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I have been an avid reader ever since I was five years old. In my reading I stumble across new words constantly however my vocabulary skills in speaking are totally different.
My work place exposure to words of a "profane" nature has been rather extensive. Construction workers, packing house workers, truck drivers, prison inmates and prison staff all have rather colorful vocabularies. Some of the inmates I supervised had really creative ways of cussing me out. After all I had the power to make their lives miserable if I wrote them up for using the words on the FCC list of seven banned words in broadcasting. One inmate in particular had the knack for using ordinary words that were not profane to insult staff. One day when I was on duty in a gun tower I heard him insulting one of the yard officers for at least three minutes without ONCE using a profane word. I never realized that "tractor driving, big butt, clumsy, goober lip, pencil necked geek, four eyed, big eared, brain dead, farmer, etc." could be so insulting. All of those words and not one of them could be used in a misconduct report.
A few years after that incident the inmate had paroled and I saw him in a local grocery store. I asked him the usual questions about how he was doing and so on. He had found a job with a local attorney doing clerical work but on week ends he traveled the comedy club circuit and was doing stand up comedy. I told him he should put in a skit about his diatribe with the yard officer that I overheard. He just laughed and said that particular officer had given him a lot of inspiration.
Heck who knows? That ex inmate may go on to be the next Eddie Murphy. In my opinion he has the talent.
I have a big vocabulary (of non-curse words, even!) and use it extensively. If I worked in a different situation, I may not. I don't know. I don't think using good grammar and a varied vocabulary is a bad thing in any setting.
I agree, good grammar and a varied vocabulary is great in any setting. What I had hoped to illustrate in my previous post was the fact that PROFANITY is not necessary to show displeasure with another person.
I mentioned Eddie Murphy in that post also. In my opinion Eddie Murphy is the POSTER BOY as an example of using profanity as a crutch.
The inmate I mentioned did his crime when he was a teenager and he was in his mid thirties before he paroled out. To protect his identity I will call him D. When D came into the system he was illiterate. He took advantage of one of the programs at our institution and tutors worked with him for two or three years. In a few years D had his GED and by the time he paroled out he had taken every class offered by the Education program in the institution. D is way above average intelligence in my opinion and he has had to overcome some tremendous obstacles. I know the attorney he is working for and he says D is an exemplary employee. I would not be surprised to see D make it as a stand up comedian in the future. Nebraska is the home of Larry The Cable Guy. If a so called "Nebraska Red Neck" can make it in the comedy business, why not a "Black Ex Con from Nebraska? Believe it or not there is a lot of good material for humor behind bars. Most ex cons HAVE to have a sense of humor to make it behind bars. The same applies to those of us in charge of watching them.
Totally agree that some people use profanity as a crutch.
That being said, a well placed "DAMN IT!" feels mighty good sometimes.
BTW, my dad was a truck driver and he never, ever cursed. I heard him say "damn it" one time - he was fixing the dishwasher and raised up and smacked his head. Other than that, I never heard anything stronger than "holy cats!" out of him.
Well, yes, passive vocabulary is way larger than active. English is my second language and it makes me sad I can't seem to retain as much info and as many words as I'd like. There are words I recognize, but haven't heard pronounced. No offense, but I had more fancy words in my vocabulary before I ever moved here. After figuring out most people wouldn't understand them even if I knew them and noticing they're not really being used, my stash quietly died a slow death little by little. I suppose mingling with a different crowd can enhance one's vocabulary... On the other hand, I don't particularly care for pretentious people who you feel take their time to choose the most sophisticated word for show-off purposes. Many times I'm just tempted to finish their sentences as they take forever.
I agree, good grammar and a varied vocabulary is great in any setting. What I had hoped to illustrate in my previous post was the fact that PROFANITY is not necessary to show displeasure with another person.
Wife: You son of a biscuit-eating bulldog!
Husband: What the french, toast?
Wife: Did you think I wouldn't find out about your little doo-doo head cootie queen?
