From: Chris Taylor (Christopher.Taylor@man.ac.uk)
Date: Thu 17 Apr 2003 - 11:41:40 GMT
And it's more that just 'daddio' for beatniks becoming 'man' for
hippies, or gay not meaning gay anymore...
Chris Taylor wrote:
> Hi. This is probably old stuff but I'd like to ask for opinions: It
> strikes me that (and perhaps I am being arrogant) I will cope with
> future language changes, in the sense of new idioms, neologisms both
> real and from hybridisation - e.g. fan-bloody-tastic something-a-rama or
> something-gate etc. etc. [there's a million and as usual I can't think
> of any good ones atm but bear with me] and of course eStuff :) and
> acronym-style abbreviations IIRC - better than my forebears because I
> _expect_ bits of words to be strapped together, adding bits of meaning
> to utterances composed on the fly. I'd expect that the pervasive media
> gives some of these constructs a launching platform, but the fact that
> almost everyone I know that is (with some exceptions) my age or less
> does this stuff completely independently all the time shows up (I think)
> a different approach to language these days (although of course we're
> still conveying the same content/meaning).
>
> So I guess my question is; has anyone related / discounted (in favour of
> a better reason) the change from print to electronic media to the change
> from what I can best describe as clonal to hybridising language
> evolution, on a timescale which has also changed from ages to realtime
> (as you would expect)? I see it as a paradigm thing - I (informally) use
> language (through analogy and hybrid words etc) in a different way -
> words are no longer the thing but sub-words (stems would be a good one,
> suffixes too) and I use them like lego.
>
> I just feel like I'm on the other side of a big change in language use
> and I don't think anything will turn up in the future which will baffle
> me the way my grandad (and even my mum) look baffled when I speak to
> them the way I would in casual peer conversation...
>
> Ok so that wasn't the clearest expression of it but I hope you get the
> gist. Tell me this was done and dusted by 1965 then :\
>
> Cheers, Chris.
>
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> Chris Taylor (chris@bioinf.man.ac.uk)
> http://bioinf.man.ac.uk/ »people»chris
> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>
>
> ===============================================================
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> see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit
>
-- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Chris Taylor (chris@bioinf.man.ac.uk) http://bioinf.man.ac.uk/ »people»chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ =============================================================== This was distributed via the memetics list associated with the Journal of Memetics - Evolutionary Models of Information Transmission For information about the journal and the list (e.g. unsubscribing) see: http://www.cpm.mmu.ac.uk/jom-emit
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