It’s 4:20: do you know where your teen is? Is he at low tea or high tea? Or just high?

“420”. Or more specifically: Four Twenty. What does that mean to you? For me, I’m transported back to a specific time every weekday afternoon at my boarding school in the English countryside when we would sip warm tea and dip our dry Rich Tea biscuits (and occasionally cake, if we were lucky) into our cups at the end of a long school day. Low tea was, for many, the high point of the day; long were the minutes spent waiting in class for the school bell to ring out, heralding the arrival of caffeine-and-sugar-time. In those days (and this will surely date me), 4.20 meant simply a number or time of day: tea-time! Its ‘higher’ connotations had yet to spread beyond the drug culture of Californian youth …

Let’s go 420, and explore the origin and history (and the truths and myths) of the term. And let’s also look at the origin and history (and widespread misunderstanding) of the terms “low tea” and “high tea”, and find out just what is eaten at what time on each occasion.

“Let’s go 420, dude!”

You have to have been hiding under a rock for the last couple of decades if you don’t know what 420 means. But ask anyone why, and the haze of uncertainty about its etymology is about as thick as the mind of a ’70s Deadhead (which is actually where the term spent much of its infancy, probably also under a rock). “Isn’t or wasn’t 420 the police dispatch code for smoking pot?” No, it’s not the dispatch code for anything. “Hitler’s birthday was April 20.” So …? “4.20pm is tea-time for pot-smokers in Holland.” Yeah, and for everyone else in the world, including the Queen of England. “There are approximately 420 active chemicals in marijuana.” There are about 315 active chemicals in marijuana, but the actual number fluctuates depending on which plant you’re using. “April 20 is the date that Jim Morrison/Jimi Hendrix/Janis Joplin [pick one] died.” Nice try, but even though they were all strongly associated with drugs and drug-taking, not one of them died on April 20.

Steven Hager, editor of High Times, traced the term 420 back to a group of about a dozen pot-smoking high-school students in 60s/70s San Rafael, California, who called themselves the Waldos. The kids first used the term in fall 1971 as part of a plan to search for a cannabis crop that was rumored to have been abandoned in a nearby forest. For this particular marijuana hunt, which was repeated on several occasions (although that crop never was never to be found), the Waldos agreed to meet at 4.20pm near a statue on the school campus before heading into the woods. The meeting time for the hunt became a general meeting time for smoking pot, and so as not to let on to unsuspecting parents or teachers, 420 became their code-word for a time to get high. As it spread beyond the school grounds, referring more generally to the art and recreation of marijuana-taking, the term began to take root amongst the dope-smoking Californians of the day — notably the Deadheads (Grateful Dead fans and followers) who were local to and associated with San Rafael. And before long, 420 was understood and used (linguistically as well as literally) by an entire generation of potheads, who have in turn passed it along to their own issue — the word, the habit, and in some cases the wacky baccy itself. Here’s a flyer that was handed out by Deadheads in Oakland, CA before a Grateful Dead concert in 1990:

The term 420 is now ubiquitous in popular culture and in the common vernacular, often with tongue in cheek or as an oblique reference to Grandpa’s medicine. Most of the clocks in Pulp Fiction are set to 4:20. (There is one watch set to 9.00.) There’s both a record label and a band called 4:20. Atlanta’s Sweetwater Brewing Company sells 420 Pale Ale and opens at 4.20pm most weekdays. A New York-based travel company, 420 Tours, sells cheap packages to the Netherlands and Jamaica. California’s Senate Bill 420 regulates marijuana used for medical purposes. In 2001, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Center for Substance Abuse Prevention published (on its web site) a document called: “It’s 4:20: do you know where your teen is?”

Nowadays, you’ll find “420-friendly” used commonly as an attribute — alongside height, education, hobbies and fetishes — by online romance-seekers in their web profiles. So if you’re looking to date a stoner, you’re in luck: just type 420 into the search-box …

Low tea and high tea

Low tea

High tea

That’s not a mistake: these are fair representations of the meals “low tea” and “high tea”, names that derive not from the tides, the time of day, nor the quality or class of food prepared, but from the height of the tables at which the meals were traditionally taken.

