geier, the author of the article, when he went on to say. “It doesn’t take a Harvard symbologist to see that this is mostly sour grapes and a whole lot of hooey.”

I enjoyed The Da Vinci Code and I plan to read The Lost Symbol, but I didn’t feel the need to stand in line at midnight to purchase it. Actually, I can’t think of anything I’d stand in line for at midnight. I take that back, I can’t think of anything that could get me out of the house at that hour line or no line. Besides, I have a feeling the book will be around for quite some time.

Did you venture out to be one of the first to own a copy? If you bought it, did you buy or look at any other books? What do you think of dubbing Dan Brown as a “Book Killer?”

Thanks for stopping by.

Tags: Bronte, Dan Brown, Da Vinci Code, The Lost Symbol, Helen Ginger,

How Authors See Themselves

“A person himself believes that all the other portraits are good likenesses except the one of himself.” – Edvard Munch

I came across what I think is a most interesting site, Art and the World of Luis Quintanilla. Click here for a biography of this talented artist. A group of paintings titled "The Portraits of Authors as How they See Themselves" caught my attention.

The site said all text could be copied for non-commercial use, but nothing about the photos of the art itself. Since I don’t want to infringe on any copyrights, I’ll leave it up to you to click over to see any portraits you’re interested in.

Here are comments by a few of the authors:
Dorthy Parker as Betsy Ross
"We all have our crosses to bear, or so I am told, and among the more burdensome of mine is my face. Had I been consulted, things would have been vastly different. But I was not, and there I was, and there it was. So when Luis Quintanilla, deep in his project of painting various writers in the characters of those whom they secretly - well, perhaps not always quite that - considered themselves to be, asked me how I saw myself, I could only tell him the desperate truth: as a pastel old party, sitting in a corner, knitting. That was how the portrait started out. But then the artist, a man of infinite compassion, brushed in the cap and the shawl, and thus, by a few strokes, made something of my face and of me - a flagless Betsy Ross, say, or a non-arithmetical Madame Defarge. Either one enchants me, and gives me the incentive of emulation. And so I am truly grateful to a truly great artist."

George Jean Nathan as Hamlet
"I see myself as a somewhat somber fellow who views the meanness of life with a rebellious sense of its possible beauty and who subscribes for happiness and security to the recipe of sticking a rose into the brain and throwing a pitcher of ice-water over the heart. "

Elliot Paul as a Picador.
"It’s not so much the adoration of the crowd and the danger. Think of the hours. And if one is impaled or slashed, there are always the sulfa drugs.”

"I suppose everyone who is built for a picador wants to wear the cloth of gold, face the bull on his own level, and be fearless and precise. And Anglo-Saxons long to be Latins, and vice versa."

Here are the other authors listed:
Carl Van Doren as a Sculptor of Benjamin Franklin. He was a Franklin scholar and had written his biography.
Leonard Lyons as Mercury, the messenger of the gods. He was a widely read gossip columnist for the New York Post.
William Shirer as an Astrologer.
Richard Wright as a Jigsaw Puzzle, because he saw himself as a jigsaw puzzle.
Freda Kirchway, of "The Nation," as Madame Butterfly.
John Steinbeck as a Sea Serpent. He claimed he had once seen a sea serpent.
Lillian Hellman in grays, because she saw herself as gray in spirit.
William Rose Benet as a Balearic Countryman.
Quentin Reynolds, the journalist, as a Judge.
John Dos Passos as a Sunday Painter. (He was a good amateur painter.)
Vincent Sheean as a Mandarin colonel.
Arthur Miller as Abraham Lincoln.

I found this letter by Arthur Miller in the excerpts from the biography of Quintanilla, Waiting at the Shore.
“Dear Mr. Quintanilla: the only hesitation I have about sitting for you is due to an inability to decide who or what would be a representative symbol. I have been liked to Lincoln by some, which is flattering, but a few see in my face the present Pope. I myself, of course, like to think the former. Anyway, I would be delighted to sit, having been an admirer of your work for many years. I work, usually until noon. But I wish you would phone me and we can set up the days."

I, like Arthur Miller, have an inability to decide who or what would be a representative symbol, other than just simply me as myself. That sounds hokey, but it’s all I can come up with at the moment.

If you were to have your portrait done, how would you see yourself?

