#rhetoric — Public Fediverse posts
Live and recent posts from across the Fediverse tagged #rhetoric, aggregated by home.social.
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The Crazy Thing About “Woke 1” Was How It Was Exploited
https://fed.brid.gy/r/https://defector.com/the-crazy-thing-about-woke-1-was-how-it-was-exploited
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The Crazy Thing About “Woke 1” Was How It Was Exploited
https://web.brid.gy/r/https://defector.com/the-crazy-thing-about-woke-1-was-how-it-was-exploited
-
The Crazy Thing About “Woke 1” Was How It Was Exploited
https://web.brid.gy/r/https://defector.com/the-crazy-thing-about-woke-1-was-how-it-was-exploited
-
The Crazy Thing About “Woke 1” Was How It Was Exploited
https://web.brid.gy/r/https://defector.com/the-crazy-thing-about-woke-1-was-how-it-was-exploited
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#Rhetoric has always played a role in #diplomacy & #foreignpolicy, & ancient #history is replete with #advice. Maitreya Thakur (FCDO) discusses rhetorical #multilingualism in the #West & #India.
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#Rhetoric has always played a role in #diplomacy & #foreignpolicy, & ancient #history is replete with #advice. Maitreya Thakur (FCDO) discusses rhetorical #multilingualism in the #West & #India.
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#Rhetoric has always played a role in #diplomacy & #foreignpolicy, & ancient #history is replete with #advice. Maitreya Thakur (FCDO) discusses rhetorical #multilingualism in the #West & #India.
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#Rhetoric has always played a role in #diplomacy & #foreignpolicy, & ancient #history is replete with #advice. Maitreya Thakur (FCDO) discusses rhetorical #multilingualism in the #West & #India.
-
#Rhetoric has always played a role in #diplomacy & #foreignpolicy, & ancient #history is replete with #advice. Maitreya Thakur (FCDO) discusses rhetorical #multilingualism in the #West & #India.
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🟢 NuclearRhetoric | 8/10
🇺🇸 🇮🇷Claim about discussing nuclear weapons against Iran
It has been reported that the use of nuclear weapons against Iran is being discussed in strategy meetings, presented as real rather than speculation. -
🟢 NuclearRhetoric | 8/10
🇺🇸 🇮🇷Claim about discussing nuclear weapons against Iran
It has been reported that the use of nuclear weapons against Iran is being discussed in strategy meetings, presented as real rather than speculation. -
🟢 NuclearRhetoric | 8/10
🇺🇸 🇮🇷Claim about discussing nuclear weapons against Iran
It has been reported that the use of nuclear weapons against Iran is being discussed in strategy meetings, presented as real rather than speculation. -
But I think the American people expect more from us than cries of indignation and attack. The times are too grave, the challenge too urgent, and the stakes too high — to permit the customary passions of political debate. We are not here to curse the darkness, but to light the candle that can guide us through that darkness to a safe and sane future.
John F. Kennedy (1917-1963) American politician, author, journalist, US President (1961–63)
Speech (1960-07-15), “The New Frontier,” Presidential Nomination Acceptance Speech, Democratic National Convention, Memorial Coliseum, Los AngelesMore about this quote: wist.info/kennedy-john/25388/
#quote #quotes #quotation #qotd #johnkennedy #johnfkennedy #jfk #attack #campaign #debate #future #inspiration #politicians #politics #rhetoric
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But I think the American people expect more from us than cries of indignation and attack. The times are too grave, the challenge too urgent, and the stakes too high — to permit the customary passions of political debate. We are not here to curse the darkness, but to light the candle that can guide us through that darkness to a safe and sane future.
John F. Kennedy (1917-1963) American politician, author, journalist, US President (1961–63)
Speech (1960-07-15), “The New Frontier,” Presidential Nomination Acceptance Speech, Democratic National Convention, Memorial Coliseum, Los AngelesMore about this quote: wist.info/kennedy-john/25388/
#quote #quotes #quotation #qotd #johnkennedy #johnfkennedy #jfk #attack #campaign #debate #future #inspiration #politicians #politics #rhetoric
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But I think the American people expect more from us than cries of indignation and attack. The times are too grave, the challenge too urgent, and the stakes too high — to permit the customary passions of political debate. We are not here to curse the darkness, but to light the candle that can guide us through that darkness to a safe and sane future.
John F. Kennedy (1917-1963) American politician, author, journalist, US President (1961–63)
Speech (1960-07-15), “The New Frontier,” Presidential Nomination Acceptance Speech, Democratic National Convention, Memorial Coliseum, Los AngelesMore about this quote: wist.info/kennedy-john/25388/
#quote #quotes #quotation #qotd #johnkennedy #johnfkennedy #jfk #attack #campaign #debate #future #inspiration #politicians #politics #rhetoric
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But I think the American people expect more from us than cries of indignation and attack. The times are too grave, the challenge too urgent, and the stakes too high — to permit the customary passions of political debate. We are not here to curse the darkness, but to light the candle that can guide us through that darkness to a safe and sane future.
John F. Kennedy (1917-1963) American politician, author, journalist, US President (1961–63)
Speech (1960-07-15), “The New Frontier,” Presidential Nomination Acceptance Speech, Democratic National Convention, Memorial Coliseum, Los AngelesMore about this quote: wist.info/kennedy-john/25388/
#quote #quotes #quotation #qotd #johnkennedy #johnfkennedy #jfk #attack #campaign #debate #future #inspiration #politicians #politics #rhetoric
-
But I think the American people expect more from us than cries of indignation and attack. The times are too grave, the challenge too urgent, and the stakes too high — to permit the customary passions of political debate. We are not here to curse the darkness, but to light the candle that can guide us through that darkness to a safe and sane future.