In the 17th and 18th centuries, “tea was generally consumed within a lady’s closet or bedchamber and for a mainly female gathering.” Ladies would receive callers with their morning tea, usually “abed and bare-breasted” (from “A Social History of Tea” by Jane Pettigrew). It is generally thought that the English afternoon tea tradition was established in the early 19th century by Anna Maria Russell, Duchess of Bedford, a lifelong friend of Queen Victoria whom she served for a time as a lady of the bedchamber. The Duchess, feeling the energy low that hits us all in the late afternoon, started asking for light sandwiches and tea to be brought to her to tide her and her rumbly-tummy over between the lunchtime and evening meals. Then she invited others to join her in this afternoon repast, and so the tradition of afternoon or “low” tea was born. Ladies of the fashionable upper classes would serve a ‘low’ or ‘afternoon’ tea around four o’clock, just before a promenade in the park.

Low tea can consist of any combination of biscuits, sandwiches (cucumber please), scones with clotted cream and jam, and, most importantly, tea. It’s not so much a meal as a light and indulgent afternoon snack. (Although who would call scones with clotted cream and jam ‘light’?) “Low tea” got its name from the furniture and setting of those partaking of the late afternoon fare: in living or drawing rooms in low armchairs, with low side-tables pulled alongside them on which could be placed cups and saucers, doilies and side-plates.

High tea, on the other hand, was served at the dining table. High tea is a more substantial evening meal, usually consisting of “meat and two veg” (or a similar combination); it was the main meal put on the table at around 6 pm for the working man of the family to return home to. However, high tea wasn’t a meal just of the working class. The middle and upper classes would sometimes take a high tea in the early evening – at five or six o’clock – replacing the later evening dinner, especially if there were evening entertainments planned (much like our modern pre-theater meal) or not enough staff on duty to cook or serve the dinner feast.

For inexplicable reasons, “high tea” has persisted in modern English usage – especially in America – and is often used erroneously instead of “low tea”, which is now moreorless obsolete, to describe the traditional afternoon fare. When an American hotel or tea-house offers a “high tea” service, you can be sure you’ll be eating the equivalent – at least linguistically – of tea at the Waldorf, and not the fish and chips and mushy peas that characterized the high teas of yore.

* * * * *

Thanks to Snopes.com, High Times and the Huffington Post for the dope on 420; and Afternoon Tea and Afternoon to Remember for lessons in the history and etiquette of afternoon tea.

http://hightimes.com/entertainment/ht_admin/834

http://www.snopes.com/language/stories/420.asp#DQK60F3kSb7mEd6o.99

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/04/20/what-420-means-the-true-s_n_188320.html

http://www.afternoontea.co.uk

http://www.afternoontoremember.com

Sitting in our own ponder

It’s a good word, ponder. It’s meatier and weightier than the rather simple and banal think. It represents a weighing and balancing of different thoughts and ideas; a sense of contemplation that is more slow, profound, internal, searching, and prolonged than a fleeting or flighty thought. It’s also far away from its more questioning and less serious cousin, wonder: change the first letter, and we’re plunged more deeply into our own minds and inner conflicts.

The OED defines ponder as meaning to weigh mentally, to think over, or to consider (transitive), or simply to think, or muse (intransitive). Note how its adjectival form, ponderous, takes on heavier and more negative connotations suffused with weight and solemnity: it means slow and clumsy because of great weight; dull, laborious, or excessively solemn.

Steve, a psychologist whose livelihood depends on his own pondering about himself and others, found himself ‘stuck’ or lodged in a state of contemplation. While in this frame of mind he walked past a man sitting on a bench who was also clearly in his own ‘state of ponder’. A glassy-eyed faraway look, a furrowed brow, a downward cast of the head, a still body belying a churning mind… Putting these observations — of bench-man and his own reflective impasse — together, Steve decided not only to nominalize this most static and sometimes even stagnant of verbs: he cast it in an expression very descriptive of a temporal state of being we all know. He found himself ‘sitting in his own ponder’.

Could Obama be in danger of losing his presidency as he sits in his own ponder? In the first Presidential debate of 2012 he portrayed himself as an introvert who weighs not just his thoughts but also his words with gravity and perhaps some inner conflict. His tendency to ponder is not typical of — and arguably not even suited to — the mind of the 21st-century politician, whose constituents with their increasingly narrow attention spans are swimming in ADD media, viral memes and 160-character tweets. Obama’s opponent, by comparison, is clearly capable of solid thought and thinks easily on his feet (not always successfully, as his “binders full of women” comment clearly illustrated), but it’s hard to imagine Romney sitting in his own ponder, as our President is wont to do.

