tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-520807396714463309.post4369834672847865200..comments2024-02-12T02:22:30.561-05:00Comments on The Lousy Linguist: Thinking Words (part 1)Chrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09558846279006287148noreply@blogger.comBlogger15125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-520807396714463309.post-88018577412455143422009-12-09T17:46:41.227-05:002009-12-09T17:46:41.227-05:00doh! How coult I have forgotten about The Online E...doh! How coult I have forgotten about <a href="http://www.etymonline.com/index.php" rel="nofollow">The Online Etymology Dictionary</a>.Chrishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09558846279006287148noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-520807396714463309.post-42677942782620532722009-12-04T13:24:39.856-05:002009-12-04T13:24:39.856-05:00Rob, that's a clever suggestion, I'll give...Rob, that's a clever suggestion, I'll give it a try. I've often used <a href="http://www.collins.co.uk/corpus/CorpusSearch.aspx" rel="nofollow">The Collins Collocation Sampler</a> for this kind of thing, but it wouldn't give me a picture of changes in collocations over time, so this is a nifty way to track that. Thanks!Chrishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09558846279006287148noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-520807396714463309.post-19506777998152712852009-12-04T11:00:56.509-05:002009-12-04T11:00:56.509-05:00I'm a little late here, but if you back to the...I'm a little late here, but if you back to the Time corpus and search for inappropriate with any noun one word to the right and another search with any noun within 4 words to the left, you'll see which nouns this adjective has modified (or complemented). Do the same for unacceptable. This can give us an idea of the semantic shift that has/is occurring. Note the 7 instances of "inappropriate relationship" in the 1990s. I don't have time to summarize the patterns, but a few seem pretty obvious.<br />Keep up the lousy linguistics :)Rob Troyerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/03973741302731519730noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-520807396714463309.post-28281731825337681912009-12-04T07:34:32.245-05:002009-12-04T07:34:32.245-05:00Another vote for checking out your public library&...Another vote for checking out your public library's website for OED access-- Worked for me.MattFnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-520807396714463309.post-54298802157041386222009-12-03T16:57:17.255-05:002009-12-03T16:57:17.255-05:00Edward, thanks for the comment and clarification. ...Edward, thanks for the comment and clarification. It's certainly a challenge to discover contemporary shifts in meaning. It wasn't my intention to nit-pic your article, rather it just seemed like a convenient opportunity to show how online resources could be used to help understand linguistic patterns and change.Chrishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09558846279006287148noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-520807396714463309.post-74008687631687872692009-12-03T15:37:53.256-05:002009-12-03T15:37:53.256-05:00Your research is interesting, but the point of my ...Your research is interesting, but the point of my Prospect article was that a new and broader meaning of "inappropriate" and "unacceptable" has gained ground over the last 20 years. As to whether their overall use has gone up or down, I am agnostic.<br /><br />Edward SkidelskyEdward Skidelskynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-520807396714463309.post-61805114958053939012009-12-03T14:23:14.366-05:002009-12-03T14:23:14.366-05:00yeah, it's also a function of Blogger software...yeah, it's also a function of Blogger software. I simply took a screen grab of the Excel graph and posted it as a picture. it would be nice if there were a plug-in where bloggers simply input the values directly the the blog generates the graph.Chrishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09558846279006287148noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-520807396714463309.post-31306886041153263122009-12-03T12:56:40.514-05:002009-12-03T12:56:40.514-05:00Excel's default colours are tasteful but not e...Excel's default colours are tasteful but not easy to distinguish (i.e. I can't tell which line belongs to which label). It would be helpful to either change to more garish colours or directly label the lines.Rosie Redfieldhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06807912674127645263noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-520807396714463309.post-32408569231218897642009-12-03T10:24:24.549-05:002009-12-03T10:24:24.549-05:00goofy, nice idea. I'll see what I can find. Th...goofy, nice idea. I'll see what I can find. Thanks!Chrishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09558846279006287148noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-520807396714463309.post-3780880929012444252009-12-03T09:33:59.105-05:002009-12-03T09:33:59.105-05:00Some public library websites offer free access to ...Some public library websites offer free access to the online OED, at least mine does.goofyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14760721504519661112noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-520807396714463309.post-57331562823495466872009-12-02T20:34:37.388-05:002009-12-02T20:34:37.388-05:00panoptical, awesome, thanks! Nice to see M-W is r...panoptical, awesome, thanks! Nice to see M-W is reliable. <br /><br />Interesting point about the general direction of semantic change. Does this conform to the original author's point about moral decay? Hmmm...Chrishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09558846279006287148noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-520807396714463309.post-54386043081554886472009-12-02T20:28:58.620-05:002009-12-02T20:28:58.620-05:00I guess I should mention that those dates are from...I guess I should mention that those dates are from the OED, and also apologize for failing to proofread my comment before posting it. The size of this comment box makes it hard for me to scan for errors; I suppose I'll compose future comments in a text editor and copy-paste them.panopticalhttp://panoptical.wordpress.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-520807396714463309.post-3494540232840024182009-12-02T20:08:51.981-05:002009-12-02T20:08:51.981-05:00Unacceptable: 1483
Inappropriate: 1804
Coarse: 142...Unacceptable: 1483<br />Inappropriate: 1804<br />Coarse: 1424<br />Tactless: 1847<br />Vulgar: 1391<br />Lewd: c890<br />Improper: 1531<br />Indecent: 1563<br /><br />Looks like M-W did a pretty good job, overall. If you put up a paypal button you might be able to get enough donations to cover an OED subscription.<br /><br />One of the things I noticed was that a good number of those words underwent the sort of moral transformation that Nietzsche posits when he described "good and bad, good and evil." Lewd coarse, and vulgar, at least, started out meaning plain, common, ordinary, or, in the case of lewd, a layperson (as opposed to clergy). Improper and Indecent strike me as exactly the same sorts of words as inappropriate and unacceptable: there is an a proper, appropriate (note the common stem) way to act, a decent and acceptable way to act; and then there's the opposite. None of the words started out carrying anything specific; it was just assumed that common people would act coarse, vulgar, and lewd, while noble people would know how to act properly.panopticalhttp://panoptical.wordpress.comnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-520807396714463309.post-77555690588884817272009-12-02T20:00:49.848-05:002009-12-02T20:00:49.848-05:00excellent work! you get extra credit.excellent work! you get extra credit.Chrishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09558846279006287148noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-520807396714463309.post-78864445752235987902009-12-02T18:24:20.472-05:002009-12-02T18:24:20.472-05:00If you add up the counts for the words in the two ...If you add up the counts for the words in the two cited categories, the results suggest a (post hoc, and therefore dubious) pattern.<br /><br />The plot is shown here:<br />http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/myl/Thinking1.png<br /><br />It suggests that 'coarse', 'tactless', 'vulgar' etc. declined until WWII and then stayed about the same, perhaps with an additional decline in past decade; while 'inappropriate' and 'unacceptable' rose gradually from the 1930s to 1970 or so, and then leveled off.Mark Libermanhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00130072209967601751noreply@blogger.com