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How Swearing Works

Do you swear? Find out How Swearing Works. I developed a rather bad habit of swearing when I was in college, though the unidentified author of this article says that "the brains of people who pride themselves on being educated respond to slang and 'illiterate' phrases the same way they do to swearwords." True enough, even if I commit the offenses myself. (Slang isn't necessarily an offense.)

When I was a child I puzzled over why some words were so bad, since they were just an assortment of sounds which appeared in other not-bad words, and the same ideas expressed in a bad word could be acceptably expressed in other words, whether clinically or euphemistically. The emotions carried by bad words could also be acceptable if expressed differently. And some sounds that are bad in one language have a completely meaning in others.

One simple example is the British word "bloody". It's not so shocking in England as it used to be, so I understand, but Americans never got a shock from it even in the old days. (It originally referred to God's, or Jesus Christ's, blood.) This is also a perfect example of how the same word can be shocking or not depending on the context, because I assume that even in the old days the Brits sometimes had to refer to someone or something that was covered in blood as "bloody".

By the time I figured it all out, I'd picked up the habit, and now, language that used to be shocking anywhere can be heard regularly on TV.

While it's commonly thought that swearing relieves stress (whack your finger with a hammer and try not to swear), someone told me to try this exercise: Stretch out your arm and try to keep it steady while someone else pushes down on it. Now do the same thing while you are using bad language. The theory is that you lose strength simply from the negative vibes of the words. (She thought the same thing happened when you wear synthetic rather than natural fiber clothing.) My younger son demonstrated the same principle which he learned in his aikido class: You will gain strength by visualizing the moving energy (chi) in your arm keeping it firmly in place while someone else tries to force it down. This works, and it's easy to learn. So it's the thought that counts.

Note the differences among these words (not a complete list, of course):

Swearing: Since swearing can also mean taking an oath (and using oaths can mean swearing), what's so bad about it? It's probably because so many people swear falsely so often.

Blasphemy: Related to "blame". Used in religious contexts, so it's about blaming God. Mustn't do that.

Profanity: Irreverence.

Remember the rule against taking the Lord's name in vain? Sort of combines swearing, blasphemy, and profanity. "In vain" means don't waste your time.

Cursing: Invoking power to do evil, or cast an evil spell. Like sending someone to hell.

Dirty words: Usually body stuff.

Obscenity: Officially dirty.

It's all about the power of the word, which there was in the beginning. Shortly after the beginning was the swear word.

THE GOOD STUFF

Notice how many words relating to beauty and love and so on have to do with magic spells: entrancing, enchanted, glamour, bewitching, charmed, alluring, fascination.

Enthralled and captivated, however, have to do with being enslaved. Victorian novelists used to refer to the "power" a man or woman had over someone who was in love.

HE WUNG IT

Over Thanksgiving I heard my nephew say, "He wung it." He was winging the past tense of the expression "to wing it", meaning to improvise. Of course there are analogous constructions: He swung it (not swang or swinged). But, She sang it (not sung it, only She has sung it). It should have been, "He winged it," but no wonder he was confused. It's one of those cases where your ear doesn't necessarily help you.

ABILITY TIPS

AbilityNet is a British site with links to useful tips on ways to make computers easier to use by people with visual and other difficulties.

MAKE YOUR OWN BOOK PLATES

Here's an idea for making book plates for yourself or for someone else as a Christmas gift: Buy a package of computer-printable address labels in whatever size you like. Although Word has an automatic label-making function in Tools, you'll probably do better to use the table function to set up a grid to fit your labels. Then you can insert a graphic, even a photo, on each label, plus something like "Ex Libris Jennifer" or whatever. In fact, this way you can even give each label on the sheet a different graphic.

ALL THE WAY FROM ENGLAND

Mike Sykes wrote, re The Great Vowel Shift [me in brackets]:

When I was at university, one of the dramatic societies performed Julius Caesar in what they understood to be the contemporary pronunciation: the only thing I remember of it is "And I will seek for Pindarus the whale". [I had to look this one up. In Act V, Scene 3, Titinius says, "And I will seek for Pindarus the while."]

I suspect there is still a vestige of it in the North-South divide (that's of England, not Britain or UK): dialect apart, there are various words that even the more accent-free of us northerners pronounce with a short 'a' that a southerner would pronounce with a long. The city near Bristol is 'Barth', whereas in this part of the country 'bath' rhymes with 'cat' while 'barth' is considered affectation. (How 'bath' is considered down south I've never thought to ask. A few words seem to be ambi(?), e.g. 'master' which I think I pronounce somewhat between 'masster' and 'marster', though nearer the latter. See Received Pronunciation - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

And further, Mike wrote about Name Games:

Talking of made-up names, you are surely aware of Wendy? But perhaps it's too well known to be worth mentioning. [Not so well known here, though I'm sure this is Wendy in Peter Pan. Was that not a familiar name?] Of course, classical authors made them up by the dozen, though more often surnames, and it's hard to believe any survived, unless they got into the dictionary, like Gradgrind or Scrooge. I'm convinced one's feeling about a name, particularly unusual one, is often derived from one's feelings about the first, or most important, person one knew by it. It took me many, many years to rid myself of the conviction that Graham indicated a very weak person. Tom is another with strong connotations from schooldays. I could go on. [Someone wrote a book about personalities of names; unfortunately I can't remember anything about it, except that the author wrote, "Everyone is really named Sam, but they just don't know it."]

And I am really grateful to you for leading me (indirectly) to List of neologisms on The Simpsons - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. I have a soft spot for The Simpsons, but I find the accent takes a lot of effort to follow, and subtitles are so distracting.

Retreat: The Essence of Christian Mysticism

Bernadette Roberts

I am organizing a workshop with Bernadette Roberts, a remarkable Christian contemplative and author of three books:

The Path to No-Self: Life at the Center

The Experience of No-Self: A Contemplative Journey

What is Self? : A Study of the Spiritual Journey in Terms of Consciousness

This retreat, called The Essence of Christian Mysticism, will be held on the weekend of May 5-7, 2006, in Loveland, Ohio. For more information, go to Bernadette Roberts Retreat (www.keithops.us/brretreat.htm). NOTE: The web page has been changed to allow viewing with different kinds of browsers.

If you buy these or any other books from Amazon, using the link below, I'll get a tiny commission, and I'd appreciate it.

Link here to look for books on Amazon.com!

NEED A WEB PAGE? NEED SOMEONE TO ORGANIZE A MEETING OR CONFERENCE? CALL KEITHOPS.

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