Focus 580; The English Language

Good morning welcome to focus 580 our morning talk show. My name is David Enge. Glad to have you with us. We're welcoming back this morning to the program Dennis Baron. He's professor of English at University of Illinois and every once in a while he's here and we talk about language and we have talked about a number of things including how language changes over time how people resist that change. We have talked about efforts that people have made deliberate efforts that people have made to change language which interestingly I'm not often fails. We have talked and we have also given people the opportunity to call in and complain and complain about misuse of language which is something that you may do as well. And also if you have questions about grammar proper usage any and all of those things are certainly welcome. The number here in Champaign Urbana 3 3 3 9 4 5 5. We do also have a toll free line that is good anywhere that you can hear us and that he's 800 to 2 2 9 4 5 5 so either

way if you're here in Champaign Urbana 3 3 3 9 4 5 5 and anywhere else that you may be listening around Illinois and Indiana. Even if you were listening on the internet as long as you are in the United States 800 to 2 2 9 4 5 5 calls are welcome. Good to have you here once again thank you for going to be here David. At about this time I think if we've talked in the past around the end of the year we sometimes we have talked about the idea of the word or phrase word here yeah. Have you given some thought to the have were here for 10 days and I have I have my my own ward when are my you know I have them. Please word of the earth if I make a ripping paper sounds right. Yeah it's actually a phrase I mean let me back up a little and we can talk about the word of the Year award as I see it the word of the Year Award is given to that word which best represents the spirit of the times and the State of the English language and things like that. Some people

prefer to give the award to a brand new word. Which sort of limits here your scope a little bit. So anyway without further ado by my word of the year for last year by the way it was manned cow mad cow is that indeed one words that it was OK. Yeah yeah okay so I would I would say which is in the new word or phrase but I call it I call in you know at some point phrases solidify into words occasionally. So bookcase used to be two words and now it's one firehouse those sorts of things you know. Website is still two words but people think of it as as a unit. OK so mad cow which of course is now in the news again but my word of the year for this year is a roadside bomb

roadside bomb you think that's going to be your word for 2005 word for 2004. OK well this isn't your respective Oh I say awards like the Oscars. You know it's given for the word of the previous year. I just feel like that word that phrase epitomizes the kind of things that have been on our minds for much of the 2000 and for of course the word of the year. I mean I I made that choice. But we can have to go now since then we may have been preempted by tsunami. Oh so you know I'm I'm willing to rethink that but. Well I don't want to pick a roadside bomb as opposed to some of the other similar words I mean a new word and the word goes back 20 or 30 years.

There's car bomb and suicide bomber. Those all go back. A suicide bomber goes back to the 1940s actually. And then of course there is the umbrella term improvised explosive device IED. But it just doesn't have the ring of word of the year to it. And Sue I mean there's a certain amount of irony in picking a roadside bomb because I think it embodies the kind of specific imagery we think of a roadside rest. It used to be the name of you know motels back in the days of when Alfred Hitchcock was making psycho road stay and the roadside market those those kinds of things and combined with the kind of surprising. The climactic effect of the bomb which.

Anyway that's that's right now. Now let me say that other people picked different words Merriam-Webster selected its word of the year for 2004 by doing an internet poll and everyone logging on to the Merriam-Webster website was given the opportunity to select their word of the year and they picked blog. I thought that that might be a word that would be yeah. Some people say yeah yeah and of course that's that is that's on a lot of people's lists too. And interestingly enough the folks at what's called Lake Superior the Unicorn at least for your state St. Paul College Yes the ones who publish a list of words that need to be banned from English blog is their word that needs to be manned That's their number one fan word so they're in absolute opposition to the Merriam-Webster choice what is it they have

against it. They don't like the sound of it. They they're nasty people then just talk about curmudgeon. And we if you like it if you like it they won't they won't let us. That's pretty arrogant there's land there. They're against anything that anybody likes to do. Well. It was you know they were listening. I would like to call in and nominate a word for yeah or or anything else that you know let's settle this let's make a democratic you know what I want I'm just one little voice here we have a caller already in Champaign on line one. Hello. Oh yes. Good morning. Yes. And at this point in time I'd like to ask you for phrases. Yes their game this morning. Sure yeah. Well you remember that. I think it was President Nixon who became famous for this point at this point right. Right. I detected some irony as you began your state and you had of course

