Sunday, March 1, 2015

20150301.0958

That I have been erratic in posting to this webspace recently, I know. The past few days have seen me ill, not gravely, but annoyingly and tiringly. Before that, I was busy--and, really, I still am, although being out of things for the past few days has left me at something of a loss as to what needs to be done now. And there are family concerns which I will note are present but I will not discuss in any detail--except to say that the prayers of those who pray and kind thoughts from those who believe such things can help will be most welcome, for they very much are.

One thing that comes to mind, though, and from typing the previous paragraph is the word "discuss." I had initially typed it as "discus" and started to move on from it when I noticed and corrected the error. It could serve as a teaching moment were it to happen where my students could see it, and I may well end up using it in a lecture if I am assigned a freshman course in the fall. For one, it serves as a warning that the spellcheck function cannot be trusted blindly. "Discus," after all, is a word, and given the way Standard American English (however defined, because there is not a single prevailing definition, not really) functions, it could even be a verb used oddly but sensibly in the context. Family business is generally not something to which to take a sporting disc, bluntly or finely, after all.

For another, it serves as a reminder that the small details of things matter. The presence or absence of a single s, a collection of pixels representing one letter representing one brief burst of sibilance, changes the meaning of the word and sentence entirely. It changes the sound of the word, at least in my mouth and ear, shifting the stress from syllable to syllable more than adding much in the way of a snake's speech to the word. And it makes easier the task of the reader in untangling the levels of meaning and representation that are encoded into every piece of writing, every utterance of language--for each is, in fact, an interpretive act. The choice of words used to describe a thing is a choice, thus a judgment made (and, admittedly, not always the best). Such judgments say much about the minds of those who evidence them.

But my judgment now is that I should go eat what my wonderful wife has cooked.

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