Euphemisms: Only your cognoscenti know what you mean BY ROGER K. MILLER Published: February 27, 2011 “Euphemania: Our Love Affair With Euphemisms” by Ralph Keyes (Little, Brown, $24.99) Was Shakespeare right? Would a rose by any other name smell as sweet? Surely, being Shakespeare, he was right, his point being that what matters is what …
Columbus Dispatch
So to Speak | Joe Blundo commentary: Euphemisms waged, won ‘incursion’ on language Sunday, February 20, 2011 I was reading a book about euphemisms just as federal spending was being relabeled “investments” and new dietary guidelines turned hamburgers into “solid fats and added sugar.” The government can’t talk without euphemisms, but, then again, neither can …
Euphemism of the Week
In the runup to the Super Bowl, a journalist visiting Pittsburgh found that locals thought little of the Steelers’ quarterback. The journalist reported that they considered Ben Roethlisberger a “jagoff.”
PasteMagazine.com
Once during a dinner party, British statesman Winston Churchill asked the server for a breast of chicken. A woman sitting next to Churchill scolded him for uttering the vulgar word “breast.” Churchill wondered how he should have phrased the request to the server. “White meat,” came the reply. The next day, Churchill sent the woman …
Boston Globe
Don’t say it: The art of dodging bad words February 13, 2011 What could be more fun than mocking yesterday’s euphemisms? Open a copy of Mencken’s “The American Language” and you find our American forebears exclaiming “nerts!” (to avoid the naughty “nuts!”) and calling their legs “limbs” or “benders.” Then there are the benighted Brits, …
Ralph on NPR’s All Things Considered
Ralph recently appeared on NPR’s All Things Considered program. [audio:https://ralphkeyes.on-forge.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/Keyes-Euphemania_atc_16.mp3|titles=Keyes, Euphemania_atc_16] Transcript below: MELISSA BLOCK, host: This is ALL THINGS CONSIDERED from NPR News. I’m Melissa Block. ROBERT SIEGEL, host: And I’m Robert Siegel. In his new book about euphemisms, Ralph Keyes takes me back to browsing through a book on my parents’ bookshelf about …