being a you know with roughly half of the country for you and against you if you're a president you can get a lot of ridicule when you come up with something that means now. And but now we have a new phrase out there that's beginning to drive me up the wall. You know unfortunately I don't think it was coined by. President so there probably won't be a lot of funny back life although I could certainly if I was a cartoonist I could have a ball with this one. Yeah that is on the ground on the ground. You media politicians boots everybody is running all over the world to see what's going on the ground what's happening on the ground. And I can just picture them you know that. Secretary of State leading a commission over to somewhere yet to see what's on the ground. Of course you know they're all crawling around with their noses in the dirt. So you think that one will ever die or will you just do it forever

to hear that throw up. Yeah these these things go in Thad's people will get tired of it after a while don't forget we had boots on the ground. For quite a while in what's that boots on the ground means actual soldiers in place. All the criticism was made is we didn't have enough boots on the ground you need more boots on the receiver Well there was a lot of a lot of talk about that and yes that's what Dennis says it means we just somebody said we didn't have enough people there in one piece. I mean you have any idea when this winds to first emerge. Oh no no no no no. I've heard it rarely in the past years or two ago but it's become such a fad that even NPR. People use the phrase Oh yeah yeah it has been they're not quoting somebody else. Which of course they are. They're stuck doing that if people people use it when they mean reality as

opposed to you know what you think might be happening someplace. You know this is this is the eyewitness. The you know the you are there not in the year. It's not in the war. None in the waters not under the ground. Certainly it's on the on the ground. Well anyway that's my nomination for 2008. Actually it's been around in 2000 and for a lot of compete there too. Sure I have expense it's going to get worse. Well I'll be listening to this show and enjoy hearing the professional side of the language talked about. Thank you very much for the program. All right well thanks for the call. Good morning we have some others that Dennis Baron as our guest is Professor of English at the University of Illinois and occasionally is here we talk about language about use about misuse if you have questions about grammar. Those are welcome if you have complaints. Those are welcome and of course we're talking a little bit about the word of the year something that people in Dennis's business have been

thinking about for a while looking at words that are frequently used as he said beginning sometimes people pick words that are new and others that it's just words that seem to express the the spirit is I got a psych Geist he's a man who's been to college. Yeah. Probably quite a bit of it too. Yeah but as much as you can get him right. 3 3 3 9 4 5 5 toll free 800 to 2 2 9 4 5 5. Here's color in Urbana 1 2 0 0 0. Yes I've never heard of the word God. What is it. OK a blog is. In a web it's a blend of web as in Internet World Wide Web and log as in a diary. So a Web log or blog is a kind of web based diary where people record

their daily thoughts. That's correct and that's from the web log. Yeah yeah that's what we call a blend what that's about. From me. Exactly. Thank you. All right thank you. And it's a very popular form of web communication now. It's a new genre as email was a new genre when it arose as instant messaging was a news Jonna when a rose in the latest genre of electronic genres is the Web blog or the blog. It's proving immensely popular. Who would think that if you just wrote whatever you felt like saying every day and published it so anybody could see it that anybody would actually want to read it. But in fact what the

Internet shows us is that if you write something and put it out there somebody is going to read it and respond to it. All right well let's go on then. To a caller in Indiana Dan Savage's Yes that could have well been No I well I guess I'm not maybe I'm being are we getting old is that a rhetorical question the answer is yes yes yes we are. I don't do you don't have a blog to go no no no. Whose time exactly is time who has time to write them. I mean you know my my initial thought was you know you have a blog or you have a life but apparently people can do both. All right let's go to let's go to Indiana I'm not so sure well he'll learn number four. Hello. We are getting absolutely. Go ahead. Beats It beats the alternative right so my father always said. I was interested in the blog mainly of whether the web log

going to blog follows you know normal rules telescoping words and things like that or whether this is a new baby step so to speak. Yeah it does in a way. Blends usually take the beginnings of the first word and part of the second word and join them together. But there are examples I can think of another person going blank at the mo and maybe some of our listeners can can think of examples. I can't think of an example of a blend where you take the end of the of the first part and and to the beginning of the second part. But certainly clipping the beginnings of words is common as well so that we have softer pizza in

