And here is the Wannaskan Almanac for Word-Wednesday, July 11, 2018, brought to you by Earl's Drive-In, A classic 1950's drive-in restaurant, complete with carhop service! Serving hot, fresh, delicious made-to-order food by the tub and tasty ice cream desserts for over 60 years. 1001 3rd St NE, Roseau, MN 56751.
July 11 is the 192nd day of the year, with 173 days remaining until the end of the year, and 264 days remaining until April Fools Day.
Earth/Moon Almanac for July 11, 2018
Sunrise: 5:20am; Sunset: 9:27pm
Moonrise: 4:12pm Moonset: 6:48pm, waning crescent
Temperature Almanac for July 11, 2018
Average Record Today
High 78 96 90
Low 57 37 64
July 11 Celebrations from National Day Calendar
National Cheer Up The Lonely Day
National Rainier Cherry Day
National Blueberry Muffin Day
All American Pet Photo Day
National Mojito Day
National 7-Eleven Day
July 11 Word Riddle
I am five letter word that is under you.
If you remove my 1st letter, then I am over you.
If you remove my 1st and 2nd letters than I am all around you.
Who am I?*
July 11 Notable historic events, literary or otherwise, from On This Day
July 11 is the 192nd day of the year, with 173 days remaining until the end of the year, and 264 days remaining until April Fools Day.
Earth/Moon Almanac for July 11, 2018
Sunrise: 5:20am; Sunset: 9:27pm
Moonrise: 4:12pm Moonset: 6:48pm, waning crescent
Temperature Almanac for July 11, 2018
Average Record Today
High 78 96 90
Low 57 37 64
July 11 Celebrations from National Day Calendar
National Cheer Up The Lonely Day
National Rainier Cherry Day
National Blueberry Muffin Day
All American Pet Photo Day
National Mojito Day
National 7-Eleven Day
July 11 Word Riddle
I am five letter word that is under you.
If you remove my 1st letter, then I am over you.
If you remove my 1st and 2nd letters than I am all around you.
Who am I?*
July 11 Notable historic events, literary or otherwise, from On This Day
- 1533 Pope Clement VII excommunicates England's King Henry VIII
- 1818 English poet John Keats, In the Cottage Where Burns is Born, Lines Written in the Highlands, and Gadfly
- 1877 Kate Edger becomes New Zealand’s first woman graduate and first woman in the British Empire to earn a Bachelor of Arts
- 1905 Black intellectuals and activists lead by W.E.B. Du Bois organize the civil rights Niagara Movement
- 1960 Czechoslovakia adopts Constitution
- 1960 To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee is first published
- 1961 Gene Kiniski beats Verne Gagne in Minneapolis, to become NWA champ
July 11 author/artist birthdays, from On This Day
- 1899 E. B. White, Charlotte's Web, Elements of Style
- 1987 Matej Gaspar, Yugoslavia, Earth's 5,000,000,000th person designated by the United Nations
Words I looked up this week: compossibility, coopportunity, deracinate, libtard, mafted, relict, verbena
Inspired by John McWhorter's Aspen Ideas Festival address this year, "Adjusting to Modernity in American English", today's edition of Wannaskan Almanac Word-Wednesday explores the ways that different authors may (or may not) wish to be woke to "correct" usage. Language usage has always been a fluid, socially designated process of "standardization", but since 2009, social media increasingly favor the authority of speaker/user groups over academia and dictionaries. In other words, once a person establishes a social media platform [@realDonaldTrump, #metoo, @jmcdonnell123], that person may successfully sway the minds and usage of followers.
The exception - of course - would be poets, whose usage is always true and standard. Otherwise, writers of prose fiction [all genres] and nonfiction [scientific, political, polemical], will be more effective if woke to correctness as interpreted by different reader subclasses. An author of fiction writing for millennials will want to accurately represent the word choices of different generations of characters that move the narrative. An author of nonfiction - actually or purportedly factual - will want to be woke to the entire range of reader word usage, especially for labels involving gender, ethnicity [race], political correctness, religious faith, urban vs. rural living, and of course, profanity.