Why does ‘sitting in our own ponder’ make us think of ponds? (At least it does me.) Are they related, pond and ponder, or is it just that they sound alike, especially when the verb is masquerading as a noun? Ponder, a Middle English word, comes via the Old French verb ponderer from the Latin ponderare, from pondus -eris “weight”. According to the Online Etymology Dictionary, its meaning “to weigh a matter mentally” is attested from the late 14th century. Pond comes from a variant of the word pound: aha! we wonder: is that a pound of weight? No, this pound is an enclosed place – usually for animals. It’s from the late Old English pundfald — “penfold, pound,” related to pyndan — “to dam up, enclose (water)” …. and thus we arrive at pond.

And we’re back to sitting in our own ponder.

For Steve.

Malarkey, and stuff

So what does that word “Malarkey” mean?

According to Merriam-Webster, it’s defined as “insincere or foolish talk: bunkum“.

The OED dates its first reference to 1929. And all dictionaries seem to agree: its origin is unknown.

“Even life without drugs has gotta be better than this malarkey.” — Pete Doherty

“It’s malarkey. When you tell people that the roof crushing in on your head is not the cause of injury, it’s your head hitting the roof, it’s laughable.” — Joan Claybrook

“That was a bunch of malarkey! … That’s a bunch of stuff! That’s what the Irish call malarkey.” – Joe Biden, responding to Paul Ryan’s attack on the government’s foreign policy during the VP debate, 2012

When you walk through a storm, do you keep your chin or hold your head up high?

When you walk through a storm hold your head up high / And don’t be afraid of the dark / At the end of a storm is a golden sky / And the sweet silver song of a lark
Walk on through the wind / Walk on through the rain / Though your dreams be tossed and blown
Walk on, walk on with a hope in your heart / And you’ll never walk alone

Before you walk on, go to iTunes and listen to track 17 of Joseph Calleja’s gorgeous new album, Be My Love: a Tribute to Mario Lanza (released a couple of days ago). Listen carefully to the words. http://itunes.apple.com/us/album/be-my-love-tribute-to-mario/id568147992

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Did anything surprise you? In glorious voice, the Maltese tenor sings “You’ll Never Walk Alone”, arguably Rodgers and Hammerstein’s most famous song, which they wrote for their 1945 musical, Carousel. Julie, the heroine of the story, has bid a heartbreaking farewell to the father of her unborn child, after the no-good barker at the local fairground has fallen fatally on his knife during a botched hold-up. Julie’s cousin, Nettie Fowler, sings to her of hope and courage, urging her to forge on through her despair with hope in her heart. It’s one of the great moments of musical theater; if your heart has ever been broken, you’ll know what strength can be drawn from the powerful words and melody, and even the owner of the hardest heart won’t fail to melt a little when he hears this poignant song. As well as being adopted as the anthem of Liverpool, the English football club, thus turning it into a favorite of British sports fans, “You’ll Never Walk Alone” has been widely covered by singers of all genres from the 40s onwards – the soprano Renee Fleming sang it at Obama’s inauguration in 2009 – and it holds a spot in the firmament of great and loved American songs.

But strangely, there’s a mystery surrounding its lyrics – in the first line concerning which part of your body you should hold (or keep) high. As Claramae Turner sang in the 1956 movie version of the musical, “hold your head up high”. But on the original Broadway cast recording (which presumably reflected the stage lyrics), and in subsequent revivals on the Great White Way, the mezzo advises her grieving cousin to “keep her chin up high”. It’s not clear which version Oscar Hammerstein preferred or intended to be sung. And nowadays you will hear one version sung just as often as the other. (Football fans, led by the Liverpudlians, lift their heads rather than raise their chins.)

On the Rodgers and Hammerstein web site, Bruce Miller of the music department of the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Mass. votes musically in favor of the head rather than the chin: “”‘Keep your chin up high’ is, as most singers will affirm, more difficult to sing and project than ‘Hold your head up high.’ The vowels for ‘keep’ and ‘chin’ are more closed than those for ‘hold’ and ‘head’.””

He’s right: just spend a moment saying the phrase “hold your head up high” aloud, and notice how the shape of your mouth stays round and open and doesn’t move a great deal as you articulate the words. Now try doing the same thing with “keep your chin up high”: the oral acrobatics necessary to shift between the first three vowel sounds — closed “ee”, open “or”, closed “i” — while maintaining a steady breath and tone are challenging. Now imagine amping up the decibels and projecting over a pit orchestra to the back of a packed theater. It’s interesting that singers such as Calleja – and many like him and of his caliber – have chosen the more treacherous option.

