Comments for harm·less drudg·ery

Comment on Alphabet Soup: TESOL and WMD Edition by Ø

Tue, 18 Jun 2013 22:35:40 +0000

No pressure. Just kidding.

Comment on Alphabet Soup: TESOL and WMD Edition by korystamper

korystamper — Sun, 16 Jun 2013 02:39:59 +0000

Yes, I promise. I’ve been working on a post for, um, a month now. Soon!

Comment on Alphabet Soup: TESOL and WMD Edition by Ø

Sun, 16 Jun 2013 01:35:46 +0000

Kory, you will post again some time, yes? Some of us are struggling with withdrawal.

Comment on About by Sky

Sky — Mon, 20 May 2013 04:22:48 +0000

Hi,
I was just telling a friend about your wonderful article “Alma Mater,” but when I looked for it online the original link from brainchildmag was dead. I can’t seem to find it anywhere else, either. Do you know if there’s any way to access the article? I can’t (don’t want to) believe it’s just gone.

Comment on A Plea for Sanity this National (US) Grammar Day by Aaron

Aaron — Mon, 22 Apr 2013 14:09:46 +0000

Arriving a bit late to the party. All I can say is “Bravo!” This is the finest piece I’ve seen yet regarding grammar/language bullies. As someone who enjoys language in a playful way (think Ira Gershwin), I have respect for rules and customs, but I also recognize that they are not moral codes, just conventions to make life easier. But when people take these practical conventions and distort them into tyrannical rules, they begin to lose some of their practicality, don’t they? I wish there were Kory Stampers in all fields — arts, politics, science, etc. — to remind all of us, but particularly the hard-nosed practitioners, that rules and conventions are meant to be useful and to promote ideas, not to crush people and thought.

I stand by this principle, irregardless of what others may think. (That was for you, Ms. Stamper, since we know irregardless is indeed a word, albeit and incredibly grating one to some of us).

Comment on Appearances by Aaron

Aaron — Sun, 21 Apr 2013 02:02:23 +0000

Bridget, we Stamperphiles should just pool our money to start a conference dedicated to a love of English by amateur lexicophiles. We could see the dorky PowerPoint slides AND have coffee with Kory…

Comment on About by Jeff Syrop

Jeff Syrop — Thu, 11 Apr 2013 01:39:41 +0000

Kory, or anybody, but I hope Kory reads this: How would an excellent, fluent translator translate this sentence from English to, say, Italian? “He’s a real Eddie Haskel.” I wonder if every culture has a word that means Eddie Haskel.

Comment on Alphabet Soup: TESOL and WMD Edition by Ø

Mon, 08 Apr 2013 20:25:29 +0000

I am a little reluctant to mention this, but 2013-30>1980.

Comment on Alphabet Soup: TESOL and WMD Edition by alletra

alletra — Mon, 08 Apr 2013 18:33:37 +0000

I love your blog, cant wait for more to come!

Comment on Alphabet Soup: TESOL and WMD Edition by Alec Bass

Alec Bass — Mon, 08 Apr 2013 13:53:05 +0000

I recently re-read Frank Herbert’s Dune, which I first read in the ’70s in high school. The novel employs a specialized vocabulary that combines words from the author’s imagination and ones from Arabic. In the >>GULP<< 30 years since I first read the novel, some of the words have become familiar English words, including "Jihad."