For example, consider the word, chairman. The etymology of the word chairman dates back to the 1650s, first defined as an "occupier of a chair of authority," from chair (n.) + man (n.), and within 100 years coming to mean "member of a corporate body chosen to preside at meetings" by c. 1730. In current standard usage, a chairman is the highest officer of an organized group such as a board, a committee, or a deliberative assembly. The person holding the office is typically elected or appointed by the members of the group. The chairman presides over meetings of the assembled group and conducts its business in an orderly fashion. When the group is not in session, the officer's duties often include acting as its head, its representative to the outside world and its spokesperson. The evolving list of synonyms and alternative usages includes: chair, madame chairman, chairwoman, chairperson, president, leader, convener, spokesperson, spokesman, spokeswoman.
From A Year with Rilke, July 11 entry:
Transforming Dragons from Letters to a Young Poet
We have no reason to distrust our world, for it is not against us. If it has terrors, they are our terrors. If it has an abyss, it is ours. If dangers are there, we must try to love them. And if we would live with faith in the value of what is challenging, then what now appears to us as most alien will become our truest, most trustworthy friend. Let us not forget the ancient myths at the outset of humanity's journey, the myths about dragons that at the last moment transform into princesses. Perhaps all the dragons of our lives are princesses who are only waiting to see us act just once with beauty and courage. Perhaps every terror is, in its deepest essence, something that needs our recognition or help.
July 11 Pun
Be better than yesterday, find a new princess or prince today, and to stay out of trouble - at least until tomorrow.
*I'm a chair.
Inspired by John McWhorter's Aspen Ideas Festival address this year, "Adjusting to Modernity in American English", today's edition of Wannaskan Almanac Word-Wednesday explores the ways that different authors may (or may not) wish to be woke to "correct" usage. Language usage has always been a fluid, socially designated process of "standardization", but since 2009, social media increasingly favor the authority of speaker/user groups over academia and dictionaries. In other words, once a person establishes a social media platform [@realDonaldTrump, #metoo, @jmcdonnell123], that person may successfully sway the minds and usage of followers.
The exception - of course - would be poets, whose usage is always true and standard. Otherwise, writers of prose fiction [all genres] and nonfiction [scientific, political, polemical], will be more effective if woke to correctness as interpreted by different reader subclasses. An author of fiction writing for millennials will want to accurately represent the word choices of different generations of characters that move the narrative. An author of nonfiction - actually or purportedly factual - will want to be woke to the entire range of reader word usage, especially for labels involving gender, ethnicity [race], political correctness, religious faith, urban vs. rural living, and of course, profanity.
For example, consider the word, chairman. The etymology of the word chairman dates back to the 1650s, first defined as an "occupier of a chair of authority," from chair (n.) + man (n.), and within 100 years coming to mean "member of a corporate body chosen to preside at meetings" by c. 1730. In current standard usage, a chairman is the highest officer of an organized group such as a board, a committee, or a deliberative assembly. The person holding the office is typically elected or appointed by the members of the group. The chairman presides over meetings of the assembled group and conducts its business in an orderly fashion. When the group is not in session, the officer's duties often include acting as its head, its representative to the outside world and its spokesperson. The evolving list of synonyms and alternative usages includes: chair, madame chairman, chairwoman, chairperson, president, leader, convener, spokesperson, spokesman, spokeswoman.
From A Year with Rilke, July 11 entry:
Transforming Dragons from Letters to a Young Poet
We have no reason to distrust our world, for it is not against us. If it has terrors, they are our terrors. If it has an abyss, it is ours. If dangers are there, we must try to love them. And if we would live with faith in the value of what is challenging, then what now appears to us as most alien will become our truest, most trustworthy friend. Let us not forget the ancient myths at the outset of humanity's journey, the myths about dragons that at the last moment transform into princesses. Perhaps all the dragons of our lives are princesses who are only waiting to see us act just once with beauty and courage. Perhaps every terror is, in its deepest essence, something that needs our recognition or help.
July 11 Pun
Although their music was cutting hedge and highly sod after,
it was, unfortunately, only a topiary gig.
Be better than yesterday, find a new princess or prince today, and to stay out of trouble - at least until tomorrow.
*I'm a chair.
Yay...I guessed the riddle! Do I get a bucket of food from Earl's?
ReplyDeleteYOU WON A FRENCH FRY!
ReplyDeletePlease contact Kim for a great deal on craft beer to go with that fry.
Alas, viewing these other comments, I feel like I've come in the backdoor of a great party, just as everyone was leaving, only to find all the beer kegs empty and ten thousand peanut shells underfoot.
ReplyDelete