Putting oral gymnastics aside, let’s look at the meaning and nuance of the phrases in question. I can understand why Hammerstein might have felt conflicted about them. First, just the anatomical parts themselves symbolize different things. Whereas our chins serve little purpose other than to act as head-guards, and we think of them in the mundane context of falls and scrapes and mouth spills, our heads are more ‘meaningful’, being at the center of our being and our sense of self: they house our minds, our senses, our thoughts, and our feelings. The head is undoubtedly more noble and poetic than the chin. And yet the expression “keep your chin up” is perhaps closer in meaning than the alternative to the sentiment that Rodgers & Hammerstein sought to convey in their song. “Hold your head high” (more often used without the “up”) has connotations of pride and rising above defeat, error, conflict or humiliation. There’s even a hint of wrong-doing in the head-holder, whereas those encouraged to have more confidence by “keeping their chins up” are perhaps more blameless and facing unlucky or fateful obstacles. And yet the notion of holding your head up high somehow carries more gravity and permanence than keeping your chin up, which seems more trite and fleeting by comparison. Furthermore, neither expression fits well in its true form (“keep your chin up” or “hold your head high”) in the meter and rhyme of the song: Hammerstein clearly had to add a “high” to the chin or an “up” to the head for the line to work musically. Might Hammerstein have battled between the conflicting pulls of gravity, meaning, meter and rhyme?

Mark Horowitz, Music Specialist at the Library of Congress, is quoted on the Rodgers & Hammerstein web site stating that: “Every version in the Rodgers & Hammerstein collections reads ‘Keep your chin up high’ with the exception of the Twentieth Century Fox score, which reads ‘Hold your head up high.'”” The most likely scenario is that Hammerstein started out with the chin, but changed it to the head as an imperfect but aesthetic improvement.

Below are the versions that the song’s various interpreters have chosen over the years.

Joseph Calleja (on Be My Love): chin

Renee Fleming (at Obama’s inauguration): head

Mahalia Jackson: chin

Barbra Streisand: head

Ray Charles: chin

Louis Armstrong: head (he actually sang “put your head up high”)

Frank Sinatra: chin

Righteous Brothers: head

Elvis Presley: head

Gerry & the Pacemakers: head

as Nettie Fowler:

Shirley Verrett (Broadway/Tony Awards, 2009): chin

Claramae Turner (1956 film): head

Christine Johnson (Broadway cast recording, 1945): chin

Homophones, and similar words that confound us

Homonyms are the identical twins of language: words that share the same spelling and the same pronunciation but have different meanings – so you can’t tell them apart just by looking at them. Only context can define or identify them. Here, spelling is a doss: you can’t go wrong.

Homophones, on the other hand, are like linguistic fraternal twins: even though they’re very similar and they sound almost identical, and they might even dress alike and hang out in the same places, they are spelled differently: they look different. So they’re the ones that give us all headaches when it comes to writing and spelling. In real life, identical twins generally provide us with the greater challenge and fraternal twins tend to cause less embarrassment and confusion. It’s the opposite when it comes to language – at least when we’re spelling and composing.

Take a look at the list of homophones (or near-homophones) below, and ask yourself truthfully: how many of these words do you have to look up in a dictionary to make sure you’re using the right one? At least two of these pairings get me every time. (Basic definitions provided below, courtesy Merriam-Webster.)

accede / exceed

aural / oral

affect / effect

assent / ascent

bear / bare (used as a verb)

complement / compliment

council / counsel (and councilor / counselor)

defuse / diffuse

discreet / discrete

elusive / allusive / illusive

elicit / illicit

hordes / hoards (see an earlier Glossophilia post: https://glossophilia.org/?p=873 )

imminent / immanent / eminent

populace / populous

premier / premiere (see an earlier Glossophilia post: https://glossophilia.org/?p=1105 )

prescribe / proscribe

principle / principal

prospective / perspective [not real homophones, but often confused]

