TGIF: That Gerund Is Funky (Dec 20)

crossword

Words and language in the news this week have a birthday theme.

Tomorrow is the 100th birthday of the crossword puzzle, as NPR’s protojournalist blog reports. “Created by a British-American wordsmith, the very first Word-Cross appeared in the New York World on Dec. 21, 1913. And the crossword puzzle — as we know it — was born.”

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You’ll all be thrilled to know that Oxford Dictionaries has created the “OED birthday word generator”, which allows you to find a word that started its life around the same time you did. My contemporary is blag: what’s yours? Go get busy with words your own age. Mentalfloss has the story.

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Here are seven grammar mistakes you’re probably making, courtesy HuffPost.

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TGIF: That Gerund Is Funky (Dec 13)

signer

Words and language in the news this week: a sign language interpreter meltdown; Yankee driving lingo; two tweets that could have used an edit; and Cormac McCarthy on punctuation …

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When the sign language interpreter at Nelson Mandela’s memorial service in Johannesburg started to “sign rubbish”, complaints started to flood in from deaf viewers around the world. According to the BBC, “Wilma Newhoudt-Druchen, the country’s first deaf female MP, tweeted: ‘ANC-linked interpreter on the stage with dep president of ANC is signing rubbish. He cannot sign. Please get him off.'” Thamsanqa Jantjie, the rogue interpreter, explained that he had a schizophrenic episode and started to hear voices in his head.

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BBC America’s Mind the Gap blog published a very useful British hitchhiker’s guide to understanding America’s driving lingo. From jaywalking to tailgating, you can get your Yankee drive-speak on.

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Slate.com’s Lexicon Valley blog argued a case for the Oxford comma by publishing a Sky News tweet reporting on the Mandela memorial. “Top stories: World leaders at Mandela tribute, Obama-Castro handshake and same-sex marriage date set…” was the tweet. “A handshake and a proposal” was Slate’s interpretation of it.

skytweet

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Cormac McCarthy takes a minimalist approach to punctuation. “James Joyce is a good model for punctuation. He keeps it to an absolute minimum. There’s no reason to blot the page up with weird little marks. I mean, if you write properly you shouldn’t have to punctuate.” Open Culture examines McCarthy’s three punctuation rules and how they all go back to Joyce.

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When the University of Michigan found out that it was ranked number 12 in a world ranking, it sent out this tweet:

UMichtweet

Ooops! Not so hot in the spelling rankings, it seems …

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Possessive waffling

B&Jwaffling

So, why is it called Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream – and not Ben’s & Jerry’s? It’s what’s known as a joint possessive: because the ice cream is owned jointly by Ben and Jerry, they need only one possessive — ie. one apostrophe — between them. And this rule is good for limitless numbers of owners. Let’s say Jack Hypothetical joined the company and claimed his stake in their delicious branded FroYo: the three ice-cream men would still have to make do with just one apostrophe: Ben & Jerry & Jack’s FroYo.

Now, assuming that Ben & Jerry don’t live together, when it comes to talking about their homes we refer to Ben’s and Jerry’s houses, and to their respective loved ones as Ben’s and Jerry’s families. That’s not to suggest that they each have multiple properties or that either of them is a bigamist, however, and to be sure to avoid any confusion or ambiguity with regard to that plural matter, it’s sometimes wise to just reword the phrase. But giving them each their own possessive apostrophe clarifies that the items are separately owned — what’s Ben’s is Ben’s and what’s Jerry’s is Jerry’s — whether in single or multiple form.

That’s joint possessives covered. Double possessives are a different thing — and, just to confuse things further, they come in two forms.

First, going back to Jack Hypothetical: let’s say he started out as a friend of Ben’s. Looking at that sentence, I’ve twice indicated Ben’s possession of Jack (as a friend): first by saying “friend of” (with the of suggesting ownership), and then by giving Ben an apostrophe and an “s”. Why do we sometimes repeat the possessive sense like this? There’s no real reason, except that it’s been done for centuries and it’s generally accepted in standard English. In the same way that we say “it’s a habit of mine” (and not “it’s a habit of me” or “it’s a habit of I“), we naturally use the double possessive. In The Careful Writer (1965), Theodore M. Bernstein noted that “grammarians have argued over the origin and nature, but not the validity, of the double genitive with the fervor of hot-stove league fans rehashing a Word Series play.”

