Rage From the Edge

We all do stupid things on the internet. When we are typing words, mistakes or errors due to haste or lack of education are rampant. Whether it is the improper use of "they're" in a chat room, or bungled grammar in an email, when humans have to interact by using words, there are always going to be misinterpretations, misspellings, and misuse that usually results in laughter all around. This article, Word Craft, and the several articles that follow in this series will seek to point out the many foibles of the English language while also educating internet users to some of the more odd things that can occur within our vaunted rhetoric. Please note, this article is a reprint of some of my work done at Encyclopedia Dramatica and is posted here to gain a wider audience.

PLEONASMS

Pleonasms are the opposite of oxymora. They are a redundant phrase. For a large list of examples, please see this source.

Examples include:

• DMZ Zone - Where "DMZ" stands for "demilitarized zone." Adding the word "zone" to the end is not necessary.

• ABS System - As same as the example above. "ABS" stands for "Anti-lock Braking System."

• ATM Machine - Same as the other two. "ATM" means "Automated Teller Machine."

• "Anonymous Stranger" - This example shows two words with similar meanings being used together. The word "anonymous" is being used in an attempt to modify the word "stranger," but because the definitions of the words are so closely related, the resulting phrase becomes a pleonasm.

• "Collaborate Together" - This often used phrase is an example of a pleonasm due to the fact that the word "collaborate" already presupposes action taken together.

• "General consensus of opinion" - As above, this phrase uses two words that generally have the same meaning. Consensus implies opinion by its own definition.

• Individual Person - The word "individual" is a synonym of the word "person."

• Past History or Past Experience - The word "past" signifies an antecedent, or "a preceding circumstance."

Unlike pleonasms, Oxymora are a figure of speech that combines two normally contradictory terms. For a large list of examples, please see this link.

Almost every literate person these days knows what an oxymoron is. The most famous example in popular culture would probably be the commonly used term "jumbo shrimp." Shrimp are smallish sea creatures and their name has lent itself to our language as a way of describing something small. In contrast, the word jumbo means "large." So when the fellows at the Shellfish Marketing Board needed a way to describe the largest version of these tasty fish, they came up with probably one of the most widely remembered oxymora of all time.

• Advanced BASIC

• Anarchist community

• Ballpoint

• Devout atheist

• Even odds

A Dummy Pronoun is a pronoun that serves in an ad hoc capacity. This word is used to take the place of a known, unknown, or accepted (generally agreed upon fact) noun not to be spoken of directly. Dummy pronouns tend to be semantically impersonal and empty.

Examples include:

• "It seems my dad loves pornography." This sentence contains the dummy pronoun "it." The sentence could also be written without the dummy pronoun by writing: "My dad seems to love pornography." The dummy pronoun uses in the first sentence is empty of meaning.

• "Old people on the internet try to look like they are with it. In this example, the slang term "with it" is a phrase used to describe being up to date with current trends and fashion. Inside that phrase, the word "it" has no physical meaning or value.

Spoonerisms are a transposition of sounds of two or more words. Sometimes they are the result of wordplay and other times spoonerisms are the result of accident or error. The most famous example of a spoonerism is probably the phrase "cunning stunt." For further exploration, a humorous discussion takes place here.

Examples include:

• fighting a liar ----> lighting a fire
• you hissed my mystery lecture ----> you missed my history lecture
• cattle ships and bruisers ----> battle ships and cruisers
• nosey little cook ----> cosy little nook
• a blushing crow ----> a crushing blow
• tons of soil ----> sons of toil
• our queer old Dean ----> our dear old Queen
• we'll have the hags flung out ----> we'll have the flags hung out
• you've tasted two worms ----> you've wasted two terms
• our shoving leopard ----> our loving shepherd
• a half-warmed fish ----> a half-formed wish
• is the bean dizzy? ----> is the Dean busy?

Everybody knows what a Palindrome is. Its a phrase, sentence, or number that can be read the same forwards or backwards. Some examples include: radar, level, rotator, rotor, kayak, reviver, racecar. Recently, computer programmers have attempted to create the largest palindrome ever. These attempts result in huge sentences that contain several thousand words and several tens of thousands of letters. They also have one more thing in common: none of them make a single lick of sense when a person attempts to read them.

SEMORDNILAPS

Essentially, a Semordnilaps is the term used for a word, that when spelled backwards, reveals a new readable word not related to the original. The actual term "semordnilaps" is a semordnilaps of the word "palindrome."

For the complete list of semordnilaps found in the English language, please see this link.

Any person who has looked inside a font file has seen a Pangram. The sentence: "The quick brown fox jumps over a lazy dog" is probably the most well known and most widely used pangram there is. By definition, a pangram is a sentence or phrase that utilizes every letter of the alphabet. Linguists and bored people the world over busy themselves trying to come up with new versions of pangrams. The current trend is to see who can write the shortest one in terms of total letters used.

The shortest pangram known (32 letters) that still retains an understandable structure:

"Pack my box with five dozen liquor jugs."

Here are some further examples (note, these examples are shorter than the above pangram, however they make no sense.):

• How quickly daft jumping zebras vex." (30 letters)

• "Quick wafting zephyrs vex bold Jim." (29)

• "Waltz, nymph, for quick jigs vex Bud." (28)

• "Bawds jog, flick quartz, vex nymph." (27)

• Mr Jock, TV quiz PhD, bags few lynx." (26)