rents for parents and things like that kind of slang expressions. Is there someone who has gotten the credit for coining this. I mean we don't know. I know I haven't I haven't seen it tell people who would claim and that often happens that somebody claims to have done the first blog and probably people started these things before they had the name and the name came later to sort of define what was going on I'm not sure about that even. But it you know it certainly snuck up on me. I wasn't quite aware of it as it was starting out. But soon after that when people began talking about it I took a look at it and to see what was going on and I said Who would want to read this stuff and you know what's best depends on who is whose blog we're talking about. Sure. I mean obviously there are ones that are more popular than others but I mean some of them are I understand from what I read about blogs that the most popular other

politically oriented ones. And in fact some of the newspapers have blogs I know the guardian over in England has its own blog. And you know individuals have their more associated with individuals though. And then when there is a there is a language blog called Language Log which I just discovered last week. Which is post it's not quite the same thing it's not the rantings of an individual but it's collections of comments about language from many many different people. So in the blog the diary kind of blog they're often interactive where some money creates a narrative in every day add something to it and readers can respond and I suppose you can follow those responses by following links to them. Sorry what's next champagne. The caller's next line number one. Hello. I'm very interested in the language and language usage

also and I cull most of my information from written media like newspaper and magazines not noticing and I've noticed a certain trend and writing in which language has become more colloquial. The level of vocabulary that is used as descriptive of heavily that is at a much lower level than say what would normally be found in articles or even of the newspaper. You know a couple of decades ago. I don't. Could you comment. Sure. Sure. Yeah I think journalistic writing has become more colloquial as as you look at it over the course of the centuries and certainly as in today's a lot of today's newspapers. There is an attempt to be done simply colloquial but consciously engaging humor

in in straight news. We know what would otherwise have been straight news articles you will find a certain amount of wit rhetorical wit and a dizzying meanness that didn't used to be there and I have a feeling that this is you know almost consciously cultivated by the newspapers to sell papers to grab readers as a response to the decline in newspaper circulation. How are we going to make newspapers more attractive to readers in the face of competition from other media. Particularly the 24 hour news stations first on radio and now on television. So I think that's part of the explanation there's also a general trend for written language to become somewhat more informal over the course of you know the last

50 60 years in newspapers in certain kinds of periodicals. So there's of those two kinds of things are at work you'll see sentences a bit shorter than than they were 100 years ago in these kinds of print media. And I was interested in your characterization of the vocabulary as being at a lower level now. What do you mean by that. Well I guess that if I were to take a study you know and you know that's the kind of a cover that. There are certain types of sports that are used to describe certain acts that are or seems that there would be a repetition of a cover that rather than a proliferation of different kinds of sports described the same sort of thing. OK and so I would say that the words are more commonly

easier to understand and it's. Maybe I was reading an article about presidential speeches for example and that comparing the grade level the educational level of the day to the cabbies are you and the Kennedy debate Kennedy-Nixon debate was that a 12th grade level and the last presidential debate. The education level required to understand that if they was that an eighth grade level. That's what I would what I mean you know there's been a lot of comment about particularly public political discourse about its sort of dumbing down. That's one of the things that you sometimes hear said about it that it's not as lofty as it used to be. I think it depends who's talking to

you. Maybe they don't want to go there. Do you think. Problematic is it to have a man or two. Is it is it is it may be evidence of a kind of anti-intellectual ism in American public discourse. Right. Just calling it public discourse rather than undercuts that. Well wondering if it is a reflection of maybe a change in direction in education and or you know is there is there are negative side effects to this long her or is it something that was just a you know another trend will come forward. Here's what I think. OK what are the things that you also see going on in particular political discourse is

the impact of market research on what politicians say to the point where they actually try out different vocabulary on audiences. Rate the response and tell and you know the researchers tell the politician which word to you which of a group of synonyms to use which of which sort of expression to use as a way of winning. Audience favor. Now that seems to me to be more insidious then and you know any sort of overall linguistic trend. I mean this is this is you know this is a very subtle manipulation of the of the public mind rather than just whether you know what whether you're doing something that sounds lofty with lots of you know