Now, what if we want to ask about Ben & Jerry’s ice cream’s calories? That seems a fair question, if a little awkwardly phrased (and a bit of a party pooper, if you ask me). This is the other form of double possessive: when something is owned by something that is in turn owned by something else. By far the best way of avoiding this sort of double possessive is to reword it: let’s ask instead about the calories of Ben & Jerry’s ice cream. But note that we don’t use the earlier form of double possessive in this case — ie. we don’t inquire after “the calories of the ice cream’s”, whereas we might inquire after that amazing FroYo idea of Ben’s (or Jerry’s? or both?). Only people and animate objects have the privilege of the extra possessive, it seems: not even ice cream warrants it. But please don’t ask me to explain why …

waffle

I know: I’m waffling now — but not in the American sense, which Oxford Dictionaries defines as “failing to make up one’s mind”. Ben & Jerry’s “Waffling?” poster uses some tasty word-play here, pointing out our failure to choose which flavor of ice-cream to put in their waffle cones. So yes, a lot of waffling goes on in North America’s Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream stores. But this particular play on words would be lost on most Brits, to whom waffle means something different: “to speak or write, especially at great length, without saying anything important or useful”. Waffle seems to be what I’m doing and spewing here — since it comes in both verb and noun form.

Here ends this waffling of mine. A triple possessive is calling me: my Ben & Jerry’s Ron Burgundy’s Scotchy Scotch Scotch…

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Wise words from Nelson Mandela

mandela

Nelson Mandela, July 18, 1918 – December 5, 2013

“When a man has done what he considers to be his duty to his people and his country, he can rest in peace.”

“If I had my time over I would do the same again, so would any man who dares call himself a man.”

“If you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his head. If you talk to him in his language, that goes to his heart.”

“Social equality is the only basis of human happiness.”

“Difficulties break some men but make others.”

“We must use time wisely and forever realize that the time is always ripe to do right.”

“Without democracy there cannot be peace.”

“I can rest only for a moment, for with freedom come responsibilities, and I dare not linger, for my long walk is not yet ended.”

“I dream of an Africa which is in peace with itself.”

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TGIF: That Gerund Is Funky (Dec 6)

deathbed

Words and language in this week’s news: featuring men speaking valleytalk, dodgy carol grammar, a particularly pesky tongue-twister, some famous last words, and cursing Ohioans…

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When you’re caroling this Christmas, be mindful that you might be ho-ho-hoing ungrammatically. The Week has identified six potentially dodgy lyrics in our Yuletide musical fare. You better watch out: Grandma Clause is coming to town …

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According to a study reported in the Daily Mail, Ohioans curse more than anyone else and Southerners are more courteous. “Researchers made the discoveries after mining for curse words, ‘pleases’ and ‘thank yous’ among more than 600,000 phone calls between consumers and businesses across 30 industries, including cable and satellite companies, auto dealerships and pest control centers. The monitored calls spanned the last 12 months.”

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“The taste of death is upon my lips. I feel something that is not of this earth.” These were the last words of a famous composer; to find out who uttered them, read Classic FM‘s compilation of the great composers’ parting words to the world.

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U.S. psychologists have come up with what they say is the world’s most frustrating tongue-twister. The World’s newsroom at WGBH gives it a go (and you can see the results on YouTube).

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A study shows that men are speaking more like girls — Valley girls, that is. The BBC reports on the news that young men in California rise in pitch at the end of their sentences in a process known as “uptalk” or “valleygirl speak”, which has been associated historically with young females, typically from California or Australia.

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Sleight or slight in the magic of the hands?

sleight

Over Thanksgiving, my ex-husband was displaying some of his close-up magic skills. During one particularly dazzling card trick, he explained as part of his patter that he was using what we all heard to be a “slight of hand” technique. “Don’t you mean *sleight* [ie. rhyming with freight]?” I asked, and so did his wife who is also British. “No, it’s slight,” the amateur magician maintained. And I thought to myself: isn’t it odd that the Americans seem to use a different word in that expression, or is it simply that they’re pronouncing the right word wrongly?

Well, it turned out that it was I who was mistaken. The correct word, on both sides of the Atlantic, is sleight, and the correct pronunciation — for both Yanks and Brits — is slaɪt, rhyming with kite. And whereas I’ve been spelling it right and pronouncing it wrong for nearly half a century, many people pronounce it correctly but write it down as slight or slide, thinking that’s how it’s spelled.

“Sleight of hand”, also known as prestidigitation (“quick fingers”) or légerdemain (French for “light hand”), is a technique used by magicians and card sharps to surreptitiously hide or move cards, coins or other objects to produce an effect. The opposite of the sleight is the flourish, whereby the magician acts or gestures overtly, often to distract attention from something else he or she is doing (quite possibly a sleight).