John F. Kennedy (1917-1963) American politician, author, journalist, US President (1961–63)
Speech (1960-07-15), “The New Frontier,” Presidential Nomination Acceptance Speech, Democratic National Convention, Memorial Coliseum, Los AngelesMore about this quote: wist.info/kennedy-john/25388/
#quote #quotes #quotation #qotd #johnkennedy #johnfkennedy #jfk #attack #campaign #debate #future #inspiration #politicians #politics #rhetoric
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Generalizing claims like "narratives are everywhere", "reality consists of contradictions", "life is but a network of practices" etc. are not useful statements that reveal something about the world. Rather they are pleas for a research program that uses narratives, contradictions or practices as a general lens for analysis.
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Generalizing claims like "narratives are everywhere", "reality consists of contradictions", "life is but a network of practices" etc. are not useful statements that reveal something about the world. Rather they are pleas for a research program that uses narratives, contradictions or practices as a general lens for analysis.
-
Generalizing claims like "narratives are everywhere", "reality consists of contradictions", "life is but a network of practices" etc. are not useful statements that reveal something about the world. Rather they are pleas for a research program that uses narratives, contradictions or practices as a general lens for analysis.
-
Generalizing claims like "narratives are everywhere", "reality consists of contradictions", "life is but a network of practices" etc. are not useful statements that reveal something about the world. Rather they are pleas for a research program that uses narratives, contradictions or practices as a general lens for analysis.
-
Generalizing claims like "narratives are everywhere", "reality consists of contradictions", "life is but a network of practices" etc. are not useful statements that reveal something about the world. Rather they are pleas for a research program that uses narratives, contradictions or practices as a general lens for analysis.
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Supposing the sub-disciples of philosophical dialogue were originally Dialectic and Rhetoric as a knowledge of philosophical dialogue cannot advance without a comprehension of them. Why then divide philosophy into metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, aesthetics and logic presupposing the dogma of an empiricist nomenclature?
Answer: To control the direction and minds of the youth, so explaining why the oligarchs executed Socrates as he gave them the dialectic method so they could be free from dogmatic systems of naming! If Aristotle found a way to further undermine the oligarchs abuse of power, it can, and is still being done today. Their time is coming to an end. #philosophy #dialectic #rhetoric #metaphysics #epistemology #ethics #aesthetics #logic #oligarchs #Socrates #Aristotle
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Supposing the sub-disciples of philosophical dialogue were originally Dialectic and Rhetoric as a knowledge of philosophical dialogue cannot advance without a comprehension of them. Why then divide philosophy into metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, aesthetics and logic presupposing the dogma of an empiricist nomenclature?
Answer: To control the direction and minds of the youth, so explaining why the oligarchs executed Socrates as he gave them the dialectic method so they could be free from dogmatic systems of naming! If Aristotle found a way to further undermine the oligarchs abuse of power, it can, and is still being done today. Their time is coming to an end. #philosophy #dialectic #rhetoric #metaphysics #epistemology #ethics #aesthetics #logic #oligarchs #Socrates #Aristotle
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Supposing the sub-disciples of philosophical dialogue were originally Dialectic and Rhetoric as a knowledge of philosophical dialogue cannot advance without a comprehension of them. Why then divide philosophy into metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, aesthetics and logic presupposing the dogma of an empiricist nomenclature?
Answer: To control the direction and minds of the youth, so explaining why the oligarchs executed Socrates as he gave them the dialectic method so they could be free from dogmatic systems of naming! If Aristotle found a way to further undermine the oligarchs abuse of power, it can, and is still being done today. Their time is coming to an end. #philosophy #dialectic #rhetoric #metaphysics #epistemology #ethics #aesthetics #logic #oligarchs #Socrates #Aristotle
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Supposing the sub-disciples of philosophical dialogue were originally Dialectic and Rhetoric as a knowledge of philosophical dialogue cannot advance without a comprehension of them. Why then divide philosophy into metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, aesthetics and logic presupposing the dogma of an empiricist nomenclature?
Answer: To control the direction and minds of the youth, so explaining why the oligarchs executed Socrates as he gave them the dialectic method so they could be free from dogmatic systems of naming! If Aristotle found a way to further undermine the oligarchs abuse of power, it can, and is still being done today. Their time is coming to an end. #philosophy #dialectic #rhetoric #metaphysics #epistemology #ethics #aesthetics #logic #oligarchs #Socrates #Aristotle
-
Supposing the sub-disciples of philosophical dialogue were originally Dialectic and Rhetoric as a knowledge of philosophical dialogue cannot advance without a comprehension of them. Why then divide philosophy into metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, aesthetics and logic presupposing the dogma of an empiricist nomenclature?
