| Peculiarities of American English |
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Inhibited Americans, including all of Hollywood, use the popular word for one of the more pleasant human activities as a CURSE WORD !
That "fuck", "fucking", "fuck you" "motherfucker" etc. should be so frequently uttered as curses, is typical for a society sexually hampered by religion.
There is a fine example from my own country. In catholic central Switzerland "whore" is used as a curse-word in the form of a prefix to nouns: "Huere-Pleger", i.e. whore-rascal.
Why should I feel guilty for enjoying a film in which fellow adults are explicitly seen making love?
Religious hypocrits seem to dictate the self-censorship of the American film industry.
On the other hand, I am not asked to feel repulsed by watching their films of glorified war, thrilling murder and excessive violence!
Am I to understand that sex is amoral while killing and mutilating is not?
Only hypocrits could have invented the word Sex'N'Crime.
Obviously, it wants to unite two abominable activies into one word.
Every time I am exposed to sex'n'crime, I am reminded of my first visit to the United States.
In 1964, after only a fortnight in the country, I was the guest on a local radio show.
The interviewer opened with the inevitable question: "Felix, how do you like America?"
"It's great; much more freedom" said I, which is what he expected. It was also the truth - at the time!
I then ventured some criticism:
"What I find hard to understand, is that in the tv-ad for a brassière, the model may only be shown from the rear, or frontally with her arms crossed over her chest." (The bra was called "Cross-Your-Heart", by the way). "On the other hand", I continued, "blood, squirting out of a stabbed man's throat is not censored".
There were a few seconds of embarrassed silence.
The interviewer then regained control and ended the interview with:
"Thank you Felix, we hope to welcome you again at the end of your visit, when you will certainly have somewhat more indelible impressions."
The next day, something absolutely unexpected happened.
I got a telephone call from a local Lutheran minister, who had heard the radio show.
"I believe there may be something to what you said"", he admitted.
That made me feel a lot less guilty.
The pathetic inhibition also shows in the semantics of unspeakeable installations used for body functions.
Official America is too bashful to use original international terms like "WC" or "toilet". Instead they created nonsense like "bathroom" or even "restroom". I have never actually seen either a tub or a bed in any American toilet.
Difficulties arise when Americans adopt foreign words, the meaning of which they have misunderstood, in their own vocabulary.
In American restaurants an "entree" is the main course !!
Entrée (f), as many words in culinary parlance, is French and means "entry".In most countries, it is used for the first dish of a menu.
A resume (French = resumé) is just a summary, isn't it? Not to Americans.
They took the word to mean "curriculum vitae", which is Latin for course of life.
If you happen to see the word "circa" engraved on a brass plate under a painting, it doesn't mean that the exact date of the old masterpiece is unknown. It just means Americans have mixed up "circa" (lat .= about, approximately) and "anno" (lat.= in the year...).
In the USA matinee is not a morning presentation as in the original French word "matineé, but generally takes place in the afternoon or evening. Soirée would be a better word.
Another example is "Chalet". Originally a typical Swiss mountain home, the châlet is built of wood on a solid masoned granite base. Apparently, the word is applied to any old small country house.
Finally, the falsely used French word: "cabaret" is not what the name implies: satirical small stage theatre, but something approaching varieté.
Here's hoping they don't pick up "varieté" (m) and recycle its use as a foreign word for, say, "brothel"!
In the beginning there were the Native American names for settlings, like Wisconsin, Massachusetts, Okeechobee, Chattanooga and many more.
Then came the Spanish influence in the West and places such as Los Angeles, Santa Barbara, Sacramento etc appeared on the map.
Finally, Europe was raided for town names.
At first, the adjective "New" was put in front of the stolen name, as in New Amsterdam, (subsequently to become New York), New Bern, New England, New Jersey, New Brunswick and so on.
Later on, they seem to have tired of using the "New" and simply dropped it.
The result were places like "Zurich","Venice", "Florence","Lebanon", "Panama City" and even "Beverly Hills". There are probably hundreds, all of them already existing in other parts of the world.
So now you have to specify "Paris, France", lest someone mistake it for "Paris, Illinois", Paris, Kentucky", "Paris,Tennessee" or "Paris, Texas".
Many of the takeovers have become better known in their New World version than the originals.
Advertising agencies have strange ways of dealing with the English language.
Have you noticed how often, to reward you for buying their goods, merchandisers
throw in a "free gift".
What on earth is that supposed to mean? Are there any gifts out there that you have to pay for?
Are there also "low-cost gifts"?
The very definition of a gift is that it is free of charge!
It has become fashionable to speak of a "solution" when referring to a product. Advertising copywriters have probably found this a word-saver, as it implies the product solves a problem.
What if the customer doesn't feel he has a problem, when he's simply looking for a new product?
Truncating a sentence and then requiring the reader to complete it, is a way texters want to imply its self-evident nature.
We all know the notorious word-savers from creations made to look like a sentence: "Because Ajax goes further." with a period after the non-sentence.
What purpose is served by adding the word "single" in a statement such as:
"The single most important term in your career is hired".
How does the meaning of that phrase change when you omit the fashion word single? I haven't a clue.
Marketing people no doubt have long realised that their customers want to be met as individuals and as human beings.
Not so in the terminology of their own billing department.
To them a customer is an "account" as in "Mr. Anderson is a key account".
Thus, they freely admit that Anderson is not a personality figure, but a figure of $$$s to them.
Along the same lines a passenger becomes a"fare"..
Dollars and cents replacing human beings!
Another curious development, introduced about 15 years ago in American English, is that products are no longer produced - they are "shipped".
The product itself has become a "shipment".
Shippment is by no means used in its oritinal sense of transportation alone, but also replaces manufacture and production.
But when a killer succeeds in shooting his victim through the heart or between the eyes, it's a clean shot, a clean hit or even a clean kill !
So soil is "dirt", but killing is "clean".
A disgusting inversion of meaning. Shouldn't it be the other way round?
The horrors of human behaviour are played down by yarn like to "take out", or to "waste", meaning to kill (to deprive of life, acc. to Merriam-Webster).
Killing seems to be a favourite in the new popular dictionary.
For example, instead of switching off the car headlights or the engine, motorists now "kill" them.
What thoughtless twisting of words!
Ï would like to know who introduces changes like that into the language and by what mechanism they manage to slip into general use.
And, finally:
What do people mean when they insert the phrase "... you know" about every tenth sentence?
If the answer to the rhetorical question is assumed to be "yes" and the person addressed does know, then why is the statement made anyway?
Probably, the insertion is a vague expression of uncertainty.
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