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accede: to become a party (as to an agreement); to express approval or give consent; to give in to a request or demand; to enter upon an office or position

exceed: to extend outside of; to be greater than or superior to; to go beyond a limit set by

aural: of or relating to the ear or sense of hearing

oral: uttered by the mouth or in words; of, given through or involving the mouth

affect: the conscious subjective aspect of an emotion considered apart from bodily changes; a set of observable manifestations of a subjectively experienced emotion

effect: something that inevitably follows an antecedent (as a cause or agent); an outward sign; power to bring about a result; a distinctive impression

assent: to agree to something especially after thoughtful consideration

ascent: the act of rising or mounting upward; an upward slope or rising grade; the degree of elevation

bear (vb.): to move while holding and supporting; to be equipped or furnished with; to support the weight of; to accept or allow oneself to be subjected to especially without giving way

bare (vb): to make or lay (something) bare (adj. lacking a natural, usual or appropriate covering)

complement: something that fills up, completes, or makes perfect; to complete or enhance by providing something additional

compliment: an expression of esteem, respect, affection, or admiration; to express esteem, respect, affection, or admiration to

council: an assembly or meeting for consultation, advice, or discussion; a group elected or appointed as an advisory or legislative body (a councilor is a member of a council)

counsel: advice given especially as a result of consultation (a counselor is a person who gives advice or counseling)

defuse: to make a situation less tense

diffuse: to spread widely or freely

discreet: unobtrusive; having or showing discernment or good judgement

discrete: separate, distinct

elusive: tending to evade grasp or pursuit; hard to comprehend or define; hard to isolate or identify

allusive: containing or characterized by indirect references; containing an allusion

illusive: based on or having the nature of an illusion

elicit: to draw forth or bring out

illicit: not permitted, unlawful

hordes/hoards (see an earlier Glossophila post: https://glossophilia.org/?p=873)

imminent: ready to take place

immanent: indwelling, inherent; being within the limits of possible experience or knowledge

eminent: standing out so as to be readily perceived or noted; exhibiting eminence especially in standing above others in some quality or position: prominent

populace (n.): the common people; masses; population

populous (adj): densely populated; having a large population

prescribe: to lay down a rule; to write or give medical prescriptions

proscribe: to condemn or forbid as harmful or unlawful

principle: a comprehensive and fundamental law, doctrine, or assumption; a primary source

principal: (adj): most important, consequential or influential; (n.) person who has controlling authority or is in a leading position

prospective: relating to or effective in the future

perspective: the capacity to view things in their true relations or relative importance; a mental view or prospect; the appearance to the eye of objects in respect to their relative distance and positions

premier / premiere: (see an earlier Glossophilia post: https://glossophilia.org/?p=1105 )

‘Britishisms’ Creeping into American English

Nice piece published by Yahoo News on Thursday. Thanks, Rona, for the hat-tip.

http://news.yahoo.com/britishisms-creeping-american-english-183652134.html

‘Britishisms’ Creeping into American English

By Natalie Wolchover | LiveScience.com – Thu, Sep 27, 2012

British people have long bemoaned the gradual encroachment of Americanisms into everyday speech, via Hollywood films and sitcoms. Now, “Britishisms” are crossing the pond the other way, thanks to the growing online popularity of British media such as Harry Potter, Downton Abbey and The Daily Mail.

For example, BBC News reports that “ginger” as a descriptor of a red-haired, freckly person has shot up in usage in the United States since 1998. That’s the year the first Harry Potter book, with its Weasley family of gingers, hit store shelves. The trend shows up in Google ngram searches, which track the frequency of words and phrases appearing in print.

The Britishism invasion also includes “cheeky,” “twee,” “chat-up,” “sell-by date” and “the long game,” as well as “do the washing up,” “keen on,” “bit” (as in “the best bit”), “to book” (e.g. a flight), “called X” (instead of “named X”) and “to move house.”

A few of these now sound so familiar to American ears that their recent Limey origins might come as a surprise. [Why Do Americans and Brits Have Different Accents?]

While some of these British terms have gained ground because they sound pleasantly posh to American ears, Jesse Sheidlower, American editor-at-large of the Oxford English Dictionary, says others simply fill a gap where there is no equivalent in American English. “One-off,” as in something which is done, or made, or which happens only once, and “go missing,” instead of the vaguer “disappear,” are two examples.

According to Sheidlower, the small but noticeable increase in the American usage of traditionally British terms doesn’t bother Americans nearly as much as Americanisms bother many Brits.

“In the U.K., the use of Americanisms is seen as a sign that culture is going to hell,” he told BBC News. “But Americans think all British people are posh, so — aside from things that are fairly pretentious — no-one would mind.”

This laissez-faire linguistic attitude hasn’t always been the American way. Early in U.S. history, when the nation was striving to distinguish itself from its former landlords, the dictionary maker Noah Webster set about establishing a distinctly American form of English. Webster’s legacy includes the lack of “u” in words like “color” and the “-er” ending in words like “center” — spelling variants he viewed as superior to their British counterparts (colour and centre).