figures of speech and things like that or something that sounds more folksy. So it's the attempt to you know kind of of marketing the political sphere that are much much in the same way that we market products. Well thank you very much. I'd like to talk to you more but I'm sure there are other people waiting for you. Oh fair question but I'll continue That's right. Well thanks for the call. And I think on previous programs I've asked questions about what we know about over time. What what would the average number of words right person would know and first of all you said well that's a very difficult question is a difficult answer but I seem to recall also you're saying that you're not you're not sure that the vote the average person's vocabulary necessarily in terms of the number of words one knows has has declined

and there's no there's nothing to suggest that that is the case. So if that was an implication of the caller's question that we simply know fewer words. I don't think that's actually what's going on I don't think that our our word Horde is becoming impoverished. What if you want to look at it as as impoverishment it's what we select from it that you know we are selecting perhaps some kinds of things that people say we didn't used to be selecting and aiming for certain kinds of effects that we weren't looking for in the pain. Do you think that in everyday conversation the number of words used or word variety is less now than in the past or is that again of those questions that you have said well how do you how do you want to but yeah I mean I know

in you know with that caveat that we don't really have. Have a good way of quantifying it. I would say that there are no indicators to suggest that it's less. I mean everybody complains about people who who they know who use certain words over and over again to the point that it drives you nuts. And then they say well this is an indication that that person has an impoverished vocabulary or has a small vocabulary. I don't know that that's necessarily follows. Just because you select certain words from what you know to use doesn't mean that you don't know the other. It just means that you don't use the other words why you don't use them is another reason that you know you have to figure out. Our guest in this hour folks 580 Dennis baronies professor of English at the University of Illinois we're

talking about language questions and comments are welcome We have several By the way before we get too far away from the discussion of the blog. Our Web czar John Brightman was listening and he says you know W while O has a blog do we do you do us. We do. W w w dot will blog orgy. So if you're interested in what goes on in that blog you know you looked at you know I don't have time. No i too busy doing this goofy program. No I have no idea. OK because I've never heard it mentioned on air. I mean I do listen to la Well I think and I'm sure that Jack would agree that probably we don't make enough mention on air of the fact that we have the website and about the kind of material it's available we do get what you're thinking about here about the website archives here we have on there but. But there are other things associated with their website so. OK so you want to know what a blog is go Checco the station's website which is held at UIUC dot edu. And we also have a lot of information

there we have every day there's a weather forecast there. There are web archives there are some other material there so I'm sure that from the website you can get to the blog and you can make a pledge and you can even make a pledge. What a guy would have thunk. That's why we keep asking him back here. Let's go to Bloomington Illinois on line three. Hello. Well yes I have a question about the specific word. Yes. The usage of it should always concern me I guess in a kind of a minor way because it doesn't seem appropriate. The word proactive to me it should be pronounced or should the prefix should be pretty active but it's almost universally applied and if you think about proactive it means you're in favor of action and it's usually meant is usually used for an activity that is action in advance of some thing. Do you find that when you give a note that.

Well I at that particular point never occurred to me. So what I would say just off the top of my head in in response is that pretty active doesn't necessarily imply a connection between what goes before where is and the action that you're focusing on where is proactive establishes a direct connection where what comes first sort of paves the way for the action precipitates it is is looks toward it which which is essentially the kind of sense that you get with the prefix pro toward inf in favor of four whereas previous simply before without any particular connection other than a chronological one so that's my guess is why that that word does what it does say. Sorry you don't like it.

Oh I know that's a possible explanation actually although I use almost it's used a lot. To my ear used a lot of people on issues kind of indiscriminately. They don't always refine it to the extent that you have in you know we're going to do something in it before something else and usually you want to be proactive so that you do something so that something else doesn't happen. You know write to any then wasn't you thing you know in a preventive measure. It's also used to imply that you know I'm going to be proactive about something and it's a state of it's a quality that people have yeah he's a very proactive guy. Exactly and what does it mean yes. That doesn't define well plus it often is not precise enough because what they really mean is that they're going to pre act on some particular point. So anyway it just yeah you could not even find the word pre-action in the dictionary.

