depthful is great, it has a classic Old English flavor and that fearsome consonant sequence in the middle!
― avellano medio inglés (f. hazel), Friday, 22 May 2020 15:16 (three years ago) link
Hmm, good point. I probably would like it more as literal usage, e.g. "The abyss is most depthful."
― jmm, Friday, 22 May 2020 16:06 (three years ago) link
in what sense have you heard it used?
― avellano medio inglés (f. hazel), Friday, 22 May 2020 16:52 (three years ago) link
As synonymous with 'profound' or 'meaningful' to describe a work of art. In that context, it always just sounded like a contorted way of saying 'deep'.
I'm happy to learn that 'lengthful' was once in common use.
― jmm, Friday, 22 May 2020 17:00 (three years ago) link
I was once in a conversation about a wine (iirc it was a Chateauneuf-du-Pape) where someone said it had a lot of "flavorfulness." Someone else said "yeah, some of us just call that 'flavor.'"
Personally I have no problem with elevated diction, elaborately florid language, and with sesquipedalian circumlocutions. So in theory I am okay with "depthful" and "lengthful," but I know there will always be some sneering simplifier asking why you don't just say "deep" or "long."
― I bless Claude Rains down in Africa (Ye Mad Puffin), Friday, 22 May 2020 17:20 (three years ago) link
the idea that simplicity or directness is anywhere near the top of the list of motivations for word choice is insane if you're a linguist. that's not how any of this works! caprice is so undervalued as a foundational aspect of language
― avellano medio inglés (f. hazel), Friday, 22 May 2020 17:27 (three years ago) link
sorry i think you mean capriciousness
― budo jeru, Friday, 22 May 2020 17:30 (three years ago) link
lol
― pomenitul, Friday, 22 May 2020 17:31 (three years ago) link
totally agree, f. hazel.
Just sayin, if you go out into the world of professional writers and editors, be prepared to have to fight any time you want to use a three-syllable word when there's an allegedly synonymous one-syllable word available. There's someone in every office who's read a little too much Hemingway.*
Though I have a tough time defending "compliancy" when the prettier word "compliance" exists.
* = Or, rather, thinks they have. People using "Hemingway" as a stand-in for short/punchy/raw sentences are being both simplistic and wrong. Hemingway wrote a whole bunch of frilly filler as well as cartoonishly muscular, manly, "simple" prose. But that's a different topic.
― I bless Claude Rains down in Africa (Ye Mad Puffin), Friday, 22 May 2020 17:42 (three years ago) link
Following Strunk & White is a great guide for 98% of people who must write something in order to communicate to others, because most people have little stomach for writing. They approach it as a tedious chore, a frightening opportunity to fail in public, or an elaborate way to bury their thoughts in impenetrable prose and thereby deflect criticism.
But Strunk & White is not a master class. Every masterly writer moves past that level and learns to write in a flexible prose that personally suits them.
― A is for (Aimless), Friday, 22 May 2020 17:53 (three years ago) link
xpost lol!
― avellano medio inglés (f. hazel), Friday, 22 May 2020 18:00 (three years ago) link
re Strunk & White - hell to the yeah. "Omit needless words" is decent advice for some people. But in the wrong hands, it can be turned into a really stifling atmosphere, where joy and fun and play are outlawed.
― I bless Claude Rains down in Africa (Ye Mad Puffin), Friday, 22 May 2020 18:02 (three years ago) link
Strunk and White have been dead for a combined 100 years or something, there’s nothing timeless about style advice.
― silby, Friday, 22 May 2020 18:18 (three years ago) link
"I can't stop thinking about blahblahblah". I'm fairly sure you stop thinking about it all the time, now fuck off with your failed attempts at gravitas.
― Alert! The virus lives (Matt #2), Friday, 22 May 2020 21:05 (three years ago) link
I used that phrase in a thread here yesterday but I don't think I was trying to evoke gravitas!
― silby, Friday, 22 May 2020 21:13 (three years ago) link
To be fair to Hemingwayesque editors, paper costs money
― dip to dup (rob), Friday, 22 May 2020 21:52 (three years ago) link
yeah like anyone actually uses paper and ink anymore
― I bless Bad Brains down in Africa (Ye Mad Puffin), Friday, 22 May 2020 22:03 (three years ago) link
some people eat them
― I am a free. I am not man. A number. (Neanderthal), Friday, 22 May 2020 22:16 (three years ago) link
“it’s an art not a science”
― brimstead, Saturday, 23 May 2020 01:24 (three years ago) link
& variations thereof
I am a working scientist. Every month or so I get the urge to stand on a roof and scream "JUST BECAUSE YOU MEASURED SOMETHING DOESN'T MAKE IT SCIENCE" at Heston Blumenthal and every marketing consultant who uses a "fact about the brain" to shore up their buzzword bullshit, and every fucker who looks up something on the internet to support their argument and GIFs it with "SCIENCE". Fuck this bullshit. If you feel the need to announce it as SCIENCE it reliably shows you don't know what science is. Same goes for the chumps who think "scientifically proven" is a thing, it's not, it's the exact opposite of what science is. FUCK.