As the Online Etymology Dictionary explains, sleight as a noun meaning “cunning” was an early 14th-century alteration of sleahthe (c.1200), from the Old Norse sloegð meaning “cleverness, cunning, slyness”. Sleight meant “skill, cleverness, dexterity” from the late 14th century, and its modern meaning of “feat or trick requiring quickness and nimbleness of the hands” is from the 1590s. The term “sleight of hand” is attested from c.1400. Because of the strange pronunciation, “sleight of hand” is often mistakenly written or understood as “slight of hand” or “slide of hand” — either of which (with slight coming from slettr, meaning “plain, flat, even, smooth, level”) would seem entirely appropriate for the magician’s cunning techniques.

TGIF: That Gerund Is Funky (Nov 29)

Indiangirls

Words and language in the news this week: women vs. girls in India; a grammatical collie, and cute cats in language learning; the strident period; allegations of racist correcting; and some classic American mispronunciations …

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In India, the BBC reports, men are men, but women are often “girls”. “‘In colloquial Indian parlance, you are a girl until you get married – only then do you become a woman’, says Winnie Singh, whose Maitri charity supports female victims of violence. But in itself, that illuminates deep-seated patriarchal views about women and their role, argues Delhi-based lawyer Rebecca John, who has represented many rape victims.”

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In the New Republic, Ben Crair reports on the new aggressive stance of the once benign period. The period is pissed. Period.

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According to many news outlets, including AZonline, a border collie called Chaser is so smart that she knows verbs, adverbs and propositions.

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A professor at the University of California in LA has been accused of racism after correcting a student’s grammar, capitalization and punctuation. Examiner.com reports.

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The BBC‘s technology reporter Carolyn Rice writes that the use of cute cat photos can improve people’s memory function when they’re learning languages.

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Having trouble pronouncing some of the names in the news (especially when they’re from other lands)? Have no fear: the Washington Post‘s WorldViews blog presents a guide to 26 foreign countries and names that Americans often mispronounce.

Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) Thanksgiving Address

iroquois

The Haudenosaunee (Iroquois) Thanksgiving Address
“Ohenton Kariwahtekwen”

The Iroquois Thanksgiving Address is a prayer of gratitude dating back more than 1,000 years. It is still spoken at many Iroquois ceremonial, social and governmental gatherings, and is often recited by traditional Haudenosaunee at the start and end of each day. Ohenton Karihwatehkwen means “The Words That Come Before All Else.”

The People

Today we have gathered and we see that the cycles of life continue. We have been given the duty to live in balance and harmony with each other and all living things. So now, we bring our minds together as one as we give greetings and thanks to each other as people.

Now our minds are one.

The Earth Mother

We are all thankful to our Mother, the Earth, for she gives us all that we need for life. She supports our feet as we walk about upon her. It gives us joy that she continues to care for us as she has from the beginning of time. To our mother, we send greetings and thanks.

Now our minds are one.

The Waters

We give thanks to all the waters of the world for quenching our thirst and providing us with strength. Water is life. We know its power in many forms-waterfalls and rain, mists and streams, rivers and oceans. With one mind, we send greetings and thanks to the spirit of Water.

Now our minds are one.

The Fish

We turn our minds to the all the Fish life in the water. They were instructed to cleanse and purify the water. They also give themselves to us as food. We are grateful that we can still find pure water. So, we turn now to the Fish and send our greetings and thanks.

Now our minds are one.

The Plants

Now we turn toward the vast fields of Plant life. As far as the eye can see, the Plants grow, working many wonders. They sustain many life forms. With our minds gathered together, we give thanks and look forward to seeing Plant life for many generations to come.

Now our minds are one.

The Food Plants

With one mind, we turn to honor and thank all the Food Plants we harvest from the garden. Since the beginning of time, the grains, vegetables, beans and berries have helped the people survive. Many other living things draw strength from them too. We gather all the Plant Foods together as one and send them a greeting of thanks.

Now our minds are one.

The Medicine Herbs

Now we turn to all the Medicine herbs of the world. From the beginning they were instructed to take away sickness. They are always waiting and ready to heal us. We are happy there are still among us those special few who remember how to use these plants for healing. With one mind, we send greetings and thanks to the Medicines and to the keepers of the Medicines.

Now our minds are one.