Thanks for stopping by.

Tags: Evard Munch, portraits, Quintanilla, Dorthy Parker, Arthur Miller, John Steinbeck,

Language of the Internet Revisited

“Language shapes the way we think, and determines what we can think about.” – Benjamin Lee Whorf

I can’t help but wonder what Mr. Whorf, a linguist who died in 1941, would think of acronyms becoming a part of the English language. Personally, I’m not crazy about the idea. Since Monday’s post on the Changing Dictionary, I’ve spent way too much time flipping through pages of online guides to understanding chat acronyms. BTW (by the way) I’ve recycled the next couple of paragraphs from a blog I posted in January 2008, on the Language of the Internet because my feelings are the same.

I worry about technology; I can’t help it. I mean I love computers but I worry that they, along with cell phones, are changing the language of communication. And, I am not good at learning languages. In fact, I have problems with English.

While living overseas, I attempted to tackle various languages (Mandarin, Korean, Dutch, Italian and Arabic). I managed to learn just enough to get me in trouble. For example, in Taiwan, I thought our Landlord had come to invite us to his mother’s 76th birthday party. I smiled, said yes, and offered my congratulations. Imagine my horror the following day when I discovered we were invited to her funeral. It’s a wonder we weren’t evicted.

To prevent putting my foot in my mouth in computer lingo, I simply avoid using anything but a couple of the basics, such as LOL (laugh out loud). This week, after perusing Wĕbopēdia, NetLingo and techdictionary, I may now add a few more words to my repertoire. For instance I really liked the following:

AWGTHTGTTA – Are we going to have to go through this again? (I swear I didn’t make this up – you’ll find it listed in techdictionary)
BOBFOC – Body off Baywatch, Face off Crimewatch
WOMBAT – waste of money, brains and time
WUCIWUG – what you see is what you get
A3 – anytime, anywhere, anyplace
L8RG8R – later, gator
SMHID - scratching my head in disbelief
ATWD – Agree that we disagree
IANAL – I am not a lawyer

However, I don’t understand the use acronyms when you save only two or three letters. For example why use UNBLEFBLE for unbelievable?

For you parents out there, I’m throwing in CD9 – Code 9 meaning parents are around and POS – parent over shoulder

If you get stuck on an acronym, you can find help at Internet Slang Dictionary and Translator. Simply enter the letters, click on translate and the meaning will magically appear.

Unfortunately, I think acronyms are here to stay. Therefore, in order to be able to communicate with my grandson in a few years, I plan to purchase E-Z Text Messaging 4 Grandparents by Valli Marti. If I start studying now, maybe I’ll be fluent in…hmm…ten or twelve years.

Feel free to share your favorite acronym(s), rant on the use of them, or rave about this wonderful new language.

And, to get into the swing of things, I made up one of my own my own – TU4SB (thank you for stopping by).

Tags: Whorf, Acronyms, Slang Dictionary, Webopedia, NetLingo, techdictionary,

The Changing Dictionary

“Dictionaries are always fun, but not always reassuring.” – M.F.K. Fisher

According to a recent article, "Twitter and Gourmet Sex: They’re in the Dictionary Now," on time.com, the 30th Anniversary of the Collins English Dictionary was published on September 3, with over 260 new entries.

“To qualify for inclusion in the esteemed lexicon, a word had to have, over the past two years, six quality citations in Collins' digital corpus, a computerized database that scans 2.5 billion words across a number of print and online resources.”

Among the new words this year, I picked out a few of my favorites:

carborexics - those obsessed with reducing their carbon footprint
ecotarian - a person who only eats food that has been produced in an environmentally friendly manner
frugalista - a person who tries to stay fashionably dressed on a budget
glamping - glamorous camping
ponzimonium - financial turmoil in the wake of uncovering Ponzi schemes

I guess because I'm such a fuddy-duddy (is that still a word?), I don’t believe that OMG (oh my god), WTF (what the f__) are words. However, they have been included in the dictionary along with the sounds of hmm, heh and mwah (exaggerated kiss). According to Duncan Black, editor of the dictionary, “They’re part of the language of microblogging.”

