Fritinancy

Listen to me!

Turn up your speakers or pop in your earbuds and listen to the latest episode of The Allusionist, a fine podcast about words and language, in which host Helen Zaltzman interviews me about – what else? – names and the naming process. Stay tuned to the end to hear Helen chat with Roman Mars, host of the 99% Invisible podcast, about how The Allusionist got its name.

And use your eyes to check out the links at the bottom of the page, cleverly subtitled “Readify.” (The joke is explained within the show.) One of them goes to “Title TK,” a 2014 podcast about naming from 99% Invisible that does not feature yours truly but does include this example of a truly appalling coinage, discourtesy of H&R Block, the tax-preparation firm.

Helpth! They evidently love that Frankenword, because they’ve refused to let it go.

Word of the week: Henge

Henge: A type of Neolithic earthwork featuring a circular banked enclosure with an internal ditch. The most famous henge is Stonehenge, in Wiltshire, England; it is estimated to have been built between 3000 and 2000 BCE. The -henge element “may have meant something ‘hanging’ or supported in the air,” according to the OED.

Detached henge first appeared in the mid-18th century; Daniel Defoe, author of Robinson Crusoe, wrote in his 1742 Tour of Great Britain that “The present Name [sc. Stonehenge] is Saxon, tho' the Work is beyond all Comparison older, signifying a hanging Rod or Pole, i.e. a Gallows, from the hanging Parts, Architraves, or rather Imposts; and pendulous Rocks are still in Yorkshire called Henges.”

Henge is in the news this week because of Manhattanhenge, an affectionate name for an annual east-west alignment of the setting sun with New York City’s street grid. The phenomenon occurs today, May 31, at about 8:12 p.m. (It also occurred on May 30, and will be visible again on July 11 and 12.)

According to a Wikipedia entry:

In accordance with the Commissioners' Plan of 1811, the street grid for most of Manhattan is rotated 29° clockwise from true east-west. Thus, when the azimuth for sunset is 299° (i.e., 29° northward of due West), the sunset aligns with the streets on that grid.

Other cities with fairly uniform grids and unobstructed views of the horizon may also experience the event. A similar phenomenon, dubbed MIThenge, can be experienced at varying times of the year.

 

Manhattanhenge observed from 34th Street. Photo via American Museum of Natural History.

The case of the coded acronym

I’m over at the Strong Language blog today with a story about a Hollywood recording studio that recorded some of the biggest names of the 1960s and 1970s: the Doors, Frank Zappa, Jimi Hendrix, Linda Ronstadt. The studio’s own name was the acronym T.T.G., which may have stood for “Two Terrible Guys.” Or it may have stood for a Yiddish-Arabic expression that was considerably swearier.

Names in the news: Glixel, Binghamton Mets, Fagas Straps

Some recently encountered names that made me wonder: What were they thinking?

Word of the week: Canvass

Canvass: To conduct a public-opinion survey; to solicit votes or opinions; to scrutinize; to debate or discuss.

In this U.S. election season – and in the Philippines’, I’ve discovered – canvass makes frequent appearances in media reports. From the spelling, you’d infer that it’s related to canvas, the sturdy woven fabric used for making sails, clothing, and surfaces for painting. And you’d be correct. But what’s the connection?

On the Visual Thesaurus: “Hack”

My latest column for the Visual Thesaurus, “Unpacking ‘Hack’,” looks at the the myriad meanings of hack, from “crude chop” to “cough” to “cab” to “computer break-in.” I explore the word’s dual etymology and spend some time on current usages such as life hack and hackathon.

Full access is restricted to subscribers; here’s a taste:

All of these hacks branch out from two Middle English sources. In the 13^th century, acken or hacke meant “to cut with heavy blows in an irregular fashion.” A century later, a hak or hake was a tool for chopping; the word later came to be applied to the gash made by such a tool. Early on, a hacker was a person who chopped wood, but in late-1940s America it meant a tennis or golf player of mediocre ability and poor form – someone who “hacks” at the ball instead of stroking it elegantly, as the Random House Historical Dictionary of American Slang puts it.

Meanwhile, English had acquired hackney from Old French haquenée around 1300. In both languages, the word meant an ordinary horse – as opposed to a war horse or a hunting steed – with an ambling gait. Early on, such horses were hired out, and so hackney came to mean “a horse or carriage kept for hire.” The “ordinary” sense gave rise to an extended meaning of “common drudge” and to a shortened form, hack. (It also produced an adjective, hackneyed, that means “trite” or “commonplace.”) By the 19^th century a hack was anyone whose less-than-stellar services could be hired – such as, for example, a political hack, party hack, or hack writer. By the 1910s hack was also U.S. slang for a hearse or, alternatively, a taxicab or its driver.

Read the rest of the column.

Haus hunting

Why is the German word for house suddenly trending among hipsteresque businesses? I’m still puzzling over that question after having spotted this trifecta over two days in Los Angeles:

Word of the week: Asperitas

Asperitas: A cloud formation “made up of well-defined, wavelike structures in the underside of the cloud, more chaotic and with less horizontal organization than undulatus. It is characterised by localized waves in the cloud base, either smooth or dappled with smaller features, sometimes descending into sharp points, as if viewing a roughened sea surface from below. Varying levels of illumination and thickness of cloud can lead to dramatic visual effects. (Source: World Meteorological Organization.) Asperitas is a Latin word meaning “roughness” or “harshness”; the root is the source of asperity (harshness) and exasperate (to irritate or provoke).

 

Asperitas formation over Mesa, Arizona. Photograph via Cloud Appreciation Society.

May linkfest

The official Trump typeface – as seen on hotels, airplanes, and campaign logo (but not on the failed steaks, wine, or university) – is Akzidenz Grotesk.

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Budweiser has announced that it’s rebranding its beer “America” for the duration of the U.S. election season. It’s not the first America-first stunt the brewery has pulled, notes Mark Wilson in Fast Co Design: previous summer-only editions have featured the Statue of Liberty and the American flag. But this bit of revisionism is especially thorough: “Almost every bit of type on the Budweiser label has been scrubbed away by Easter Egg patriotism, with new text citing the Pledge of Allegiance, the Star Spangled Banner, and America the Beautiful—all rendered in newly developed hand lettering, inspired by Budweiser’s archives.” For what it’s worth, Budweiser’s parent company, InBev, is headquartered in Belgium and Brazil.

 

Word of the week: Poplin

Poplin: A strong, lightweight, plain-woven fabric with a smooth finish, historically silk but now more commonly cotton.

Poplin weave structure, via Charles Tyrwhitt.