[lit-ideas] Re: America's Greatest Word
- From: Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Fri, 5 Nov 2010 08:25:09 EDT
In a message dated 11/4/2010 7:32:44 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time,
_jejunejesuit.geary2@xxxxxxxxxx (mailto:jejunejesuit.geary2@xxxxxxxxx) writes:
Well, OK, then. That's settled.
Mike Geary
OK in Memphis
----
It's not as easy as that. There are two problems. The etymological.
"Etymologically speaking, OK means ...". This is the topic of Metcalf's book.
Just one claim. "One proposed induction of okay involves English-speaking
Americans taking up a locally-heard American Indian word."
"The emergence of the expression "OK" coincided with a seminal period in
the development of American popular culture."
"The War of 1812 and the appearance on the American scene of the
frontiersman — both in the flesh and as a national symbol — mark the beginning
of
an indigenous psyche Americana which is strikingly reflected in the flood of
Americanisms originating in the nineteenth century.[23]"
"The Choctaw etymology is not generally accepted today. For example, The
Random House Historical Dictionary of American Slang has four separate
entries for "O.K." and says that "okeh" is the obsolete equivalent of each of
them. It also says that "okeh," ('it is indeed') is a Choctaw expression. But
it nevertheless says that "[w]ithout concrete evidence of a prior and
established English borrowing from Choctaw-Chickasaw" any "derivational
claims"
about a Choctaw etymology are as "gratuitous" as those of the Liberian
Djabo "O-ke," the Mandingo "O ke," or the Ulster Scots "Ough, aye!" [24]"
"The Choctaw expression "okeh" is still occasionally used, sometimes in
rather unexpected contexts[25][26][27] The "O.K. sauce" bottle mystique is
alive and well on the Internet; a Google search of "Masons OK sauce" yields
over 50,000 ebay hits. And there are hundreds of options for downloading
lyrics, soundtracks, videos, tweets, ringtones, etc. of the song "All Mixed
Up"
written by Pete Seeger and recorded by Peter, Paul and Mary in 1964."
You know this language that we speak,
is part German, Latin and part Greek
Celtic and Arabic all in a heap,
well amended by the people in the street.
Choctaw gave us the word "okay"…
"A strength of this etymology of "O.K." is a repeated explicit, intentional
reference to the Choctaw associated with its use as well as the use of
Choctaw loanwords, in particular okeh."
The second problem is Gricean. Granting that OK is an adjective:
A: Is _it_ OK?
B: Yes, it IS OK.
The problem then is the EX-plicature, versus the 'implicature'. In
Tenerife, implicatures did not count and this involved some deaths. But the
explicature is too explicitly forgotten. The OED indicates that "OK" qua
adjective, has 5 'senses' (but Grice objected this: "Do not multiply senses
beyond
necessity" -- his modified Occam's razor):
x is OK
x is 1. all correct
2. all right
3. satisfactory,
4. good;
5. well, in good health or order.
In early use, occas. more intensively:
x is OK
x is 6. outstanding, excellent.
Now freq. in somewhat weakened sense:
x is OK
x is 7. adequate, acceptable. OK by (someone): fine by (a person),
acceptable to (a person).
Chiefly predicative.
x is OK
x is 8. Fashionable,
x is 9. modish;
x is 10. prestigious,
x is 11. high-class.
Of a person:
X is OK
X is 12. decent,
X is 13. trustworthy;
X is 14 congenial.
Also
x is 15. Appropriate, suitable; permissible, allowed.
Freq. with for.
Of a person:
X is 15, comfortable, at ease, content, satisfied;
X is 16 reasonable, understanding. Usu. with about, with.
----- Once you have identified the EX-plicature you can DIS-implicate any
implicature that may attach to it. To do that you need an illustration in a
conversational context. And here, "OK" is hardly an easy 'move' to analyse
in 'conversational American English'.
One etymological claim, for example, has that OK is an English Misspelling
of "O.R." for "Order Received".