Some of the economical spellings Webster adopted, such as “public” instead of the British “publick,” have since spread back to England. Clearly, in the continuously evolving languages of these transatlantic allies, there is give and take.

To premiere or not to premiere

Premier was adopted by the English language in the 18th century; its sister, premiere, with its added feminine ‘e’ (and sometimes dressed up with her French accent – première), entered the English lexicon fashionably later than her male counterpart, probably in the late 19th century. Premier, derived from the French word meaning ‘first’, means first minister, prime minister or other head of government when used as a noun. When strutting its stuff as an adjective, it means first in status or importance, order or time (earliest). Premiere is a noun — and at least when she made her debut in the English language she was only a noun — describing a first public presentation of a play, film, opera or other performance. There’s little or no dispute about any of these definitions (except for Fowler frowning on the use of premier as an adjective; see below*).

It’s the female form that’s had a harder time adjusting fully to life in English society. Whether and to what extent premiere should be used as a verb is what usage experts tend to grapple with, even though the word has been in use as a verb since the 1930s. The OED does give it an official second definition as a transitive verb, “to give a premiere of”, but it stops short by not giving the verb an intransitive form, eg. “the symphony premiered in August”.

Merriam-Webster‘s Dictionary of English Usage (3rd ed.) outlines the unfolding of this verb-that’s-really-a-noun, and points out the fascinating possibility that its origins in the world of show business (where it is ubiquitous and to which its usage is still largely confined) have contributed to its lack of credibility and acceptance as a legitimate verb:

“The verb premiere is resoundingly rejected by the major usage panels, although most commentators take no notice of it and dictionaries treat it as standard. The panelists tend to regard it as jargon, in part because of its derivation from the noun premiere, which, in their opinion, makes it a noun misused as a verb, and in part because of its origins in the world of show business. It is also a fairly new word, although not as new as some might suppose. We first encountered it in 1933, and by the 1940s it had established itself in regular use as both a transitive and intransitive verb:

” … the Paris Opera plans to premiere an old work of Jean Cocteau and Arthur Honneger” — Modern Music, November-December 1942

“The latter two houses première foreign films.” – Parker Tyler, Tomorrow, March 1945

“The night Crosby premiered” — Newsweek, 28 Oct. 1946

“….the new show premièred on June 26” — Newsweek, 2 Aug. 1948

Its use continues to be common today:

“Trollope will premiere on television in the midst of the latest squall in Anglo-American relations” — Karl E. Meyer, Saturday Rev., 22 Jan. 1977

“… when the play was premièred in 1889” — Ronald Hayman, Times Literary Supp., 28 Jan. 1983

Anyone determined to avoid it will find it has no exact synonym. Open can sometimes be used in place of the intransitive premiere, but it less strongly denotes a “first ever”[**] public performance than does the longer word, and in many cases it is simply unidiomatic. A television program or musical composition, for example, could not be said to “open.” Open is also unidiomatic in transitive use — you could not say “The Paris Opera plans to open an old work. . . .” Of course, one may always replace premiere with a phrase, as in “… the new show was first performed on June 26” or “… Crosby performed for the first time on television…,” but the necessity of such revision seems dubious. The verb premiere may have deserved to be called “jargon” fifty years ago, but in current English it is just another available verb, and we recommend that you regard it as such.” So says Merriam-Webster.

The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (4th ed. Houghton Mifflin, 2006) confirms the slow and grudging acceptance of this new verb, and also notes that it has been unable to break out from its confines in the entertainment world, where its reputation still remains murky:

“In entertainment contexts, the verb premiere has become the standard way of saying ‘to introduce to the public,’ or ‘to be introduced to the public.’ Since it seems always to imply newness, premiere is frequently used in advertising. Thus a movie can premiere in selected theaters, and a year later it can ‘premiere’ to a different audience on television. The verb first came out in the 1930s and acceptance of it in general usage has been slow. In 1969, only 14 percent of the Usage Panel accepted it. Nineteen years later, however, when asked to judge the example The Philharmonic will premiere works by two young Americans, 51 percent of the Panelists accepted this usage. But only 10 percent of the Panelists in the 1988 survey accepted the extension of the verb to contexts outside of the entertainment industry, as in Last fall the school premiered new degree programs.”

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*In the first edition of his Modern English Usage (and left unrevised in his second edition), Fowler turned his nose up at the word premier used as an adjective, claiming it “is now suggestive of tawdry ornament, though it was formerly not avoided by good writers and has shown signs of coming back into favour in the wake of the now popular première. The ELEGANT-VARIATIONIST finds it useful …, but would do better to find some other way out. It is wise to confine it now to such traditional phrases as the Duke of Norfolk is premier duke and earl of the U.K.”

