Re: query: distorted languages?
| From: | Yoon Ha Lee <yl112@...> |
|---|
| Date: | Wednesday, August 30, 2000, 3:24 |
|---|
On Tue, 29 Aug 2000, Matt McLauchlin wrote:
> This happens all the time, not just due to holocausts. Compare the rapid
> vanishing of the word "gay" meaning anything other than "admirer of the Pet
> Shop Boys." A second meaning of a word becomes so shocking or joke-inducing
> that all meanings except the stigmatized one vanish.
That was what puzzled me--I think the prof was getting at language change
as a consequence of war, but it seemed to me that language change
happened all the time. Whether it happened "faster" or more often in
certain areas, I don't know. But I was puzzled at the implication that
it was something semi-unique to WWII.
YHL the generally ignorant and often puzzled