Answer: To control the direction and minds of the youth, so explaining why the oligarchs executed Socrates as he gave them the dialectic method so they could be free from dogmatic systems of naming! If Aristotle found a way to further undermine the oligarchs abuse of power, it can, and is still being done today. Their time is coming to an end. #philosophy #dialectic #rhetoric #metaphysics #epistemology #ethics #aesthetics #logic #oligarchs #Socrates #Aristotle
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🟢 Political Statement | 3/10
🇺🇸 🇮🇷President Trump Reposts Article Claiming He 'Won the Iran War'
U.S. President Donald Trump reposted an article on TruthSocial claiming that he 'won the Iran war', signaling a continued hardline stance amid ongoing tensions. -
🟢 Political Statement | 3/10
🇺🇸 🇮🇷President Trump Reposts Article Claiming He 'Won the Iran War'
U.S. President Donald Trump reposted an article on TruthSocial claiming that he 'won the Iran war', signaling a continued hardline stance amid ongoing tensions. -
🟢 Political Statement | 3/10
🇺🇸 🇮🇷President Trump Reposts Article Claiming He 'Won the Iran War'
U.S. President Donald Trump reposted an article on TruthSocial claiming that he 'won the Iran war', signaling a continued hardline stance amid ongoing tensions. -
🟢 Political Statement | 3/10
🇺🇸 🇮🇷President Trump Reposts Article Claiming He 'Won the Iran War'
U.S. President Donald Trump reposted an article on TruthSocial claiming that he 'won the Iran war', signaling a continued hardline stance amid ongoing tensions. -
”This is a distinctive and unique evil. It has always been driven by a hatred above all else, for civilisation itself. It is a revolt of the worst against the best. A revolt of the weak and cowardly against strong and the good. It is perpetuated by those who cannot build and achieve great things and take their revenge by seeking to destroy those who can. This is what radical leftism is.”
This is Marco #Rubio, uttering quintessential #nazi #rhetoric.
Calling him ”Nazi Marco” from now is ok. 😰
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”This is a distinctive and unique evil. It has always been driven by a hatred above all else, for civilisation itself. It is a revolt of the worst against the best. A revolt of the weak and cowardly against strong and the good. It is perpetuated by those who cannot build and achieve great things and take their revenge by seeking to destroy those who can. This is what radical leftism is.”
This is Marco #Rubio, uttering quintessential #nazi #rhetoric.
Calling him ”Nazi Marco” from now is ok. 😰
-
”This is a distinctive and unique evil. It has always been driven by a hatred above all else, for civilisation itself. It is a revolt of the worst against the best. A revolt of the weak and cowardly against strong and the good. It is perpetuated by those who cannot build and achieve great things and take their revenge by seeking to destroy those who can. This is what radical leftism is.”
This is Marco #Rubio, uttering quintessential #nazi #rhetoric.
Calling him ”Nazi Marco” from now is ok. 😰
-
”This is a distinctive and unique evil. It has always been driven by a hatred above all else, for civilisation itself. It is a revolt of the worst against the best. A revolt of the weak and cowardly against strong and the good. It is perpetuated by those who cannot build and achieve great things and take their revenge by seeking to destroy those who can. This is what radical leftism is.”
This is Marco #Rubio, uttering quintessential #nazi #rhetoric.
Calling him ”Nazi Marco” from now is ok. 😰
-
”This is a distinctive and unique evil. It has always been driven by a hatred above all else, for civilisation itself. It is a revolt of the worst against the best. A revolt of the weak and cowardly against strong and the good. It is perpetuated by those who cannot build and achieve great things and take their revenge by seeking to destroy those who can. This is what radical leftism is.”
This is Marco #Rubio, uttering quintessential #nazi #rhetoric.
Calling him ”Nazi Marco” from now is ok. 😰
-
A quotation from Terry Pratchett
“If a thing’s worth doing, it’s worth doing badly,” said Granny, fleeing into aphorisms, the last refuge of an adult under siege.
Terry Pratchett (1948-2015) English author
Discworld No. 3, Equal Rites (1987)More about this quote: wist.info/pratchett-terry/8523…
#quote #quotes #quotation #qotd #terrypratchett #discworld #grannyweatherwax #adage #adult #aphorism #appealtotradition #argument #debate #proverb #rhetoric #saying
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A quotation from Terry Pratchett
“If a thing’s worth doing, it’s worth doing badly,” said Granny, fleeing into aphorisms, the last refuge of an adult under siege.
Terry Pratchett (1948-2015) English author
Discworld No. 3, Equal Rites (1987)More about this quote: wist.info/pratchett-terry/8523…
#quote #quotes #quotation #qotd #terrypratchett #discworld #grannyweatherwax #adage #adult #aphorism #appealtotradition #argument #debate #proverb #rhetoric #saying
-
A quotation from Terry Pratchett
“If a thing’s worth doing, it’s worth doing badly,” said Granny, fleeing into aphorisms, the last refuge of an adult under siege.
Terry Pratchett (1948-2015) English author
Discworld No. 3, Equal Rites (1987)More about this quote: wist.info/pratchett-terry/8523…
#quote #quotes #quotation #qotd #terrypratchett #discworld #grannyweatherwax #adage #adult #aphorism #appealtotradition #argument #debate #proverb #rhetoric #saying
-
A quotation from Terry Pratchett
“If a thing’s worth doing, it’s worth doing badly,” said Granny, fleeing into aphorisms, the last refuge of an adult under siege.
Terry Pratchett (1948-2015) English author
Discworld No. 3, Equal Rites (1987)More about this quote: wist.info/pratchett-terry/8523…
#quote #quotes #quotation #qotd #terrypratchett #discworld #grannyweatherwax #adage #adult #aphorism #appealtotradition #argument #debate #proverb #rhetoric #saying
-
A quotation from Terry Pratchett
“If a thing’s worth doing, it’s worth doing badly,” said Granny, fleeing into aphorisms, the last refuge of an adult under siege.
