Paraprosdokians, and Other Fun
English is a complex but endlessly fun language.
The first time I heard about paraprosdokians, I liked them. Paraprosdokians are figures of speech in which the latter part of a sentence or phrase is surprising or unexpected and is frequently humorous. (Sir Winston Churchill loved them)
A favorite of mine is this: If I agreed with you, we'd both be wrong. Another one is: If there's a will, I want to be in it! Okay, okay, just one more: A bus station is where a bus stops. A train station is where a train stops. On my desk, I have a work station.
These are a few examples of the fun we can have with the English language. Many years ago, a man from Lebanon told me, "If you want to speak beautiful, romantic words to a woman, use French. If you want to author a scientific paper with great precision, use Arabic. If you want to write a contract, use English. No one will know what it means!"
I guess it's true that English is a paradoxical language. We have the words to, too, and two, but we have no way to write a sentence that says we have three ??? tos, toos, twos?
I've often laughed to myself when I hear a great English orator. English has its roots in street slang. Back in the day, no self-respecting aristocrat would ever speak in English. German or French were acceptable, but only the lowest of the low spoke English. Now, classy people speak English and look down on the slang in our streets. How strange.
Street language is just the normal evolution of English. If you say, "Dude, this food is lit!" you are saying that it's good. If a person is "spill'n the tea" they are gossiping, and to "clap back" is to respond to someone's criticism.
Just in the last few years, we have redefined the word "data." Of course, data used to mean more than one datum. And computer scientists still cringe when they read or hear someone use this word in place of information!
Data is not information. Data are some things (plural) that do not have sufficient context to be information. I can have one hundred measurements in inches, with each measurement being slightly more or slightly less. But the numbers are useless until we say that we are making yardsticks.
While we're at it, let's consider the English peculiarity that what we speak has almost no correlation to the same written words. One of my favorites is "tomorrow." Everyone says, "ta marrow." Even little orphan Annie sings, "Ta marrow, ta marrow, it's only a day away!" The same is true for "today." We say "ant-ar-tic" for the Antarctic, "close" for clothes, and "man-naise" for mayonnaise. English is a confusing language.
I lived in Eastern Europe for a while. During my time there, I had some friends from Alabama visit - this is a true story. My interpreter could not figure out what they were saying. Not only was the accent difficult, but the husband continually spoke with colloquialisms that made no sense at all.
Put yourself in the shoes of someone from Slovenia. What are they to think when we say, "at the drop of a hat" or "barking up the wrong tree" or "beating around the bush." My interpreter "threw in the towel" when my friend asked, "Does a cat have a climb'n gear?"
English is perplexing but fun. I once read a chapter written by Gödel where he only used self-referencing sentences. A few examples are:
When you're not looking, this sentence is in Spanish.
The reader of this sentence exists only while reading me.
The meaning of this sentence is self-evident.
Well, let's wrap this up, put a bow on it, run it up the flagpole and see if anyone salutes. Thanks for joining me. I hope it's not been a fool's errand.