SlightlyGutted - home of qualified absolutes
October 1, 2007 1:18 PM
SlightlyGutted - home of qualified absolutes
After years of threatening to put my ranting online, here i am finally holding forth on, yes, qualified absolutes, but i may also find space for their partners in crime: tautologies and confused homophones. I'd list aberrant apostrophes and bad spelling too but I fear the former subject has been done to death (by Lynne Truss et al) and the latter would just take pedantry too far, and is too sad even for me.
So we have 'very unique' and 'slightly gutted' to start off my list of qualified absolutes (hereinafter QAs). But what of the other language faux pas I promised?
Tautology is use of a redundant word or phrase, such as either of the first two words in 'equally as good' and all but the first word in 'figment of the imagination'. I've heard (and subsequently used for comic effect) 'redundant tautology' which is a beautifully concise, self-referential, perfect example of the phenomenon, hence I will tag them herein with RT.
And confused homophones? Exercise bike users peddle furiously, yet remain stationery. (CH). Actually this one is really sad. I much prefer the two common errors I mentioned formally. I'll blog them hear when I here them.
Mefites very welcome to discuss here and on the blog comments page. Thanks for listening.
After years of threatening to put my ranting online, here i am finally holding forth on, yes, qualified absolutes, but i may also find space for their partners in crime: tautologies and confused homophones. I'd list aberrant apostrophes and bad spelling too but I fear the former subject has been done to death (by Lynne Truss et al) and the latter would just take pedantry too far, and is too sad even for me.
So we have 'very unique' and 'slightly gutted' to start off my list of qualified absolutes (hereinafter QAs). But what of the other language faux pas I promised?
Tautology is use of a redundant word or phrase, such as either of the first two words in 'equally as good' and all but the first word in 'figment of the imagination'. I've heard (and subsequently used for comic effect) 'redundant tautology' which is a beautifully concise, self-referential, perfect example of the phenomenon, hence I will tag them herein with RT.
And confused homophones? Exercise bike users peddle furiously, yet remain stationery. (CH). Actually this one is really sad. I much prefer the two common errors I mentioned formally. I'll blog them hear when I here them.
Mefites very welcome to discuss here and on the blog comments page. Thanks for listening.
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