I've never heard of it. Yeah I mean well it's not that I know it's used in a technical sense by people who do fire sprinkler systems there's a valve called pre-action valve in it. OK that's a technical term. You know it well it is used technically of course but in fire protection you don't want to be proactive you definitely want to be preemptive anyway. Well I appreciate your reflection on. All right well thank you for the go. Let us go to another listener hears this. Someone in Chicago it's Lie number two. Yeah I'm with a guy with a cover but I want to. Very nicely let me tell you I'm a lady who would speak and I think that she is a you know a product of her environment I think that is what she is probably dealing with you know cheers rather than saying you know be you know making a complete statement and say you know appreciate a lot of words. I'll have a think. But my question is I want to ask you this Professor. Yes. Why is there so many talented people and I mean the learned people if you ask them a question the first thing out of their mouth and I'm going to hang up and ask

you a question is that I myself. Why is it that they always come up with those double pronouns. OK I don't know if you noticed that and I well I've certainly heard things like that and I don't notice serve as being overly used by myself thing. You know a politician is you know you know it I mean I myself think yeah I use a personal pronoun so why do you use the my style you know that if you're not quite that well I don't know I don't know that. When you used to protests like that it's kind of emphatic. But I think the caller has got something here because when people say I myself think that X is true or not true are they in fact. Isolating themselves and almost saying well you know you may not agree with me maybe most

people won't agree with me. Call me crazy but you know is it a way of saying you know this may be just one person's little opinion. Here is a way of almost using emphasis to de-emphasize the truth of what they're about to say that was a kind of a modest display of modesty ploy because if you say I think whatever it is it's almost like that's the stronger it's much stronger you know. So yeah the cooler has really got something that it's interesting it's a little rhetorical gimmick to say well you know you know to sort of de-emphasize the speaker which again may in turn serve to emphasize the fact that you know I'm being modest about it but really I think this is this is true or are as you say that we just might not agree with you might agree with or they could simply you know I'm no expert. You know so this is just a guess. So I mean it could serve either of those purposes as in my my guess about

Proactiv because I really was just you know sort of this is what it looks like it means but I really don't know the history of the usage of the word I don't have to look it up and look at the citations and and check. But I myself think that that's a plausible explanation for it. I think the caller for the call. Not that I've invited something of an answer. Not that I'm known for being modest. But he is known and known for a lot of things he's known for being professor of English at university level and he's known for you know being on the show now and again he's known for being Dennis Baron and is here to talk about language 3 3 3 9 4 5 5 toll free 800 to 2 2 9 4 5 5. Those are the numbers to call if you'd like to join us we have about 20 minutes left. We have other callers as well. And let us talk next with someone in I think another Chicago caller. That's right line for Chicago hello.

Hello Happy New Year. Thank you. I wanted to just continue ahead of the work for 2004 my work. I myself what I think if we can go on with that. But you said that it didn't the lack of vocabulary or using only a few words it wasn't a poverty of vocabulary not necessarily. Yes but I was wondering if it doesn't create a poverty of imagination because in the. Russian's words create pictures and if you're using the same words and not trying new words or using new combinations of words. I think for the listener and for your listeners plural over time there's going to be a poverty of imagination. I think the word pictures would diminish so to to extend that thought English happens to have by historical accident and propensity for borrowing. One of the largest the largest vocabulary of any of the world's languages we have close to half a million words in the English language now

most people don't know all of those words and many of them are old fashion or very specialized and so on but we do know you know a significant subset of the words the average person now a language like French or Japanese or Chinese has had has far far fewer words you know maybe half as many does that mean if they have you know a reduced option in terms of synonyms of alternate ways of saying the same thing does that mean that follow from what you said that speakers of those languages have impoverished imagination I wouldn't think so. I don't think. It's so much the number of words. I think it's always the combination you know like when you're. That's what poets do that's what writers do when they describe a scene. If you always talk about a dreary cold night and not try to use other adjectives it's always the combination I think the total number

isn't going to be the effect. But I think what we see in our conversations today is that the we are always using the same adjectives almost. Simply awesome. It's what I've heard but that's not the word for 2000 and for my word for 2000 and for word the bad or actually the phrase the bad guys the bad guys. I thought that was horrible horrible enough when I heard sergeants talking to their privates. But it gets worse when the reporter started to use that phrase and the pentacle or is it the nadir I guess would be when analysts and Ph.D.s would come on to explain the situation and use the term the bad guys. They were supposed to be making everything clearer for us I think that that has to be for me. 2004 was the year of the bad guys and the deterioration of any type of true analysis in the US.