Mistress: Who are YOU callin' a "cootie queen," you lint-licker!
Wife (to Mistress): Pickle you, kumquat!
Husband (shielding Mistress): You're over-reacting!
Wife: No, Bill. Over-reacting was when I put your convertible into a wood chipper, Stinky McStinkface!
Mistress: You hoboken!
Just cracks me up every time.
I wish I were the type of person who would be that creative under pressure, but I'm not. In a situation like the one in the video, I'm sure I'd revert to the standard four-letter words. Ordinarily, though, I'm not a big cusser at all.
Regarding more conventional vocabulary.... I'm the type of word nerd who will look a word up in the dictionary, get distracted, and spend the next 30 minutes reading the dictionary with a highlighter in my hand, marking words that are new-to-me. I'm always looking for words to add to my personal lexicon. When I read and discover a new word, I savor it like a piece of fine chocolate.
My funny vocab story is that a year or so ago I came across this new word, AMANUENSIS. It means secretary or personal assistant...more or less. I have a coworker who is a fellow word-nerd and we send each other emails when we discover new words, so I dutifully sent that one to him. He responded back with a thumbs-up. That day, I was preparing a package to mail to him and I jotted my name above the company's return address, as I always do. I wrote N. Bergin - Amanuensis. And then drew a little smiley face. It was a joke because at the time I was the "secretary/assistant" for that group. The amanuensis. See? A week or so later, the guy called to go over something work-related, and he told me that he'd walked into the kitchen a couple days before and his wife had said, "You didn't tell me Nifty got married!" And my coworker looked at her with this blank look on his face. "She didn't." But the wife was insistent. "Yeah, she did...to some Greek guy! Didn't you notice she wrote her new name on the package she sent you? See? N. Bergin-Amanuensis!"
I was in hysterics. So funny. "Yeah, she did...to some GREEK guy!"
Last edited by Niftybergin; 06-26-2009 at 10:45 PM..
I wish I were the type of person who would be that creative under pressure, but I'm not. In a situation like the one in the video, I'm sure I'd revert to the standard four-letter words. Ordinarily, though, I'm not a big cusser at all. . . .
My funny vocab story is that a year or so ago I came across this new word, AMANUENSIS. It means secretary or personal assistant...more or less. I have a coworker who is a fellow word-nerd and we send each other emails when we discover new words, so I dutifully sent that one to him. He responded back with a thumbs-up. That day, I was preparing a package to mail to him and I jotted my name above the company's return address, as I always do. I wrote N. Bergin - Amanuensis. And then drew a little smiley face. It was a joke because at the time I was the "secretary/assistant" for that group. The amanuensis. See? A week or so later, the guy called to go over something work-related, and he told me that he'd walked into the kitchen a couple days before and his wife had said, "You didn't tell me Nifty got married!" And my coworker looked at her with this blank look on his face. "She didn't." But the wife was insistent. "Yeah, she did...to some Greek guy! Didn't you notice she wrote her new name on the package she sent you? See? N. Bergin-Amanuensis!"
I was in hysterics. So funny. "Yeah, she did...to some GREEK guy!"[/quote]"
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Your Amanuensis story is the perfect example of what I meant.
BTW I love those OBIT gum commercials. Am I the only one that thinks that the writers on some of our popular TV shows need to take lessons from the writers of some of the best commercials on TV?
The OBIT gum and Budweiser writers , among others, are really talented.
I do volunteer work for our States Public Library Commission.
One of the ladies I work with related a bad experience she had using her "spell checker" on her word processor. She was elected to do the invitations to a Library Commission event that would be attended by various VIP's up to the Governor and members of our Unicameral and US Congress.
Since the Commission is always on a tight budget she decided to do everything "in house" except the printing. She worked long and hard getting the just right touches and when the deadline was near she did a final spell check of her document and sent it off to the printers.
Imagine her chagrin when the first line of the invitation read:
THE NEBRASKA PUBIC LIBRARY COMMISSION. . ."
GL2
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