The trouble with taboo words and their replacements is that the replacement quickly tends to develop its own taboo, whereupon it, too, has to be replaced. Objections to taboos and euphemisms are of no avail whatsoever. Both constitute a definite part of usage, and both will continue, presumably, as long as language (any language) exists.
--Mario Pei, “Problems of Semantics,” in Language Today: A Survey of Current Linguistic Thought 59, 72 (Mario Pei ed., 1967).
This makes me laugh. I don't know why, but for some reason it strikes me as a good potential "School House Rock" song.
5 comments:
Taboo is fun.
Um, just for everybody's enlightenment, certain four-letter words are still taboo on this G-rated blog.
(yes, so I am tyrannical)
This is all just one big joke to prove the original point of your blog post isn't it!? Isn't it!?
Sorry, I forgot about your unconditional abhorrence for expletives related to fecal excrement.
This is called the "euphemism treadmill".
} kenji
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