The Animals

We gather our minds together to send greetings and thanks to all the Animal life in the world. They have many things to teach us as people. We are honored by them when they give up their lives so we may use their bodies as food for our people. We see them near our homes and in the deep forests. We are glad they are still here and we hope that it will always be so.

Now our minds are one

The Trees

We now turn our thoughts to the Trees. The Earth has many families of Trees who have their own instructions and uses. Some provide us with shelter and shade, others with fruit, beauty and other useful things. Many people of the world use a Tree as a symbol of peace and strength. With one mind, we greet and thank the Tree life.

Now our minds are one.

The Birds

We put our minds together as one and thank all the Birds who move and fly about over our heads. The Creator gave them beautiful songs. Each day they remind us to enjoy and appreciate life. The Eagle was chosen to be their leader. To all the Birds-from the smallest to the largest-we send our joyful greetings and thanks.

Now our minds are one.

The Four Winds

We are all thankful to the powers we know as the Four Winds. We hear their voices in the moving air as they refresh us and purify the air we breathe. They help us to bring the change of seasons. From the four directions they come, bringing us messages and giving us strength. With one mind, we send our greetings and thanks to the Four Winds.

Now our minds are one.

The Thunderers

Now we turn to the west where our grandfathers, the Thunder Beings, live. With lightning and thundering voices, they bring with them the water that renews life. We are thankful that they keep those evil things made by Okwiseres underground. We bring our minds together as one to send greetings and thanks to our Grandfathers, the Thunderers.

Now our minds are one.

The Sun

We now send greetings and thanks to our eldest Brother, the Sun. Each day without fail he travels the sky from east to west, bringing the light of a new day. He is the source of all the fires of life. With one mind, we send greetings and thanks to our Brother, the Sun.

Now our minds are one.

Grandmother Moon

We put our minds together to give thanks to our oldest Grandmother, the Moon, who lights the night-time sky. She is the leader of woman all over the world, and she governs the movement of the ocean tides. By her changing face we measure time, and it is the Moon who watches over the arrival of children here on Earth. With one mind, we send greetings and thanks to our Grandmother, the Moon.

Now our minds are one.

The Stars

We give thanks to the Stars who are spread across the sky like jewelry. We see them in the night, helping the Moon to light the darkness and bringing dew to the gardens and growing things. When we travel at night, they guide us home. With our minds gathered together as one, we send greetings and thanks to the Stars.

Now our minds are one.

The Enlightened Teachers

We gather our minds to greet and thank the enlightened Teachers who have come to help throughout the ages. When we forget how to live in harmony, they remind us of the way we were instructed to live as people. With one mind, we send greetings and thanks to these caring teachers.

Now our minds are one.

The Creator

Now we turn our thoughts to the creator, or Great Spirit, and send greetings and thanks for all the gifts of Creation. Everything we need to live a good life is here on this Mother Earth. For all the love that is still around us, we gather our minds together as one and send our choicest words of greetings and thanks to the Creator.

Now our minds are one.

We have now arrived at the place where we end our words. Of all the things we have named, it was not our intention to leave anything out. If something was forgotten, we leave it to each individual to send such greetings and thanks in their own way.

Now our minds are one.

Snowclones are the (not so) new cliches

downisnewup

Got snowclones? You might not have heard of a snowclone, but chances are you’ve used one recently, perhaps without even knowing it. “50 is the new 30” or “sitting is the new smoking” you might have suggested, feeling a little bit clever. “Discretion is my middle name”, you could have said reassuringly. “Thanks be to Godot” was how a friend signed off wittily in the 48 hours before Thanksgiving…

A snowclone, according to the person who first identified and named it, is “a type of cliché or formulaic expression (such as ‘Much ado about X,’ ‘X is the new Y,’ or ‘X leads the league in Y’) that ‘can be used in an entirely open array of different jokey variants by lazy journalists and writers’.” About a decade ago, linguists began collecting these formulaic or pattern-based clichés on Language Log, a popular linguistics blog. In January 2004, soon after linguist Geoffrey Pullum identified this particular type of phraseology and invited a discussion about it on the blog, economist Glen Whitman coined the term snowclone, it was endorsed by Pullum, and it’s been used ever since by linguists, language commentators,  journalists and authors, all happy to have a name for this quirky practice. Yes, Virginia, there is a name for such clichés. In a piece on The Economist‘s Johnson blog, “G.L.” described his (or her) “Eureka” moment on discovering the concept of the snowclone: “It is a phenomenon so pervasive and mundane that it never occurs to you to give it a name, but once you discover that there is one, you wonder how you managed without it.”

