Thursday, April 20, 2006

Stupider

Here's a question for ye. It came up during my seminar this evening. About 2 hours in, running out of steam, time for a break, and all that, I used the non-word "stupider." One of the students politely corrected me under her breath: "more stupid."

Stupid anyway. Yeah, yeah....

Is there a term that refers to the performance by a word of the meaning of that very word (perhaps analogous to onomatopoeia as a word that sounds like the sound to which it refers)? I can think of only two examples - more are welcome. One is "stupider." The other is "mispell."

20 comments:

roxtar said...

I, for one, am dismayed at the rampant confusion between "loser" and "looser."

Because the usage of "looser" suggests to me a lack of rigor. A certain slackness. As in, "Her adherence to the standard spelling of simple words lacks rigor. She's a looser."

Anonymous said...

"Stupider" is already in some dictionaries, and will probably be in most dictionaries before long. You're just farsighteder than your student.

Anonymous said...

A term that expresses the performance of the meaning of a word through the saying of the word itself?

If I'm with you, "ignorami" is a funny example. From Dictionary.com (though now apparently removed...):

"The correct plural form is ignoramuses. Since ignoramus in Latin is a verb, not a noun, there is no justification for a plural form *ignorami. To use it would be to leave oneself open to the charge of being an ignoramus."

Jon said...

What's wrong with stupider? I thought the rule, in so far as there was one, was that adjectives of more than two syllables formed their comparatives with "more." "Stupid" has but the two syllables.

I agree that "stupider" sounds odd, but why is it wrong?

Heavy, heavier. Easy, easier. Stupid, stupider.

helmut said...

Loser/looser is a good one, Roxtar, and prevalent on the internets. "Ignorami" is also a great one.

Jon and Gordo - My Webster's, about 20 years old, doesn't list "stupider." But apparently is does have wider acceptance now. This may be because of the rule, Jon. But English is full of so many seemingly arbitrary exceptions to the rules that you can also see why "stupider" has been considered improper English.

Peter - I think that's right. "Hobson-jobson" is an example of its own meaning. But I don't know if it fits as denoting the category of terms.

SteveG said...

Although we could only dream of what wonderful term Austin would coin for such a notion, I propose "iteronym."

Anonymous said...

I think the problem with "stupider" has been that it just wasn't polite, thus proper lexicographers were loathe to allow it. I mean, you were just not supposed to call people stupid in the first place, much less take it to the next level. These days, however, you can become rich and famous (as, for example, Simon Cowell) by being rude in public.

Neddie said...

Ignorami is where you fold paper into little statues of the Bush Administration.

You mispelled "onomatopoeia," by the way.

Hope this helps.

(But you just can't mispell gmrabnm!)

helmut said...

I did not misspell "onomatopoeia," although there may be a variation. You misspelled "misspell," however, Mr. Copy Editor. Damn, this is fun!

"Iteronym" is great! Perhaps we could also use much less elegant "instantianism."

Larry - this may be right. A lot of language is like this - historically contingent conventionisms.

ftdlp - music delivered to your door the old-fashioned way.

MT said...

To call someone a "sesquipedalian" is to be commit the crime alleged.

MT said...

It's easy to do with typos and misspellings: e.g. "corrupton"

helmut said...

Or missing "the"s, which I seem to do a lot. There's also the very common "teh."

Back on the original tack, does "it" count as an "iteronym"?

Jim Anderson said...

Today I said "stupider" in my fifth period class. "You said 'stupider,'" remarked an aghast student. My thought: You were listening. Huzzah. My response: "Yeah, well, when you're an English teacher you get to make your own rules."

Anonymous said...

"1337" might qualify.

I also like "pwn3d." I mean, when someone who actually types things like "pwn3d" gets the best of you in a discussion, that's the ultimate humiliation. It's pwnage in every sense of the word.

roxtar said...

Kudos to Murky for the "sesquipedalian" catch...

helmut said...

I don't understand a thing you've just said, Gordo.

"Sesquipedalian" is great.

I still like iteronym. I think that should be allowed to proliferate as a new word in the English language.

You know, Peirce argued that there's a moral imperative to create new words when older ones do not suffice in explaining complex concepts. I'm not sure how complex this concept is, but SteveG is obviously quite fine and upstanding.

helmut said...

Jon - we don't say "funner." That's at least one exception to that rule.

Badaunt said...

I used to tell my students that the general rule was to use -er for one or two syllable words and 'more' for three or more. Then I realized that I was wrong, or at least that there were too many exceptions.

modern
fun
special
usual
clever
Anything ending with -ing (soothing, boring)

Is there a rule, or is it just useage?

Some words seem to be in the process of changing. I've heard cleverer, and it doesn't bother me too much, and I use stupider (but only when it's deserved). I've seen moderner but it looks weird.

(My favourite new word is one I made up myself: anthropomortify. It describes a common woe that many humans inflict on cats on the Internet, and which I inflict on birds.)

MT said...

The issue is becoming more curious and more curious by the minute.

helmut said...

Hmmm. Maybe the term I was originally looking for is the inverse of the oxymoron ("intelligenter").