Number 38
I just have to read and listen to get material for Parvum Opus, but this week readers have pretty much written it for me, and very well too.
Peeved reader:
I thought of you in connection with a couple of language peeves I've noticed recently:
Moi:
Peeved Reader is looking into a work co-op. How can we save the Wal*Mart list?
A reader took exception to this passage in PO 37:
I don't think it's necessarily wrong to include slang, idioms, or "substandard" English in a dictionary. For instance, "ain't" doesn't confuse anyone, it has a venerable history, and really should be given legitimacy. It's simply a contraction of "am not" and there is no other one; we need it.
Elegant Reader:
But in this case there IS an alternative ~ "amn't," although it is more in use in England than in the U.S. It is not only a more natural contraction, but I submit that it is more felicitous to the ear. "Ain't" will always carry the odor of its venerable history as a telltale mark of substandard English (as well as of its less usual use as an affectation of certain British upper classes). Admittedly, "amn't" saves only a portion of that fraction of a second that is required to say "am."
Moi:
I've never heard anyone say "amn't" and I'm not sure that anyone could really say it, because in English, we don't have that sequence "mnt" without a vowel sound. In fact, "ain't" is just a natural elision of those sounds. I would think "amn't" is only a written form.
Back and forth:
Moi: I've never heard anyone say "amn't"
ER: I have.
and I'm not sure that anyone could really say it
I can, and without any difficulty, although it's a bit over a single syllable.
because in English, we don't have that sequence "mnt" without a vowel sound.
But other languages do (e.g. Russian shch, Vietnamese ng, German tzt and scht, some African languages mb, several ts, etc.), and in such cases a suppressed vowel suggests itself in speech (typically a short e).
In fact, "ain't" is just a natural elision of those sounds.
It seems completely UNnatural to me ~ what is natural about adding the letter i or pronouncing it with a long a??? But mostly, it just seems a completely UGLY construction (although certainly useful in writing to indicate a lack of education or a particular regional affectation).
I would think "amn't" is only a written form.
Not in my experience. (But then, I find little requirement in any case to save that fraction of time needed to say "am/is/are not," and to my ears the interrogatory form is a rather elegant construct, is it not?)
Moi:
Well, beauty is in the ear of the listener. I just say "am I not" when necessary, which I agree is elegant; never attempted "amn't" and really don't think I've heard it. True, other languages have consonant sequences that we don't, but I think that's why so many people immigrated.
But once you start inserting vowels into contractions, you may as well not bother with the contraction ~ "am I not" to "amn't" to something a bit over a syllable ~ it's like "did not" to "didn't", though that is more familiar. Is "amn't" (which should be "am'n't") pronounced "am-uh-nt" or "am-nuh-t"?
Fred agrees with Elegant Reader, and thinks "ain't" is an ugly sound and understands why people object to it, just as some people can't bear bluegrass singers. I can't hear it ~ it does not seem inevitably nasal to me, or if so, not inevitably ugly. I like the high lonesome sound.
Elegant Reader:
If "amn't" should be am'n't, then I take it "didn't" should be "did'n't" and "isn't" should be "'is'n't" and so on ~ I have no idea in that case what "ain't" should be, because I'm mystified, as I said, by just what is contracted, and where the i comes from ~ for all I can tell perhaps it should be "a'i'n't". As to pronunciation ~ it is virtually impossible to replicate in writing, esp. without the use of diacritical marks, but I suggest that if the American/English tongue can manage the consonant sequences in "didn't," "wouldn't," it's really not so hard to twist around the much softer sequence of "am'n't" without adding a whole extra "-uh- syllable." We already manage the more difficult sequence in "amped" and "jumped" without difficulty simply by using the leading vowel as a springboard to the elision.
I'd be interested in the comments of others on this usage, and if they read the same coloring into the usage of "ain't" as I do (a flavor which can be valuable to a writer who WANTS it to have that effect). But I really much more strongly about other issues such as the dictionary-as-mirror concept that leads to the eventual apparent ratification of the typical popular confusions between infer/imply, etc. Those endorsements decrease the richness of English and do a lot more damage to the language than the rehabilitation of a formerly shunned word!
Moi:
Yes, there's a huge difference between slurring meanings, and recognizing the roots of a poor natural child like "ain't".
Discreet Reader:
Hey, here's one that you and your readers might be able to handle.
I need an easy way to remember which is which, between discrete and discreet.
According to www.m-w.com, both arise from roots that have to do with separation.
I'd hoped that since "discretion" looks like "discrete", the latter would be the one that refers to prudence (discretion) ~ but "discreet" is the prudence one.
Another hope was that "discrete" would mean "secret" which looks sorta like "secrete" which resembles "discrete." But again, "discreet" is the one that's more similar in meaning to "secret."
The strongest "spelling mnemonic" I ever learned was from a story in a grade school reader ~ perhaps the book If I Were Going. It was about a kid who lost a spelling bee because she couldn't spell "separate." The mnemonic was that she got caught like a rat in a trap . . . separate. I want something similarly unforgettable.
Moi:
I told a friend in junior high that one, or one almost like it ~ there's a rat in "separate" ~ but she said she already knew how to spell it. See, even then I was a word nerd.
Anyway, you're right, unfortunately the two words have the same root, having to do with discrimination or discernment, very close meanings. "Discretion" could refer to either meaning, adding to the confusion.
How about this: Indiscreet was a 1958 movie with Cary Grant and Ingrid Bergman, a romantic comedy, and romantic comedies tend to be about people behaving indiscreetly. Surely you would never think of this movie title as Indiscrete. Even if you haven't seen the movie (and you ought to rent it just for the spelling lesson), it would look funny in that context. The businesslike letter e at the end of "indiscrete" (which is a real word but less commonly used) just doesn't have the loose, weekend look of that double vowel. Even in "discreet" without the prefix "in", think of the two e's as two discreetly lowered eyes that appear not to be looking directly at the improper thing, or which are perhaps avoiding impertinent glances.
But I ask the readers for suggestions.
Heard in a radio ad: "It becomes very uneasy to . . ." We all know that "uneasy" means something like "worried", not "difficult". Who has ever heard it used otherwise, besides the copywriter for this ad? Perhaps copywriting is being farmed out now, like computer services, via e-mail to foreign ad writers who make a dollar a day, thus saving American ad companies millions. It is conceivable.
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