But even with its spanking new name and identity, the snowclone has had a pretty bad rap. Just a few days after it was christened, the linguist Mark Liberman — using a snowclone to make his point — pronounced on the same blog that “snowclones are the dark matter of journalism”. Granted, they can be hard worn and hackneyed, but give them a break: they have been in use for a very long time — more than a hundred years, in fact.

“X is my middle name” is widely thought to be one of the oldest snowclones on record. As Glossographia pointed out, “the entry for middle name in the OED has been relatively recently updated, and includes numerous instances of this figurative use going back to 1905, where the New York Journal has “For retiring you’re—well, that’s your middle name” and other quotations going up to the present. I did a little further searching around and was able to find an earlier one going back to 1902, in the Manitoba Free Press, quoting a correspondent from Dawson, Yukon Territory …: ‘Fight is my middle name’.”

The 21st century has seen something of an explosion of snowclonology, as tropes and memes proliferate online, and our all-pervasive culture of sampling, imitating and riffing on retro or just pre-existing material becomes reflected in the snappy repartee, referential song lyrics and generally clever discourse of our time. When Radiohead sang “Down Is the New Up” in 2008, they were jumping on a bandwagon by using one of the more common modern examples of a snowclone cliché. The origins of “X is the new Y” are a little murky, although it’s understood that it started life as “X is the new black” (a twist on the original fashion motto “pink is the new black”), and then became more general as time went on. Language Log has explored this particular snowclone’s history, noting that its pink origin is commonly but mistakenly attributed to Gloria Vanderbilt in the ’60s. Barry Popik tracked down some early examples of “X is the new Y” published in newspapers of 1979: “colors are the new neutrals” (in the New York Times) and “pearl grey is the new neutral” (in the Chicago Tribune). Now broadened to way more than just a matter of color, X is the new Y is the new oldest cliché in the book.

The Snowclones Database presents a good read about particular phrases —  especially the ones with their origins in much earlier times — that are unambiguously legitimately snowclones. However, as the snowclone has invaded our colloquial lingo so aggressively, its definition has started to loosen and sag; new, sometimes iffy snowclones are creeping into our vernacular every day, making it more difficult for linguists and word-nerds to ‘officiate’ and decide what actually constitutes a snowclone. To be (a snowclone) or not to be (a snowclone)? That is the snowclone question…

Jack Schmidt’s wiki page of snowclones is another good resource, especially as it identifies the origins of some classic clichés through the ages. But the page fell victim to this snowballing increase in snowclonology and snowclonological debate, and it ended up having to go on hold — publishing this rather sad disclaimer in 2008: “This page is intended to develop an encyclopedic article on the historical development of pattern based cliches. It has sometimes been in a reasonable state, but due to the faddish nature of its popularity, the article quickly spiraled out of control. As the fad fades, more reputable and scholarly sources are emerging to sort out the noise from the culture.”

Let’s hope the snowclone can emerge unscathed from its overblown popularity and exploitation. It came, it saw, it snowcloned.

Meanwhile, here are some classic examples from Jack Schmidt’s page*, grouped chronologically according to when the originating phrase was first uttered in its virgin form.

Pre-16th century:

“I came, I saw, I Xed” — from Julius Caesar “Veni, vidicon, vici” (Latin for “I came, I saw, I conquered”)

16th century:

“To X or not to X” — from “To be or not to be” from Shakespeare’s Hamlet.

* “A(n) X! A(n) X! My kingdom for a(n) X!” — from “A horse! A horse! My kingdom for a horse!” from Shakespeare’s Richard III

17th century:

“I X, therefore I Y” — from Descartes “I think, therefore I am”

19th century:

“Yes, X (often Virginia), there is a Y” — from  “Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Clause”, from an editorial by Francis Pharcellus Church in the New York Sun (1897)

1910s:

“The X to end all Xs” — from a popular saying that the first world war was “the war to end all wars”

1950s:

“Have X, will Y (often travel)” — from “Have Gun — Will Travel”, a late ’50s TV western

1990s:

“Got X?” — from the Got Milk? ads produced for the California Milk Processor Board

“You had me at X” — from “You had me at hello”, from the film Jerry Maguire

* all but one: I added “An X! An X! My kingdom for an X!”

 

 

 

 

 

 

Parental advisory: inexplicit content

implicitcontent

Content warnings and advisories aren’t always as explicit as they should be, given the explicit material they’re designed to protect our kids against. Often couched in ambiguous terms, they can leave much to the imagination or to broad interpretation — with sometimes dubious or downright silly results.