Of course, to add new words, they first had to make room by deleting others.
Another article, "24 Words the CED Wants to Exuviate (Shed)," also on time.com, lists some of the words that may have been cut. Had I know they were words to begin with, I may have used them and saved their jobs. Now I guess it’s too late. It’s too bad, because some of them seem like such good words. For instance:

compossible - possible in coexistence with something else
embrangle - to confuse
fubsy - squat
malison - a curse
muliebrity - the condition of being a woman
niddering - cowardly
skirr - a whirring sound, as of the wings of birds in flight

On a different topic, I hope everyone is enjoying their long Labor Day weekend. Here’s a little trivia about the day to impress those around you. The first Labor Day observance was in New York City on September 5, 1882. By 1884 other cities observed the holiday honoring working people and in 1894 it became a Federal Holiday.

Last but not least, I would like to thank Nancy Sharpe from Realms of Thought on Fantasy, Writing & Children’s Literature for the One Lovely Blog Award. Her blog is always interesting and fun to read and I’m honored to have received this from her. Though I know there are lots of deserving blogs, many of the sites I frequent have already received this award or I’ve already passed another award to them recently. In other words I’m at a loss of who to pass this along to. I guess this is a sign I need to get busy and explore more blogs. I hope I’ll be forgiven for keeping this one for myself – at least for a while. I also hope you’ll visit Nancy’s blog and the other blogs she’s passed awards on to.

Thanks for stopping by.

Tags: Fisher, Dictionary, One Lovely Blog Award, Nancy Sharpe, Labor Day,

Winner Announcement and More Awards

“The accolade of your peers is very exciting, always.” –Cory Doctorow

These months sure roll by quickly. It seems only a few days ago I was announcing the August contest and now it’s time to announce the winner. Since my grandson, Sebastian, did such an excellent job of choosing a winning entry last month, I called on his services again. This time he insisted his rubber lizard help him. I am proud to announce that the lucky winner of a signed copy of The Ride is Michelle Miller from The Book Addict blog for a comment left on August 10th. Congratulations, Michelle!

Shortly before last week’s vacation, Helen Ginger awarded me The B-I-N-G-O Beautiful Blog Award. What a pleasant surprise to read her post and discover my name and blog by the O for “Outstanding.” Thanks, Helen. Be sure to stop by her blog, Straight from Hel, for valuable advice and information on writing and publishing.

I find passing along these awards is getting harder to do because many of the sites I visit already have won every award imaginable. So I’ll repeat my caveat from a previous blog: I’m naming recipients, but I will leave it up to them on whether or not they choose to pass it on. If I’ve named someone who has already received the award, well…give yourself a pat on the back, you obviously deserve it.

B: Beautiful: Patricia of Patricia Stoltey's Blog

I: Informative: Kelly of Author Kelly Moran Blog

N: Neighborly: Morgan of Double M's take on books, blogs, dogs, networking and life

G: Gorgeous: Julie of Julie Lomoe's Musings Mysterioso

O: Outstanding: Gretchen Rubin of the Happiness Project

Shortly upon returning from my trip, I received The Honest Scrap Award from Carol Kilgore of the Under the Tiki Hut blog. Thank you, Carol.

The following is a quote from Carol’s blog: “The award rules are simple - pass the award to seven worthy bloggers who post from the heart, and list ten honest things about yourself.”

Trying to think of ten things about myself that wouldn’t put a reader to sleep is not as easy as it sounds. I decided you were all busy people and could probably use a quick snooze so here goes.

1. I love being a grandmother
2. I find it impossible to keep my writing space tidy
3. I’m an introvert
4. I love movie theater popcorn
5. Though I am about as flexible as a steel rod, I enjoy going to Yoga classes
6. My favorite wine comes out of a box
7. Creepy crawly things terrify me
8. I dislike onions
9. I don’t go often, but I do enjoy kayaking
10. Making lists like this and passing on awards drives me a just little bit crazy

Whew! I did it. Now here are the seven bloggers I've chosen to pass this award to.

Yvonne Walus: A novelist speaks on books, the universe and everything

Cindy: Cindy’s Love of Books

J. Kaye: J. Kaye’s Book Blog

Christina: Christina Rodriguez

Ann Parker: Silver Rush Mysteries

Joanne: Whole Latte Life

K.A. Laity: Wombat’s World

I hope you enjoy visiting these blogs.

Thanks for stopping by.


Tags: Doctorow, Bingo Award, Honest Scrap Award, The Ride, contest winner,