* * see Glossophilia https://glossophilia.org/?p=1052

He can’t drive home: he’s Brahms and Liszt!

[Warning: obscenities ahead …]

Marking Glossophilia’s 100th post, we’re celebrating the wonderful world of Cockney rhyming slang.

This clever and often amusing form of speech started in the East End of London, probably in the mid-19th century (although there are references to a specific Cockney dialect dating back to the 17th century, when regional folk traditions first began to be recorded). The OED‘s first recorded use of Cockney language is dated 1776. It’s difficult to establish exactly how, when and why it originated – partly because it was spoken by street-traders, costermongers and working-class Londoners, but not written and recorded by scholars and academics. The slightly convoluted ‘code’ or system of the rhyming slang, which is explained below, makes the lingo difficult to understand by non-users, and there are various interesting theories about whether it evolved by accident or design, and from whom its originators sought to keep their communications secret. Some suggest that it was a language of thieves; others that it was used by traders to talk and collude with each other without customers or eavesdroppers being privy to their conversations. Perhaps the truth lies somewhere between the two: it could have been a way for shady tradesmen to conduct their dodgy businesses without the “Old Bill” cottoning on (London’s police force was established in 1829, at roughly the same time Cockney slang began to take root; the timing might not have been coincidental). Or the local slang might have had more innocent beginnings as fun market banter that helped maintain a sense of community.

Here’s how it works: A common word (usually a noun) is replaced with a phrase of two or three words that rhymes with it, and then the rhyming part of that phrase is (usually) taken away, leaving the non-rhyming word to serve as the slang. The omission of the rhyming word is what makes this Cockney slang so hard for outsiders to decipher. Let’s take an example that’s still in common usage: butchers is slang for look. The phrase “butcher’s hook” rhymes with look, then hook is removed. Hence a Londoner will say “I’ll take a butchers” when he’s going to take a look. Another popular one is trouble, slang for wife (“trouble and strife”...).

Cockney rhyming slang is alive and well today. Fans of British TV will hear it in many programs set in London – eg. Steptoe and Son, Mind Your Language, The Sweeney, Minder, Citizen Smith, and Only Fools and Horses. And it’s rife in EastEnders, a soap opera following the lives of people who live and work in Albert Square, a fictional market square in London’s East End. Cockney slang continues to evolve – often incorporating words and names that are relevant to the time, including contemporary celebrities and personalities. For example, “Tony Blairs” is the modern rhyming slang for “flares” (as in wide-bottomed pants or trousers), but it used to be “Lionel Blairs” (Lionel Blair was a well-known actor/TV presenter in the ’60s, ’70s and ’80s). A few words and phrases have been absorbed into more widespread English usage. To scarper (to flee, go, or run away) is understood widely as a British colloquialism; it comes from Scapa Flow = Go (Scapa Flow is a body of water in the Scottish Orkney Islands). As Wikipedia explains: “The use of rhyming slang has spread beyond the purely dialectal and some examples are to be found in the mainstream British English lexicon and internationally, although many users may be unaware of the origin of those words. One example is “berk”, a mild pejorative widely used across the UK and not usually considered particularly offensive, although the origin lies in a contraction of “Berkeley Hunt”, as the rhyme for the significantly more offensive “cunt”. ”

Listen to three Londoners slinging some Cockney rhyming slang around in this colorful video shot in a London pub:

Cockney Rhyming Slang

Thanks to Fun-With-Words.com for this list of some of the most common – and amusing – examples of rhyming slang still in popular usage today.

Apples and Pairs – Stairs – “I’m too old for those apples”

Army and Navy – Gravy – “Pass the army, will you?”

Bacon and Eggs – Legs – “She has such long bacons.”

Barnet Fair – Hair – “I’m going to have my barnet cut.”

Brahms and Liszt – Pissed (BrE, as in drunk)

Bees and Honey – Money – “Hand over the bees.”

Biscuits and Cheese – Knees – “Ooh! What knobbly biscuits!”

Bull and Cow – Row (as in argument) – “We don’t have to have a bull about it.”

Butcher’s Hook – Look – “I had a butchers at it through the window.”

Cobbler’s Awls – Balls – “You’re talking cobblers!”

Crust of Bread – Head – “Use your crust, lad.”

Daffadown Dilly – Silly – “She’s a bit daffy.”