OK. Sure you have nothing to add. I got nothing to say. The bad guys the bad guys. Yeah I mean it just didn't strike me is a phrase that was in the air. Obviously it struck you that way and not that. It's troubling to me because of the the people who are you sure. One soldier a Ph.D. and says I'm I'm on this program because you want to know what the situation is in whatever place because they were just using it in a rap but then it became common to use it in any situation. And I've heard people use and referring to the Sudan as well and they say we're here and what I'm going to I'm here and I'm going to explain to you what's going on. You know I'm the bad guy and Lang tells us an awful lot. Yeah you know in my phrasing and you know and anyone I mean I don't ever remember that happening before 2004 and I don't watch a lot of the shows I mean one because it's like it is part of The Daily Show

to those kinds of commentary. And so I you know I. Well I think that I think the listeners heard at least once someone who was a guest on this program used the phrase and in fact I think she called up and called the guy on it and I think he did a he didn't quite get it. OK heat I think he quite understood her concern and I certainly understand her concern going back I think to your comment about an earlier comment about political discourse and how often it's rather than making things more clear and more understandable. It seems sometimes that is the goal to make things secure enough to. Yeah indeed. And sure and the common complaint about political discourse that it obscures more than it illuminates But so then my question is but isn't that the goal. Fred shouldn't be but shouldn't be. Yes but you know the goal of a lot of our discourse is to hide things rather than to make this clear. So it's you know I guess what I'm

saying is don't blame the language. But people are using the language to secure certain ends. And and that's what we need to look at is what you know what's what's underlying what's the goal here. Well I mean if you can obscure things by as the caller said you can obscure things implied by by being very simple like the bad guys is just you know it's one of these words from that that calls up you know than the 19 from 30s and 40s Western Hollywood Western you know would that the good guys and the bad guys or the or the crime movie or or that sort of thing where everything is black and white were you know it's clear cut who's who's who you root for and who you want to see put down. And by oversimplifying we can obscure it by using complex hard to fathom discourse we can obscure. So it's not just the language that does it. It's

how you use the language. I think that I think that your point exactly. Exactly. Thank you for your call and we would hope that the callers would continue to try to demand clarity and Russ let out of the guest if it's possible make me say something exact you can understand because you know because if you don't twist his arm. Yeah just go on forever. Exactly. To another caller Banna line one. I think you should say something more importantly. That's my favorite this year. Well actually it's been going on longer than that. Do you think that more important has been completely replaced by more important ways so that everybody you know in a more prosperous. Well yeah I think it's kind of overshadowed I used to I used to be a big defender of more important than try to use it every chance they get and point out that you know you don't need to say more

importantly but nobody listens to me and that's in my and I myself probably use more importantly although I can sort of feel it when I use it will make you cringe inside you know it doesn't make me cringe inside nor does it make the hair on my arm stand up as well if that's this one but it's a black eye for her. I bought a book for me. Yeah but I bought books for she and I. OK you have that you know that I can't believe the people who did it. Yeah a lot of people do that. And it's it's a very common usage now and has been for 20 30 years. That was oh yeah oh yeah it's been tracked between you and i phenomenon is is just fair and you know everybody says between you and I would not make a mistake if they said you know some

other other phrases become idiomatic. Well I'm asked to do that. The example I gave you I think right. Just terrible because how can you say for sure. Right. I know I know people do. People do. There is a kind of rule of language usage that says sense always trumps grammar. I would put that in that category. It's you know it's a way that people use of I think trying to make sense out of it that you know the other thing that's operating here is as people get confused by grammatical rules that they're taught specifically do this don't do that. And so there's a lot of that that goes on with propositions and so one of the common explanations for those kinds of

