Dave Shepherd, Howard Shepherd, and Howard Chang ponder a plethora of orotund expressions. That means they are talking about extravagant ways of expressing yourself. (Thanks to Michael Buchko for the topic suggestion.)
What we mean by fustian language: pompous, bombastic ways of saying very little by using a lot of syllables; some quotations from fustian speakers and writers (1:54)
Music bumper from by “Fancy Prance” by Itchie Cat (13:04)
Our favorite fustian terms (13:35)
Song: “Confused,” by Natalie Brown (20:50)
Rude word of the week: “windbag” (24:54)
Music bumper from “Winter Wind,” by Jon Schmidt (27:08)
Why is fustian language sometimes unavoidable? (27:56)
Music courtesy of The Podsafe Music Network
Theme music by Kick the Cat
time: 35:51
size: 24.6 Mb
rating: PG (Not especially rude, but full of very challenging words.)
hi, all:
LOVE your show. if you all haven’t heard the tune “schadenfreude” from the 2004 tony-winning musical avenue q, you should absolutely find and hear it. i think you will find it very enjoyable!
sch
Avenue Q is one of the best shows I’ve seen in several years. At the behest of my daughter I saw it on Broadway last year. “Schadenfreude” is a great song that somehow captures the spirit of the 21st century!
It’s interesting how people in non-technical fields tend toward using technical terms to describe things in order to seem ‘with it’, while people in technical fields tend toward using non-technical terms to describe things in order to seem ‘with it’.
For example: Where in a computer networking sense, bandwidth indicates the rate at which a transfer medium can transmit data (the speed of your connection), management tends to use bandwidth to indicate the capacity of a person or group to complete tasks (usually time, rather than skill). When talking about actual network bandwidth, though, technical people tend to use phrases about ‘the size of the pipe’. A fat pipe is a fast connection, letting a lot of data flow, for example.
For these things, I like to imagine that somewhere along the line, some technical person explained bandwidth to some non-technical person using the human time metaphor and because these were the terms in which the non-technical person could understand the concept, he or she began to use the technical phrase to stand for the metaphor, and it just caught on.
I am also struck by the use of technical terms by the non-technical.
The term “handle that offline” is probably one thats actually carried on from the bad old days of teleconferencing, where the resource involved (telephone calls, or worse video) was a significant expense. Modern chat technologies have reduced the expense of the medium used, but the reality is that “time is money”. In our office, “handle that offline” tends to be a euphemism for “will you two stop wasting our valuable *time* and sort it out between yourselves – the rest of us are not, nor do we need to be, interested”
What I also find interesting is this persistence of “old” techno-jargon. People that don’t use broadband get categorised as “dial-up”.
When is the last time you say a phone with a dial? Better yet, one being used with a modem attached?
I quite enjoyed this most recent show! I also have an example for you…
Being an engineer, I quickly realized that engineers have a hegemony on Fustian language. We tend to abbreviate EVERYTHING. When you mentioned PHP as a recursive acronym in this podcast, it reminded me of another, a commonly used term in the Electrical Engineering field: VHDL.
VHDL is a software language that basically allows a designer to define hardware in a device known as an FPGA (Field Programmable Gate Array). These devices consist of hundreds of thousands of cells which can be reconfigured to do many things, and the combination of these reconfigured cells can be used for a plethora of functions. Most notably, video compression (MPEG-2), high-speed serial data, etc. Algorithmic stuff… The code can get very complicated, obviously. Anyways, what does VHDL stand for, you ask? VHSIC Hardware Definition Language. Annnddd… VHSIC stands for Very High Speed Integrated Circuit. An acronym within an acronym. I’m sure I could come up with some more if I just thought about it for a bit.
THanks for the podcast!
-Scott
The Hacker’s Dictionary (http://www.hacker-dictionary.com) (Hacker in the sense of programmer, not in the evil sense) has this definition:
“recursive acronym
pl.n. A hackish (and especially MIT) tradition is to choose acronyms/abbreviations that refer humorously to themselves or to other acronyms/abbreviations. The classic examples were two MIT editors called EINE (”EINE Is Not EMACS”) and ZWEI (”ZWEI Was EINE Initially”). More recently, there is a Scheme compiler called LIAR (Liar Imitates Apply Recursively), and GNU (q.v., sense 1) stands for “GNU’s Not UNIX!” — and a company with the name CYGNUS, which expands to “Cygnus, Your GNU Support”. See also mung, EMACS.”
It also has:
“recursion
n. See recursion. See also tail recursion.”
and
“tail recursion
n. If you aren’t sick of it already, see {tail recursion}.”
Ho ho.
Today’s Dilbert featured the word Schadenfreude!
http://www.comics.com/comics/dilbert/archive/dilbert-20060807.html
Schadenfreude was in a recent Reader’s Digest “Word Power” feature.
(as remembered from the podcast or Tim Gunn of the Bravo TV show Project Runway)
Haute Couture (Haute is pronounced a bit like oat) is a term for the garments that are made with a lot of handwork. A gown can take weeks or months with several people working on them. Only a few garment makers can be called Haute Couture as the right to call it such is bestowed by the French. There’s a group that is responsible for it, but I don’t remember who they are.
Loved the comment;
“It’s interesting how people in non-technical fields tend toward using technical terms to describe things in order to seem ‘with it’, while people in technical fields tend toward using non-technical terms to describe things in order to seem ‘with it’”.
I must say I agree with it totally. I am a Philosopher and we tend to over analyze everything anyway. I think I use complex language because everyone in my field does as well. I have to drop the act when I am around various other friends because they look at me after a while as if i’m from another planet.
Thanks for the post.
John
http://www.motivationace.com
john@motivationace.com