Work in progress.

Really? Just Anglo-Saxon words?

I'm surprised that the Writing for the Web textbook prefers Anglo-Saxon words above all others. What about words that came into being during that whole Anglo-Norman period? Isn't an Anglo-prefix good enough?

I looked up the suggested words in the exercise. "Antagonist" comes from the Greek word "agony." So, to say that I agonized over my homework would be over the top? Instead I should say "worry" because it's OE "wyrgan," meaning to "strangle?" Which is more dramatic? And who doesn't know what agony means? What if I'm going for the "agonized" effect? [Which, by the sheer amount of question marks, I must be.]

Now sure, no one in their right mind ever needs to mention "fiduciary" on their blog, unless, of course, it is some lawyer thing.

I'd prefer to just use whatever words my audience understands [ha! a whole sentence of Middle English roots, no OE here], and there is nothing wrong with "people." My dictionary says that "people" comes from ME, which came from Old French, which came from Latin. Who's counting? [The dictionary would be an obvious answer here.] "People" hit English at some point before 1485; we may as well use it. The author even prefers it to the OE "folks."

On the "folks" note, let's not forget, the completely unspecific words "thing" and "stuff" are courtesy of our ancestors the Angles.

Let's take this moment to thank them.

Posted by Julie Young at September 24, 2003 01:14 AM