"A common mistake in the Western U.S. owing to the similar shapes of the
letters R and K. 1790 !by 1790 Albigence Waldo Putnam 1859
"The 1790 bill of sale "Andrew Jackson, Esq., proved a bill of sale from
Hugh McGary to Gasper Mansker for a negro man, which was O.K." is cited in
Putnam's History of Middle Tennessee; the assertion that the misspelling is
common is added in James Parton's 1860 Life of Andrew Jackson. Woodford
Heflin in 1939 established that the 1790 bill did in fact read "O.R." rather
than "O.K." [2]
As Metcalf notes (and others note) in his book published by the Oxford
University Press: "America's greatest word":
""Okay" can fulfill functions at many level of discourse."
"At the ideational level it functions as an adjective or adverb (Bangerter
and Clark, 2003), it signifies approval, acceptance and confirmation by
the speaker (Condon, 1986; Merritt, 1984), and affirmatively responds to a
question (Guthrie, 1997; Heisler, 1996)."
From the OED, it is clear that OK is best treated as a _VERB_. All others
parts of speech are derivational. On the other hand, the interjectionalists
prefer to see "OK" as an interjection, along with "My God" (short for 'My
God be kind to me').
OED:
adj
All correct, all right; satisfactory, good; well, in good health or order.
In early use, occas. more intensively: outstanding, excellent. Now freq.
in somewhat weakened sense: adequate, acceptable. OK by (someone): fine by
(a person), acceptable to (a person). Chiefly predicative.
Fashionable, modish; prestigious, high-class.
Of a person: decent, trustworthy; congenial.
Appropriate, suitable; permissible, allowed. Freq. with for.
Of a person: comfortable, at ease, content, satisfied; reasonable,
understanding. Usu. with about, with.
int
Expressing assent, concession, or approval, esp. with regard to a previous
statement or question: yes, all right.
a. Appended as an interrogative to a clause, phrase, etc., in expectation
of agreement or approval.
b. Brit. ——rules OK!: asserting the pre-eminence of a specified person or
thing.
Introducing an utterance or as a conversational filler, typically without
affirmative or concessive force, but rather as a means of drawing attention
to what the speaker is about to say: well, so, right.
n
An indication of approval; an endorsement, authorization. Freq. in to give
the OK (to).In early use chiefly with reference to the marking of a
document, etc., with the letters ‘OK’.
adv
Satisfactorily, acceptably.
v
trans. To endorse, esp. by marking with the letters ‘OK’; to approve,
agree to, sanction, or pass. Freq. in pa. pple.
---- as an implicature-carrying particle, OK is frequently discussed, after
seminal work by Grice in this area, as a third turn receipt by a current
speaker (Bangerter and Clark, 2003; Guthrie, 1997; Beach, 1993)."
""Okay" has also been described as serving a variety of text-structural
functions as a marker of information-state transitions."
"Several studies describe this function of okay, frequently, however,
labeling the phenomenon differently (Levin and Gray, 1983; Merritt, 1984;
Condon, 1986; Heisler, 1996; Rendle-Short, 2000; Swales and Malczewski, 2001;
Bangerter and Clark, 2003)."
"Several studies subdivide this structural type of okay, usually, however,
these subdivisions refer to the place where structural okay occurs or to
the type of new section it opens up."
""Okay" functions as a pre-closing device (Schegloff and Sacks, 1973;
Bangerter and Clark, 2003), it marks a return from a digression (Bangerter and
Clark, 2003), functions as a text bracketing device (Rendle-Short, 2000),
occurs in introductory or conclusion position (Levin and Gray, 1983), or as
an attention getter at the beginning of an interaction (Heisler, 1996)."
"Finally "okay" and "alright" are frequently mentioned in their function
of backchannel signal (Heisler, 1996; Swales and Malczewski, 2001)."[173]"
"The 1977 Tenerife airport disaster, in which 583 people were killed, was
blamed in part on a misunderstranding between pilot and air traffic control
over the intended sense of the word "OK". While the controller meant
"understood, stand by", the pilot may have interpreted it as "approved,
proceed". Standard control terminology excludes "OK" precisely to avoid such
ambiguities."
Cheers,
Speranza
The Swimming-Pool Library, etc.
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