Hampton Wick – Prick – “You’re getting on my wick!”

Khyber Pass – Arse – “Stick that up your Khyber.”

Loaf of Bread – Head – “Think about it; use your loaf.”

Mince Pies – Eyes – “What beautiful minces.”

Oxford Scholar – Dollar – “Could you lend me an Oxford?”

Pen and Ink – Stink – “Pooh! It pens a bit in here.”

Rabbit and Pork – Talk – “I don’t know what she’s rabbiting about.”

Raspberry Tart – Fart – “I can smell a raspberry.”

Scarpa Flow – Go – “Scarpa! The police are coming!”

Trouble and Strife – Wife – “The trouble’s been shopping again.”

Uncle Bert – Shirt – “I’m ironing my Uncle.”

Weasel and Stoat – Coat – “Where’s my weasel?”

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Finally, here are some gems picked especially for Glossophilia readers:

Dicky bird – Word – “I didn’t say a dicky bird!”

Porkies / Pork pies – Lies – “Have you been telling porkies again?”

and finally …

Septic tank – American (Yank) – “Last I heard, she took up with a septic.”

* and in case you’re wondering about the title of this post: Brahms and Liszt = Pissed (BrE, as in drunk)

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Marketing hype at each and every turn

Strunk and White call it “pitchman’s jargon”. Bryan A. Garner describes the phrase in his Modern American Usage as “trite” and recommends avoiding it.

“Each and every” is one of my pet peeves, and it jostles for position at the top of my list of most annoying ’emphasizers’ that are now ubiquitous in marketing and media hype. (“First ever” is at Number 1, and will probably stay there for the foreseeable future.)

“Each and every” is tautologous, even though the words have slightly different meanings – or perhaps more accurately, different emphases. Each means every one separately, with the emphasis being on the separate identity of each person or thing in the collection. Every means each and all – without exception. Here the emphasis is on the fact that everyone or everything in the group has something in common. Take these two sentences: “Each camper carried his own lunch.” “Every camper carried his lunch.” The first sentence is pointing out that the campers had a separate meal each, probably lovingly prepared by a doting parent, and each had responsibility for carrying his own brown bag. In the second sentence, the thrust of the message is that all the campers were carrying their midday meals; no-one was going hungry on that particular day. Even though the same campers were carrying the same lunches in the two sentences, their meanings are subtly different.

“Each day brought a different challenge to her project, but every day started with a cup of coffee.” In this case the challenge gave each day its own unique and particular character; the coffee united the days and described a homogenous blur of caffeinated waking hours.

“Each and every” has slowly but surely crept into marketing- and media-speak as a way of emphasizing the no-exception, all-inclusive nature of an offer, deal, or campaign, or even just emphasizing a fact. Here the emphasis is clearly on every thing, every one, every time. Each is like a toddler being dragged along behind with a thumb in her mouth: there’s no place for individuality or separation here. Using the phrase “each and every” is really a form of literary impotence or laziness, where more creative wording could be used to give every the weight it probably deserves. Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage notes that usage experts generally denounce the phrase as a cliché, a pomposity, and a bit of bureaucratic bombast.

The same criticisms can be aimed at the similarly tautologous phrase “first ever”, another marketing-hype term, which tries clumsily to accentuate the first. There are no different gradations of first: something is either first or it isn’t (when it’s second, or third, etc. …). Adding ever doesn’t make it more first; it serves only to annoy – and possibly even to raise the suspicions of – the attentive reader or listener. A more elegant way to underline the fact that the person or thing in question has beaten everyone or everything else to the start-line is to introduce a qualifying verbal phrase using ever as an adverb: “The first person ever to set foot on Mars”; “the first time the piece has ever been performed”.

Whenever you’re Irish

If you’re visiting either Northern Ireland or Texas, you might be surprised to hear the locals talking about “whenever we got married” (even though she’s still with her first husband, and she’s not Elizabeth Taylor), “whenever my son was born” (although he has only one kid, to the best of your knowledge), or “whenever we won the lottery” (and even the Irish aren’t that lucky) …

No, I’m not talking blarney: there’s an abundance of whenevers (whenever just when will do) north of the border in Castleblaney and south of Oklahoma. And just why they’re so partial to whenever in these particular places is anyone’s guess. It’s certainly not the climate.

Hat-tip to my mom, who noticed this quirk on a recent trip up north. It has also been noted by Paul Brians in his Common Errors in English Usage, and by the online Bee Dictionary.