Random person: Hey, what does "abecedarian"* mean?
Me: What is that, English? Uhmmm... yeah, I've never heard that word before in my life.
Random person: Whaaaat?!? How can that be?? Weren't you a Literature major??
Me: Oh. Yes. Yes, I suppose I was. I'm sorry, I must've missed that lecture on "abecedarian."
A harmless exchange, to be sure. But it seems to occur often enough that I feel there should be some clarification. The University of California, San Diego has a program for the study of Literature in the field of Writing. They do not, however, have a program for Literature in the field of Vocabulary. None that I know of, anyway. The difference is subtle. Words are great, and tremendously useful. And yeah, if you're into learning a new word everyday, then that's all great fun. But vocabulary is not an end unto itself (unless of course, you're a Literature/Vocabulary major). The writer is trained to put words together in such a way as to sense make good. Words are a tool. Communication of ideas is the goal. And to that end, most of the time I can get away with not knowing what abecedarian means.
That being said, I encourage everyone to expand their vocabularies. Learn a new word once in a while. Find a way to use it. Expand your mind. And then come back and teach me what that word means.
I don't even know what a Literature/Vocabulary major would study. Dictionaries? Isn't that what Linguistics majors are for? I don't know.
*abecedarian--1) Pertaining to the letters of the alphabet; 2) Rudimentary; elementary.
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4 comments:
good looking site you have here! :) i'll be reading it!
btw, how does your site know that my name is tiffany??
I post a Word of the week if that's of any use. And I actually use words that I know (but I do look them up for pronunciation guides).
@tiffany
His blog "knows" you because blogger (the software that Mr. William uses) is owned by Google. So since you're likely logged onto Gmail in a Firefox window (where Firefox maintains cookies and session variables across all instances) then it can see your username from your Gmail information. I'm sure that makes sense, right? :)
you write good. *wink*
@tiff
thanks, tiff!
@derek
hahah, yeah i remember learning "aplomb" from you. way to spread the knowledge.
@syckie
i believe the grammatically correct way to say that is "good write."
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