Will to power and natural selection applied to language...

This morning I googled and one page that came up was The grammer police strike again. (sic)

Obviously "nickerbocker" is an ass. Spelling errors in the post are just the tip of the iceberg. But I ended up googling electronical out of curiosity and found Unwords.

Language evolves like animals. Mutations occur and some survive, some don't. I also found electronical at Urban Dictionary so I'd say we're looking at a mutation that might eke out a niche. But I wrote this post because I got a kick out of the Unwords site. Posting a word there is will to power in action. You're taking the role of radiation against DNA. You're barking a command at language itself: "I say thee mutate!" Hell, I just like it! A little thing, sure, but it's the little things that perk me up in the morning.

Actually, it should be, "I say thou mutate!". "Thee" means the same thing (you) but is reserved for the end of a sentence, i.e. "I invite thee; come and watch me unsheath my sword!"

(Note that is technically the end of the sentence, as a semicolon is really nothing more but an aesthetic way of connecting two complete sentences without using a conjunction.)

All joking aside, language is one of those things that has my fascination at all times. I love watching it mutate and grow into different (and oftentimes horrid) dialects and memes.

Also, it's interesting to note what words are considered "unwords" by different software. For example, OpenOffice does not recognize "intellectualization" as a word. I tried using an "s" instead of a "z" to see if it is merely Amero-phobic, but alas it still didn't work.

Also interesting to note that Google Chrome doesn't recognize "meme" as a word.

But Nick-eeeeee, that just sounds lame. "Thee" sounds so much better; more commanding, declarative and slightly (appropriately) absurd. What say thee?

"Un"s are always fun. I keep a personal dictionary, a journal where I can make note of strange, delightful or made-up words. Like "sandwichcraft" and "spaghettify" but also things like "sirocco". I sometimes make up my own definitions too. Most recent addition was "japan", adjective, used to describe all manner of bizarrity.

One of my favorite word sites is Sklonklish: An Illustrated Word of the Day. Mostly because I think it's a neat project but also because it's packed with deliciously weird words. Like snickersnee...

I'm a big snob about mutant words though. I think if you're going to morph something it should have some style and panache. It's not necessary to know the rules in order to break them but knowing the rules makes breaking them a lot more fun and clever. Being creative and quirky need not come at the expense of being educated about and precise with the language.

Netspeak, for example, does not a good mutant make. It's communication devolved into lingo à la Idiocracy or Blade Runner (“That gibberish he talked was city-speak, guttertalk, a mishmash of Japanese, Spanish, German, what have you.”). I think what maybe started out as useful shorthand has become an excuse for sheer laziness. I know it's hip and all that but I cringe every time I see a sliced n' diced word with numbers and z's tacked on. It looks/sounds like a speech impediment to me. And it's a right pain in the ass to translate.

You mean Stan Lee steered me wrong all those years in the Thor comic?

Yeesh. If you can't trust Stan Lee, who can you trust?





Word 2007 doesn't recognize anaerobicly. But it recognizes intellectualization.



Word 2007 does. But it doesn't recognize memetics.

Inventing a new word and letting it out to see it if catches up sounds like an awesomenal idea!

I love telling people to chillax.

Inexplicably it seems to be able to diffuse many an argument.

ACTUALLY

"Thou" is used for the grammatical subject, "thee" for the grammatical object. The difference between "thou" and "thee" is the same as the difference between "I" and "me".

In this case, "I say thee" is ungrammatical, because one doesn't "say" a person. It's wrong in the same way "He said me" would be wrong. "I say to thee, mutate" would be fine. ("Thee" is the indirect object in this case.)

Screwed-up Jacobian English is a pet peeve of mine! And my pedantry just happens to be on topic for once.

Try "anaerobically".

There is an art to spell check.

I think creative people like to play around with language just to see what happens. If you change one word in a phrase you get another sentence which may or may not make sense. One I've used is "sentenced in absinthe".

I have a co-worker that writes comics in his spare time and I've noticed that whenever I do something like that he jumps onto the derailed train of thought and goes on in a new direction with something like "Yes, Absinthe is a country well know for it's harsh legal system" and then of course I have to counter with some draconian form of punishment that they are known for. So conversations become sort of an improvisation like jazz music.

People tend to shake their heads a lot when they eavesdrop on our conversations

These seem a lot like Sniglets, the 1980s invention from comedian Rich Hall.

OK, I was 98% sure that was the case, but didn't want to sound like a complete idiot in case the SVO word order hadn't evolved yet.

Seeing as how it apparently did, with the object coming at the end of a sentence, I was technically right at one point in time.

Of course, the whole thou/thee difference that is no longer present is clear indication of English's Germanic roots, ala Du/Dich.

A personal favorite of mine as well. I once told my father to chillax and he said something about me being "stuck in the '90s".

Whatever.

Makes me think of a super-villain who attacks you with a battle axe as cold as outer space!

So how do you pronounce awesomenal? I'm thinking - aw SAHM in ul.

definition-an arsenal of awesome.