― an incoherent crustacean (MatthewK), Saturday, 23 May 2020 02:05 (three years ago) link
miss rona
― groovemaaan, Saturday, 23 May 2020 04:23 (three years ago) link
our govt's speeches and press releases have the phrase "scientific advice" packed in wherever possible, and then some. I've started to hear it in the "SCIENCE!" way Matthew describes.
― kinder, Saturday, 23 May 2020 08:35 (three years ago) link
pair it with the visuals and faux equations they do produce and it's like an Armando Iannucci pisstake
― kinder, Saturday, 23 May 2020 08:37 (three years ago) link
Quite plainly a ploy to ensure scientists get stuck with the blame when investigations into the mishandling of this shitshow begin.
― Is Lou Reed a Good Singer? (Tom D.), Saturday, 23 May 2020 08:52 (three years ago) link
Science and magic are not interchangeable, not that you can tell people that
― Alert! The virus lives (Matt #2), Saturday, 23 May 2020 09:07 (three years ago) link
The other abuse of “science” is imagining that a scientist’s opinion is “science” and then acting as if it’s some kind of guarantee. Even if you’ve asked other scientists whose opinions are not the one you wanted.
― an incoherent crustacean (MatthewK), Saturday, 23 May 2020 12:40 (three years ago) link
ooh and medical doctors imagining that their knowledge and training makes their opinion scientific, or that they are scientists. Some doctors are of course, but not because of their medical degree.
― an incoherent crustacean (MatthewK), Saturday, 23 May 2020 12:41 (three years ago) link
"Nasally" instead of "nasal". I started hearing this around 10 years ago or so and I have even seen it in a textbook at this point.
― Feel a million filaments (Sund4r), Saturday, 23 May 2020 12:57 (three years ago) link
xps I really need to get over myself
― an incoherent crustacean (MatthewK), Sunday, 24 May 2020 03:57 (three years ago) link
no you're right, they're wrong
― j., Sunday, 24 May 2020 04:10 (three years ago) link
The Grapes of Wrathfulness
― Morton Koopa Jr. Sings Elvis (Sufjan Grafton), Tuesday, 2 June 2020 11:37 (three years ago) link
"inflection point" instead of "turning point"
― Sam Weller, Wednesday, 3 June 2020 08:32 (three years ago) link
just encountered 'evolvement'
― mookieproof, Wednesday, 3 June 2020 19:15 (three years ago) link
Like that pokemon had max evolvement?
― Mario Meatwagon (Moodles), Wednesday, 3 June 2020 19:15 (three years ago) link
disenvolvument
― pomenitul, Wednesday, 3 June 2020 19:16 (three years ago) link
swedish cars: what's inside
― budo jeru, Wednesday, 3 June 2020 20:01 (three years ago) link
the new normal
― fetter, Wednesday, 3 June 2020 20:21 (three years ago) link
A newer normal
― lefal junglist platton (wtev), Thursday, 4 June 2020 21:53 (three years ago) link
Bill de Blasio’s terrible, horrible, no good, very bad week
― A True White Kid that can Jump (Granny Dainger), Monday, 8 June 2020 16:48 (three years ago) link
"mercury set to soar"
― kinder, Saturday, 13 June 2020 09:36 (three years ago) link
"too good not to share", accompanying a supposedly hilarious/incisive meme
extra hate if it's followed by a crying with laughter emoji.
― brain (krakow), Thursday, 25 June 2020 09:49 (three years ago) link
"Karen"
― snakes & cookies (doo dah), Thursday, 25 June 2020 11:12 (three years ago) link
rest assured, "Karen" will soon pass away to the land of forgotten memes.
― the unappreciated charisma of cows (Aimless), Thursday, 25 June 2020 16:28 (three years ago) link
Shovel-ready
― lefal junglist platton (wtev), Monday, 29 June 2020 18:05 (three years ago) link
haven't heard that one since ARRA
― all cats are beautiful (silby), Tuesday, 30 June 2020 04:14 (three years ago) link
"The 27 Club"
― mirostones, Tuesday, 30 June 2020 13:10 (three years ago) link
"Whack a mole". Not entirely because of Boris Johnson, only 99% because of Boris Johnson.
― Future England Captain (Tom D.), Wednesday, 1 July 2020 13:51 (three years ago) link
'straight-sized' people/bodies/clothing
― panburger partner (unregistered), Thursday, 2 July 2020 11:53 (three years ago) link
'theatre makers'
― Li'l Brexit (Tracer Hand), Wednesday, 15 July 2020 16:09 (three years ago) link