The ESRB (Entertainment Software Ratings Board) says that its ratings “provide concise and objective information about the content in video games and apps so consumers, especially parents, can make informed choices.” For games in its “Everyone 10+” category, it warns that the content “may contain … mild language and/or minimal suggestive themes.” Isn’t “mild language” what a toddler speaks when she’s just getting beyond the babbling stage? And as for “minimal suggestive themes”, are we talking about American works of art from the ’60s and early ’70s, or sparse interior decors?

A common warning for parents is that “mild peril” is contained in children’s movies. Is there really such a thing as “mild peril”? Peril, according to most dictionaries, means “serious and immediate danger”. Can serious and immediate danger be mild?

The Classification Board in Australia (where, incidentally, the censorship of video games and internet sites is said to be the strictest in the western world) classifies all material shown in movies, TV and videos. Its “M” rated material is “recommended for people with a mature perspective but is not deemed too strong for younger viewers. Language is moderate in impact.” How do I know if I or my child — or my spouse or parent, for that matter — have a mature enough perspective to view said M movie? And if its language is only moderate in impact, should we be looking for another movie with a better screenplay?

Here’s another good one: “adult situations”. To quote Calvin and Hobbes (the cartoon characters created by Bill Watterson): Calvin: The TV listings say this movie has “adult situations.” What are adult situations? Hobbes: Probably things like going to work, paying bills and taxes, taking responsibilities… Calvin: Wow, they don’t kid around when they say “for mature audiences.”

According to the MPAA classification system, one of the criteria for the R rating is “pervasive language”. The new movie Nebraska is rated R “for some language”. Don’t most movie screenplays nowadays have “pervasive language” or “some language”? I thought they all did, at least since talkies were invented. Screenwriters beware: you might just write and rate yourself out of a job.

“Contains behaviour which could be imitated” is one of the BBC’s online content advisories. Well, first of all it’s mildly perilous grammatically: it should more properly read “contains behaviour that could be imitated” (better conjunction). But that’s for another discussion. Can’t a lot of behavior that you see online be imitated — whether or not you even want to try and be like Jack Donaghy in 30 Rock or Luke Skywalker in Star Wars? This advisory sounds more like an offering to stand-up comedians than a warning to parents of young and impressionable children.

Parental advisories for Batman Begins (and many other movies) warn of “revealing clothing” and “dysfunctional relationships”. Whoa. But do kids really need to follow the adventures of the caped crusader in order to catch a glimpse of either of those mildly perilous phenomena? I’d say they’re more like blanket content advisories for 21st-century life.

Here’s one of Wikipedia’s several stern disclaimers. It isn’t inexplicit or vague in any way, but it does seem just a little over the top, if not perhaps tongue-in-cheek:

“USE WIKIPEDIA AT YOUR OWN RISK: PLEASE BE AWARE THAT ANY INFORMATION YOU MAY FIND IN WIKIPEDIA MAY BE INACCURATE, MISLEADING, DANGEROUS, ADDICTIVE, UNETHICAL OR ILLEGAL.”

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Moving on from the (presumably) unintentionally inexplicit warnings, here are some spoof advisories that were designed for our entertainment. Warning: explicit content follows. (And I’m not being ironic; it really does.)

The musical show Avenue Q has warnings such as “PARENTAL ADVISORY: 60% adult situations and 40% foam rubber”, and “Not appropriate for children due to language and adult content such as full puppet nudity”.

Another show, Jersey Boys, offers this disclaimer: “This musical contains smoke, loud gunshots, strobe lights, and authentic, offensive Jersey vocabulary”.

Monty Python’s The Album of the Soundtrack of the Trailer of the Film of Monty Python and the Holy Grail contains this warning: “There is little or no offensive material [on this record] apart from four cunts, one clitoris, and a foreskin. And, as they only occur in this opening introduction, you’re past them now.”

One of the tag-lines for the 2008 movie An American Carol reads: “WARNING! This movie may be offensive to children, young people, old people, in-the-middle people, some people on the right, all people on the left, terrorists, pacifists, war-mongers, fish mongers, Christians, Jews, Muslims, atheists, agnostics (though you’d have to prove it to them), the ACLU, liberals, conservatives, neo-cons, ex-cons, future cons, Republicans, Democrats, Libertarian, people of color, people of no color, English speakers, English-as-a-second language speakers, non-speakers, men, women, more women, & Ivy League professors. Native Americans should be okay.”