Terry Pratchett (1948-2015) English author
Discworld No. 3, Equal Rites (1987)More about this quote: wist.info/pratchett-terry/8523…
#quote #quotes #quotation #qotd #terrypratchett #discworld #grannyweatherwax #adage #adult #aphorism #appealtotradition #argument #debate #proverb #rhetoric #saying
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🟢 DiplomaticStatement | 4/10
🇮🇷Iranian Foreign Ministry accuses Europe of hypocrisy and double standards
Spokesperson Esmail Baghaei rejected European human rights lectures, citing European silence on Israeli genocide in Palestine and continued US aggression against Iran. -
🟢 DiplomaticStatement | 4/10
🇮🇷Iranian Foreign Ministry accuses Europe of hypocrisy and double standards
Spokesperson Esmail Baghaei rejected European human rights lectures, citing European silence on Israeli genocide in Palestine and continued US aggression against Iran. -
🟢 DiplomaticStatement | 4/10
🇮🇷Iranian Foreign Ministry accuses Europe of hypocrisy and double standards
Spokesperson Esmail Baghaei rejected European human rights lectures, citing European silence on Israeli genocide in Palestine and continued US aggression against Iran. -
The Lexicon of Pop – Explained
Once upon a time (cliché) I started to study (alliteration and sibilance) rhetoric and figures of speech (tautology), and because I’m an absolute idiot (understatement) I decided to embed the learning by writing a short poem about each one (anti-climax). The results were somewhat less than spectacular (litotes). In fact ‘litotes’, a term describing the figure of speech whereby we state or imply one thing in order to emphasise the opposite (usually for very negative or positive effect) and pronounced, “lih-toe-tees”, was one of the three or four that I managed to write before I gave the whole thing up as a bad idea. See for yourself:
Litotes
Dating him isn’t all bad, she thought. It could be worse
He’s no Adonis, and he doesn’t quite fit in his shirts.
He could tidy up more and his cooking could be better.
And he could use more common sense because he’s not that clever.
He’ll never win an Oscar, never run a marathon,
His sense of fashion in the 80s is something we won’t dwell upon.
I won’t play his CDs in the car until his choices are less dour.
I couldn’t stand to hear him sing much longer in the shower.
I can say all these things to him, although he hates complaints like these
Because surprisingly enough, he’s never heard of litotes.The best thing that you can say about it is that I was inspired by Wendy Cope’s poem “Faint Praise”; a phrase, like the poem it recalls, also being an example of litotes.
I never gave up wanting to learn more about them. I listened to the audiobook of Mark Forsyth’s ‘The Elements of Eloquence’ (sassily and snarkily spoken by Simon Shepherd), I collected new examples that I found in writing and on the web, and I made digital flashcards out of them which helped me understand that I do not learn anything from using flashcards.
And then, one day, while I was in the shower, which is where I often do my best thinking and my worst singing, it occurred to me that in order to learn these figures I needed an appropriate setting. I needed some way of locating them within a context that was both informative and memorable, something that I could readily quote from memory, that would help illustrate concepts and examples. If only there was a way to make it like A-B-C, as easy as 1-2-3, as simple as Do Re Me… and that’s literally how the idea came about. I would, I decided, collect as many rhetorical, grammatical and syntactical devices as I could, and find examples from pop songs to help us all understand them. And by ‘pop’ I really do mean ‘popular music’, and I reserve the right to plunder from rock and R&B, soul and skiffle, glitch and gaba as required.
The last piece of the puzzle was a name. Names are so important to me; they set my mental expectations, like knowing the genre of a book. I needed a name that (like me) was camp, eloquent, and often dressed in a gold lamé suit. And so, taking inspiration from the 12th bestselling album of 1982 in New Zealand, “The Lexicon of Pop” was born.
There’s also a more serious side to this. Like a lot of people in my social media echo chamber, there’s weariness of social media in general. Posting has now become such hard work and the days of “twitter on the shitter” and of spewing 140 characters of word salad every time you have 6 unoccupied seconds are long gone. The emphasis is on such heavy curation, social media is no longer any fun. And that’s not taking into account how hate-filled social media spaces have become; and when they are not hate-filled, they are AI slop-filled. The emphasis on short-form video that is chosen for you destroys any semblance of social; sharing has become asynchronous.
I regularly see Gen X speaking on-line about how much they lament that blogging has died. Not those overly polished travel influencers who get paid to stay in Abu Dhabi hotels, or mummy bloggers who use their children as content. But real people, just talking about their lives, obscure obsessions that they harbour, or random shit that they are into. The comments of those blogs were the original media. That’s where you got to know people.
And that last – random shit – is really where I come in. I love writing, but I struggle when I don’t have a purpose. I worry too much about what the audience needs from me, but that’s what I’m trying to change here. I wanted to pick something that I was hugely into (pop music) alongside a purpose (learning something new about language, but also the mental health benefits of being creative).
“When you blog purely for the intrinsic joy of the craft—the mental exercise of untangling an idea, crafting a sharp sentence, and playing with language—it transforms from a performance into a genuine creative sanctuary.And ironically, that “writing for an audience of one” approach is almost always what produces the best, funniest, and most authentic work. When you aren’t trying to game an algorithm or chase engagement, you have total freedom to be as pedantic, absurd, and ridiculously niche as you want.”
And what could be more pedantic, absurd and ridiculously niche than examining pop music lyrics to learn about language?