phenomena is that teachers instill in people of the fear that when they put put it down after Proposition A pronoun after a preposition they're going to put it in the wrong form because they're predisposed to do that and so they hyper correct they over correct. Yes I think. Hyper corrective. That's well put. That's the sense I get. And for that that might be the explanation but I think between you and I has gone beyond beyond that and that has become an idiom in English idioms are notoriously free from grammatical cost constraints. They operate on their own terms and went out in the yeah they do they do. I mean that's what it is you know there are little you know who nuggets of language the mis folded pronouns if you will. Well some people react to them as if they were. I make holes in your brain to harken back to the

last caller. Yeah we like that heart rate. I was I think perhaps even more appalled with the use of bad guys when we were free referring to either red or blue states. But I will let you proceed. You're doing a marvelous job. Thank you. Thank you for the go. The next caller is in Champagne and that would be line number three. Hello hello. Yes I have a word to suggest for a word of the year but I think it will come in the future at some time. But I think that it will happen when enough people hear this word because it's a very good word to describe what's happened to most people at some time or other. And that is best in the media. This is in Egypt.

It's when you go into a room and forget what you came in for. I license as I said you were it's a subset of amnesia. It is accident and it's a kind of senior moment. Write a post. But it happens to people who are not seniors too right. I mean I want universal. I recall that you mean many many years ago that would happen to me too. But you know is it something to worry about is it you know do you stop eating beef if that happens to you a lot. Oh I guess so yeah. The word that describes what happens to everybody in time. OK I think in some future year man it becomes better known that it might be the word of the year. Yeah well the question is. Right the question is how do you make it better known. I mean people coin words all the time and they say this it would be a great word. You know they're going to talk you phony talk shows you get your word out there

I and you know it is a kind of marketing that's running if people you know every every language change starts you know is this like a genetic mutation starts somewhere and it either goes someplace or it doesn't. OK well maybe we'll start there right now. OK I'll do that. OK thank you very much. Sense to me more like the name of a movie. Well see Destiny destiny No I have to wait till it comes out on DVD and yes Edgar County is next line number four. Hello good morning. Yes this weekend I've been reading Harold Holt seriously going to Cooper Union which I sent you and I are the same business of rhetoric. I highly recommend. And in his speech at Cooper Union who use the expression that right makes might. It's interesting that in the final letter that John wrote. Booth I

used wrote to his mother the afternoon before he went towards the other. He wrote that might makes right. Do you think this applies today. That might makes right. Well the or I mean that's how our Without you were talking about simple phrases. Now they can be used and misused. And could you talk a little more about that because in that culture where you're going with it. Well it's the fact that the linkage and developing his position regarding you know had I slavery at Cooper Union which was his launching you know for his presidential campaign basically

said that we were right and therefore we're strong and that and inverted it. You know it's just he inverted on its right head. When do we do that with expressions you mean to well I'm sure I'm right there. We have done that in the past three years. Well certainly some people would see it that way. You know I mean this is this is this is politics. Right. This is what I assume you're alluding to that if if you're strong therefore you must have you know be on the right side you must be one of the good guys rather than one of the one of the bad guys. I mean but this is what we argue about always. You know but I just I just thought it was it was.

I was reading this book. It was interesting though its interest is most interesting. I happened to be doing some research on autographs which sounds like a totally off topic kind of subject because I was doing something about signatures and and you know how they authenticate documents. And I happen to come across the information. I happen to see it in the in the newspaper in the times I think it was a couple of. Maybe it was a month ago. Now there was a John Wilkes Booth letter that brought a record price at auction I don't remember that was the Boston auction. Yeah yeah I forget what you remember what the figure was for that it was it was something like 65 to 85 thousand. Yeah this is not really high and I noticed and I had been looking at what people pay for autographs and so that

story came while I was was thinking about that I noticed that people pay a lot more for a booth autograph than they do for a Lincoln autograph. Well it's more rare. That's right they're more rare but they're not in the right makes might cents worth as much as I would like to know where that where that letter that he wrote to his mother is in the archives I have no idea what servers and the idea that it's interesting but it's an interesting rhetorical inversion rocket that he's using. Well I'm going to have. I appreciate the caller's thoughts and I'm going to have to jump in here and apologize to the last person we have because we're out of time and we'll have to stop for this time around with the promise that I'm sure in another day Dennis will come back we'll do it again thank you very much. Thank you.