#15 Strange Words - Olivia

It doesn't take a linguist to tell you that the English language is wack.   

I mean, every single publicly educated American has encountered Shakespeare in some form.  That alone should remind you of staring at words like "prabble" or "bisson," which incidentally did not refer to anything near large buffalo creatures at the time.

So what's bizarre for the bizarre?

For me, it breaks down two ways.  First, when common words don't quite compute (take the polaroid as Exhibit A).  And good old fashioned, garden variety, home grown, colloquial slang.

First, let's take a peek again at the polaroid.

Could someone please explain to me how color could be passionate?  While it's completely possible that inside the box is actually a man named Purple, who is known for his dedication and emotional attachment to most things, something makes me feel like keeping such a package at a Health Dept. (where the photo was taken) is a health code violation, and fire hazard at the least.

Passionate purple doesn't even evoke a particular shade for me.

And this is just one example.

The second section of word strangeness has to do with words that sprung up on the sly.  Oh, how I love slang and regional terms.

For example, did you know that in Pennsylvania, a rubber band is referred to as a gum band?

Or that 'paczki' is a jelly donut in Wisconson?

This is a brief listing of interesting word collections:
Regional vocabularies of American English
Track that word!
(From the previous website) Slayer Slang
Random instances of American Slang (made me giggle)
And of course ... Urban Dictionary

And for my people in Athens, Ohio, if you want some more academic study on the subject.  American Regionalism

Have a whale of a time with these.  (Yep, that's the best my thesaurus gave me.)

Don Replies:


Those are some awesome links you gave us; ee cummings might say they were "mudlucious" or "puddlewonderful."


I really like the word "paczki."  It's a mouthful just like the doughnut (by the way, I prefer this spelling of "doughnut" to "donut" because it reminds us that it's made of dough, even if we are not.


Of all your links, the one I use the most is Urban Dictionary.  Unfortunately it's blocked at school where I work because it has too many dangerous and profane words; we wouldn't want the kids to learn any new swear words.  They'll just have to make due with the ones they already know.  Heaven forbid they might call someone a "honeyfuger."