-
The Lexicon of Pop – Explained
Once upon a time (cliché) I started to study (alliteration and sibilance) rhetoric and figures of speech (tautology), and because I’m an absolute idiot (understatement) I decided to embed the learning by writing a short poem about each one (anti-climax). The results were somewhat less than spectacular (litotes). In fact ‘litotes’, a term describing the figure of speech whereby we state or imply one thing in order to emphasise the opposite (usually for very negative or positive effect) and pronounced, “lih-toe-tees”, was one of the three or four that I managed to write before I gave the whole thing up as a bad idea. See for yourself:
Litotes
Dating him isn’t all bad, she thought. It could be worse
He’s no Adonis, and he doesn’t quite fit in his shirts.
He could tidy up more and his cooking could be better.
And he could use more common sense because he’s not that clever.
He’ll never win an Oscar, never run a marathon,
His sense of fashion in the 80s is something we won’t dwell upon.
I won’t play his CDs in the car until his choices are less dour.
I couldn’t stand to hear him sing much longer in the shower.
I can say all these things to him, although he hates complaints like these
Because surprisingly enough, he’s never heard of litotes.The best thing that you can say about it is that I was inspired by Wendy Cope’s poem “Faint Praise”; a phrase, like the poem it recalls, also being an example of litotes.
I never gave up wanting to learn more about them. I listened to the audiobook of Mark Forsyth’s ‘The Elements of Eloquence’ (sassily and snarkily spoken by Simon Shepherd), I collected new examples that I found in writing and on the web, and I made digital flashcards out of them which helped me understand that I do not learn anything from using flashcards.
And then, one day, while I was in the shower, which is where I often do my best thinking and my worst singing, it occurred to me that in order to learn these figures I needed an appropriate setting. I needed some way of locating them within a context that was both informative and memorable, something that I could readily quote from memory, that would help illustrate concepts and examples. If only there was a way to make it like A-B-C, as easy as 1-2-3, as simple as Do Re Me… and that’s literally how the idea came about. I would, I decided, collect as many rhetorical, grammatical and syntactical devices as I could, and find examples from pop songs to help us all understand them. And by ‘pop’ I really do mean ‘popular music’, and I reserve the right to plunder from rock and R&B, soul and skiffle, glitch and gaba as required.
The last piece of the puzzle was a name. Names are so important to me; they set my mental expectations, like knowing the genre of a book. I needed a name that (like me) was camp, eloquent, and often dressed in a gold lamé suit. And so, taking inspiration from the 12th bestselling album of 1982 in New Zealand, “The Lexicon of Pop” was born.
There’s also a more serious side to this. Like a lot of people in my social media echo chamber, there’s weariness of social media in general. Posting has now become such hard work and the days of “twitter on the shitter” and of spewing 140 characters of word salad every time you have 6 unoccupied seconds are long gone. The emphasis is on such heavy curation, social media is no longer any fun. And that’s not taking into account how hate-filled social media spaces have become; and when they are not hate-filled, they are AI slop-filled. The emphasis on short-form video that is chosen for you destroys any semblance of social; sharing has become asynchronous.
I regularly see Gen X speaking on-line about how much they lament that blogging has died. Not those overly polished travel influencers who get paid to stay in Abu Dhabi hotels, or mummy bloggers who use their children as content. But real people, just talking about their lives, obscure obsessions that they harbour, or random shit that they are into. The comments of those blogs were the original media. That’s where you got to know people.
And that last – random shit – is really where I come in. I love writing, but I struggle when I don’t have a purpose. I worry too much about what the audience needs from me, but that’s what I’m trying to change here. I wanted to pick something that I was hugely into (pop music) alongside a purpose (learning something new about language, but also the mental health benefits of being creative).
“When you blog purely for the intrinsic joy of the craft—the mental exercise of untangling an idea, crafting a sharp sentence, and playing with language—it transforms from a performance into a genuine creative sanctuary.And ironically, that “writing for an audience of one” approach is almost always what produces the best, funniest, and most authentic work. When you aren’t trying to game an algorithm or chase engagement, you have total freedom to be as pedantic, absurd, and ridiculously niche as you want.”
And what could be more pedantic, absurd and ridiculously niche than examining pop music lyrics to learn about language?
-
The Lexicon of Pop – Explained
Once upon a time (cliché) I started to study (alliteration and sibilance) rhetoric and figures of speech (tautology), and because I’m an absolute idiot (understatement) I decided to embed the learning by writing a short poem about each one (anti-climax). The results were somewhat less than spectacular (litotes). In fact ‘litotes’, a term describing the figure of speech whereby we state or imply one thing in order to emphasise the opposite (usually for very negative or positive effect) and pronounced, “lih-toe-tees”, was one of the three or four that I managed to write before I gave the whole thing up as a bad idea. See for yourself:
Litotes
Dating him isn’t all bad, she thought. It could be worse
He’s no Adonis, and he doesn’t quite fit in his shirts.
He could tidy up more and his cooking could be better.
And he could use more common sense because he’s not that clever.
He’ll never win an Oscar, never run a marathon,
His sense of fashion in the 80s is something we won’t dwell upon.
I won’t play his CDs in the car until his choices are less dour.
I couldn’t stand to hear him sing much longer in the shower.
I can say all these things to him, although he hates complaints like these
Because surprisingly enough, he’s never heard of litotes.The best thing that you can say about it is that I was inspired by Wendy Cope’s poem “Faint Praise”; a phrase, like the poem it recalls, also being an example of litotes.
I never gave up wanting to learn more about them. I listened to the audiobook of Mark Forsyth’s ‘The Elements of Eloquence’ (sassily and snarkily spoken by Simon Shepherd), I collected new examples that I found in writing and on the web, and I made digital flashcards out of them which helped me understand that I do not learn anything from using flashcards.
And then, one day, while I was in the shower, which is where I often do my best thinking and my worst singing, it occurred to me that in order to learn these figures I needed an appropriate setting. I needed some way of locating them within a context that was both informative and memorable, something that I could readily quote from memory, that would help illustrate concepts and examples. If only there was a way to make it like A-B-C, as easy as 1-2-3, as simple as Do Re Me… and that’s literally how the idea came about. I would, I decided, collect as many rhetorical, grammatical and syntactical devices as I could, and find examples from pop songs to help us all understand them. And by ‘pop’ I really do mean ‘popular music’, and I reserve the right to plunder from rock and R&B, soul and skiffle, glitch and gaba as required.
The last piece of the puzzle was a name. Names are so important to me; they set my mental expectations, like knowing the genre of a book. I needed a name that (like me) was camp, eloquent, and often dressed in a gold lamé suit. And so, taking inspiration from the 12th bestselling album of 1982 in New Zealand, “The Lexicon of Pop” was born.
There’s also a more serious side to this. Like a lot of people in my social media echo chamber, there’s weariness of social media in general. Posting has now become such hard work and the days of “twitter on the shitter” and of spewing 140 characters of word salad every time you have 6 unoccupied seconds are long gone. The emphasis is on such heavy curation, social media is no longer any fun. And that’s not taking into account how hate-filled social media spaces have become; and when they are not hate-filled, they are AI slop-filled. The emphasis on short-form video that is chosen for you destroys any semblance of social; sharing has become asynchronous.
I regularly see Gen X speaking on-line about how much they lament that blogging has died. Not those overly polished travel influencers who get paid to stay in Abu Dhabi hotels, or mummy bloggers who use their children as content. But real people, just talking about their lives, obscure obsessions that they harbour, or random shit that they are into. The comments of those blogs were the original media. That’s where you got to know people.
And that last – random shit – is really where I come in. I love writing, but I struggle when I don’t have a purpose. I worry too much about what the audience needs from me, but that’s what I’m trying to change here. I wanted to pick something that I was hugely into (pop music) alongside a purpose (learning something new about language, but also the mental health benefits of being creative).
“When you blog purely for the intrinsic joy of the craft—the mental exercise of untangling an idea, crafting a sharp sentence, and playing with language—it transforms from a performance into a genuine creative sanctuary.And ironically, that “writing for an audience of one” approach is almost always what produces the best, funniest, and most authentic work. When you aren’t trying to game an algorithm or chase engagement, you have total freedom to be as pedantic, absurd, and ridiculously niche as you want.”
And what could be more pedantic, absurd and ridiculously niche than examining pop music lyrics to learn about language?
-
The Lexicon of Pop – Explained
Once upon a time (cliché) I started to study (alliteration and sibilance) rhetoric and figures of speech (tautology), and because I’m an absolute idiot (understatement) I decided to embed the learning by writing a short poem about each one (anti-climax). The results were somewhat less than spectacular (litotes). In fact ‘litotes’, a term describing the figure of speech whereby we state or imply one thing in order to emphasise the opposite (usually for very negative or positive effect) and pronounced, “lih-toe-tees”, was one of the three or four that I managed to write before I gave the whole thing up as a bad idea. See for yourself:
Litotes
Dating him isn’t all bad, she thought. It could be worse
He’s no Adonis, and he doesn’t quite fit in his shirts.
He could tidy up more and his cooking could be better.
And he could use more common sense because he’s not that clever.
He’ll never win an Oscar, never run a marathon,
His sense of fashion in the 80s is something we won’t dwell upon.
I won’t play his CDs in the car until his choices are less dour.
I couldn’t stand to hear him sing much longer in the shower.
I can say all these things to him, although he hates complaints like these
Because surprisingly enough, he’s never heard of litotes.The best thing that you can say about it is that I was inspired by Wendy Cope’s poem “Faint Praise”; a phrase, like the poem it recalls, also being an example of litotes.
I never gave up wanting to learn more about them. I listened to the audiobook of Mark Forsyth’s ‘The Elements of Eloquence’ (sassily and snarkily spoken by Simon Shepherd), I collected new examples that I found in writing and on the web, and I made digital flashcards out of them which helped me understand that I do not learn anything from using flashcards.
And then, one day, while I was in the shower, which is where I often do my best thinking and my worst singing, it occurred to me that in order to learn these figures I needed an appropriate setting. I needed some way of locating them within a context that was both informative and memorable, something that I could readily quote from memory, that would help illustrate concepts and examples. If only there was a way to make it like A-B-C, as easy as 1-2-3, as simple as Do Re Me… and that’s literally how the idea came about. I would, I decided, collect as many rhetorical, grammatical and syntactical devices as I could, and find examples from pop songs to help us all understand them. And by ‘pop’ I really do mean ‘popular music’, and I reserve the right to plunder from rock and R&B, soul and skiffle, glitch and gaba as required.
The last piece of the puzzle was a name. Names are so important to me; they set my mental expectations, like knowing the genre of a book. I needed a name that (like me) was camp, eloquent, and often dressed in a gold lamé suit. And so, taking inspiration from the 12th bestselling album of 1982 in New Zealand, “The Lexicon of Pop” was born.
There’s also a more serious side to this. Like a lot of people in my social media echo chamber, there’s weariness of social media in general. Posting has now become such hard work and the days of “twitter on the shitter” and of spewing 140 characters of word salad every time you have 6 unoccupied seconds are long gone. The emphasis is on such heavy curation, social media is no longer any fun. And that’s not taking into account how hate-filled social media spaces have become; and when they are not hate-filled, they are AI slop-filled. The emphasis on short-form video that is chosen for you destroys any semblance of social; sharing has become asynchronous.
I regularly see Gen X speaking on-line about how much they lament that blogging has died. Not those overly polished travel influencers who get paid to stay in Abu Dhabi hotels, or mummy bloggers who use their children as content. But real people, just talking about their lives, obscure obsessions that they harbour, or random shit that they are into. The comments of those blogs were the original media. That’s where you got to know people.
And that last – random shit – is really where I come in. I love writing, but I struggle when I don’t have a purpose. I worry too much about what the audience needs from me, but that’s what I’m trying to change here. I wanted to pick something that I was hugely into (pop music) alongside a purpose (learning something new about language, but also the mental health benefits of being creative).
“When you blog purely for the intrinsic joy of the craft—the mental exercise of untangling an idea, crafting a sharp sentence, and playing with language—it transforms from a performance into a genuine creative sanctuary.And ironically, that “writing for an audience of one” approach is almost always what produces the best, funniest, and most authentic work. When you aren’t trying to game an algorithm or chase engagement, you have total freedom to be as pedantic, absurd, and ridiculously niche as you want.”
And what could be more pedantic, absurd and ridiculously niche than examining pop music lyrics to learn about language?
-
The Lexicon of Pop – Explained
Once upon a time (cliché) I started to study (alliteration and sibilance) rhetoric and figures of speech (tautology), and because I’m an absolute idiot (understatement) I decided to embed the learning by writing a short poem about each one (anti-climax). The results were somewhat less than spectacular (litotes). In fact ‘litotes’, a term describing the figure of speech whereby we state or imply one thing in order to emphasise the opposite (usually for very negative or positive effect) and pronounced, “lih-toe-tees”, was one of the three or four that I managed to write before I gave the whole thing up as a bad idea. See for yourself:
Litotes
Dating him isn’t all bad, she thought. It could be worse
He’s no Adonis, and he doesn’t quite fit in his shirts.
He could tidy up more and his cooking could be better.
And he could use more common sense because he’s not that clever.
He’ll never win an Oscar, never run a marathon,
His sense of fashion in the 80s is something we won’t dwell upon.
I won’t play his CDs in the car until his choices are less dour.
I couldn’t stand to hear him sing much longer in the shower.
I can say all these things to him, although he hates complaints like these
Because surprisingly enough, he’s never heard of litotes.The best thing that you can say about it is that I was inspired by Wendy Cope’s poem “Faint Praise”; a phrase, like the poem it recalls, also being an example of litotes.
I never gave up wanting to learn more about them. I listened to the audiobook of Mark Forsyth’s ‘The Elements of Eloquence’ (sassily and snarkily spoken by Simon Shepherd), I collected new examples that I found in writing and on the web, and I made digital flashcards out of them which helped me understand that I do not learn anything from using flashcards.
And then, one day, while I was in the shower, which is where I often do my best thinking and my worst singing, it occurred to me that in order to learn these figures I needed an appropriate setting. I needed some way of locating them within a context that was both informative and memorable, something that I could readily quote from memory, that would help illustrate concepts and examples. If only there was a way to make it like A-B-C, as easy as 1-2-3, as simple as Do Re Me… and that’s literally how the idea came about. I would, I decided, collect as many rhetorical, grammatical and syntactical devices as I could, and find examples from pop songs to help us all understand them. And by ‘pop’ I really do mean ‘popular music’, and I reserve the right to plunder from rock and R&B, soul and skiffle, glitch and gaba as required.
The last piece of the puzzle was a name. Names are so important to me; they set my mental expectations, like knowing the genre of a book. I needed a name that (like me) was camp, eloquent, and often dressed in a gold lamé suit. And so, taking inspiration from the 12th bestselling album of 1982 in New Zealand, “The Lexicon of Pop” was born.
There’s also a more serious side to this. Like a lot of people in my social media echo chamber, there’s weariness of social media in general. Posting has now become such hard work and the days of “twitter on the shitter” and of spewing 140 characters of word salad every time you have 6 unoccupied seconds are long gone. The emphasis is on such heavy curation, social media is no longer any fun. And that’s not taking into account how hate-filled social media spaces have become; and when they are not hate-filled, they are AI slop-filled. The emphasis on short-form video that is chosen for you destroys any semblance of social; sharing has become asynchronous.
I regularly see Gen X speaking on-line about how much they lament that blogging has died. Not those overly polished travel influencers who get paid to stay in Abu Dhabi hotels, or mummy bloggers who use their children as content. But real people, just talking about their lives, obscure obsessions that they harbour, or random shit that they are into. The comments of those blogs were the original media. That’s where you got to know people.
And that last – random shit – is really where I come in. I love writing, but I struggle when I don’t have a purpose. I worry too much about what the audience needs from me, but that’s what I’m trying to change here. I wanted to pick something that I was hugely into (pop music) alongside a purpose (learning something new about language, but also the mental health benefits of being creative).
“When you blog purely for the intrinsic joy of the craft—the mental exercise of untangling an idea, crafting a sharp sentence, and playing with language—it transforms from a performance into a genuine creative sanctuary.And ironically, that “writing for an audience of one” approach is almost always what produces the best, funniest, and most authentic work. When you aren’t trying to game an algorithm or chase engagement, you have total freedom to be as pedantic, absurd, and ridiculously niche as you want.”
And what could be more pedantic, absurd and ridiculously niche than examining pop music lyrics to learn about language?
-
I don't understand.
An allegedly "scholar' account because he quoted allegedly another "scholar",
"... LLMs are so costly that companies externalize the costs on a massive scale - on those who don't use them and society at large. Increased hardware prices... "
Externalise means outsourcing - they didn't offload the cost, it is just basic supply and demand that drove up the prices. That's just how economy works, doesn't it?
Unless he has solid evidences of direct cash flow between hardware companies and LLM developers - how do they externalise their costs?
Corporations benefit from stock prices, market demands, and offer discounts to customers aren't news.
Where has the logic gone?
-
I don't understand.
An allegedly "scholar' account because he quoted allegedly another "scholar",
"... LLMs are so costly that companies externalize the costs on a massive scale - on those who don't use them and society at large. Increased hardware prices... "
Externalise means outsourcing - they didn't offload the cost, it is just basic supply and demand that drove up the prices. That's just how economy works, doesn't it?
Unless he has solid evidences of direct cash flow between hardware companies and LLM developers - how do they externalise their costs?
Corporations benefit from stock prices, market demands, and offer discounts to customers aren't news.
Where has the logic gone?
-
🎭 Behold, an exposé on the art of "lofty rhetoric" 🤡—because nothing says "internal dissent" like crafting marketing slogans for the #tech overlords. 📢 Bravo, #New #Yorker, for another illuminating piece on the complexities of Googler life, complete with the rebel tale of a #corporate #bard. 👏
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/the-weekend-essay/the-voice-of-google #lofty #rhetoric #internal #dissent #culture #HackerNews #ngated -
🎭 Behold, an exposé on the art of "lofty rhetoric" 🤡—because nothing says "internal dissent" like crafting marketing slogans for the #tech overlords. 📢 Bravo, #New #Yorker, for another illuminating piece on the complexities of Googler life, complete with the rebel tale of a #corporate #bard. 👏
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/the-weekend-essay/the-voice-of-google #lofty #rhetoric #internal #dissent #culture #HackerNews #ngated -
🎭 Behold, an exposé on the art of "lofty rhetoric" 🤡—because nothing says "internal dissent" like crafting marketing slogans for the #tech overlords. 📢 Bravo, #New #Yorker, for another illuminating piece on the complexities of Googler life, complete with the rebel tale of a #corporate #bard. 👏
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/the-weekend-essay/the-voice-of-google #lofty #rhetoric #internal #dissent #culture #HackerNews #ngated -
🎭 Behold, an exposé on the art of "lofty rhetoric" 🤡—because nothing says "internal dissent" like crafting marketing slogans for the #tech overlords. 📢 Bravo, #New #Yorker, for another illuminating piece on the complexities of Googler life, complete with the rebel tale of a #corporate #bard. 👏
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/the-weekend-essay/the-voice-of-google #lofty #rhetoric #internal #dissent #culture #HackerNews #ngated -
🎭 Behold, an exposé on the art of "lofty rhetoric" 🤡—because nothing says "internal dissent" like crafting marketing slogans for the #tech overlords. 📢 Bravo, #New #Yorker, for another illuminating piece on the complexities of Googler life, complete with the rebel tale of a #corporate #bard. 👏
https://www.newyorker.com/culture/the-weekend-essay/the-voice-of-google #lofty #rhetoric #internal #dissent #culture #HackerNews #ngated -
Does anyone have opinions on O? When it's genuinely being used for apostrophe (the figure of speech), as a kind of cheep-ass vocative, "O death", etc, I still like to use it, because it's distinguished from the more general interjection for someone who's probably actually present, or to indicate disappointment, a sudden thought, etc. So you'd have
O death, where is thy sting
but
Oh, death, before you go, you left your soup spoon here last week
I know apostrophe isn't very popular in general these days, but where it's used, I think it helps to distinguish it from other uses. But some people are saying O is archaic even when apostrophe is intended.
What do folk think?
-
Does anyone have opinions on O? When it's genuinely being used for apostrophe (the figure of speech), as a kind of cheep-ass vocative, "O death", etc, I still like to use it, because it's distinguished from the more general interjection for someone who's probably actually present, or to indicate disappointment, a sudden thought, etc. So you'd have
O death, where is thy sting
but
Oh, death, before you go, you left your soup spoon here last week
I know apostrophe isn't very popular in general these days, but where it's used, I think it helps to distinguish it from other uses. But some people are saying O is archaic even when apostrophe is intended.
What do folk think?
-
Does anyone have opinions on O? When it's genuinely being used for apostrophe (the figure of speech), as a kind of cheep-ass vocative, "O death", etc, I still like to use it, because it's distinguished from the more general interjection for someone who's probably actually present, or to indicate disappointment, a sudden thought, etc. So you'd have
O death, where is thy sting
but
Oh, death, before you go, you left your soup spoon here last week
I know apostrophe isn't very popular in general these days, but where it's used, I think it helps to distinguish it from other uses. But some people are saying O is archaic even when apostrophe is intended.
What do folk think?
-
Does anyone have opinions on O? When it's genuinely being used for apostrophe (the figure of speech), as a kind of cheep-ass vocative, "O death", etc, I still like to use it, because it's distinguished from the more general interjection for someone who's probably actually present, or to indicate disappointment, a sudden thought, etc. So you'd have
O death, where is thy sting
but
Oh, death, before you go, you left your soup spoon here last week
I know apostrophe isn't very popular in general these days, but where it's used, I think it helps to distinguish it from other uses. But some people are saying O is archaic even when apostrophe is intended.
What do folk think?