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You’re listening to A Way with Words.

I’m Martha Barnette.

And I’m Grant Barrett.

You know, Martha, this past weekend, I went to the California State Railroad Museum in Sacramento.

It’s a great fun.

It’s the shape of a roundhouse, massive trains.

And while I was there, I was with the family and cousins and the like,

I heard something that really just struck me as perfect.

It’s a kind of language that I think is mostly gone now, but I think most Americans will recognize it.

It’s the sound of a train conductor calling out the stops for a train as you’re boarding.

He’s listing off the cities that this train is going to visit, and then he tells you to climb aboard.

But what happens is he says it in a particular way.

It’s like the peanut vendors at Yankee Stadium.

I’m just kind of making this up because I don’t remember his exact wording,

But it was something like San Francisco, Santa Cruz, San Jose, Los Angeles, born.

Like that.

Very nice.

And, you know, just list the cities because this is the, you know, you’re getting on the train.

It’s the start of the route, right?

And these are the cities that it’s going to visit, you know.

And, of course, you can’t talk about this without mentioning Mel Blanc and his joking train conductor.

But that’s kind of the thing that I’m remembering, you know.

Anaheim, Azusa, and Cucamonga.

All aboard!

And he doesn’t say all aboard.

He says board.

He just kind of corrupts it.

And what really struck me about it, besides the fact that it’s got this just,

There’s something kind of beautiful about it,

What really struck me is that it’s a really perfect micro example

Of how language changes in the mouth of one person.

He says this thing so many times and so often that it’s not all aboard anymore.

It’s bored, or it’s even just bore, you know, without the D and the all,

And it’s all kind of gone.

But you know what he’s saying because of the circumstances, the environment, the thing that you’re expecting him to say.

It’s just it was just kind of beautiful.

Yeah, it’s really lyrical.

Although I remember the first time I used to take the train from New York City to Poughkeepsie on a regular basis to go to school.

And the first time I came up from the south and heard them saying,

I had no idea where we were going.

You know, people get so used to hearing it that it’s really jarring the first time you do hear it because you’re listening for the names of towns and you don’t recognize them.

Right.

Well, all aboard!

If you want to talk about language, words and phrases, grammar, slang, jargon at your place of work, give us a shout.

1-877-929-9673.

That’s 1-877-W-A-Y-W-O-R-D.

Or send an email to words@waywordradio.org.

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, my name is Lisa, and I’m calling from Encinitas in San Diego County, California.

Hello, Lisa.

Hi.

Well, welcome to the program, Lisa.

What’s up?

Well, I am around a lot of young people.

I teach writing lessons, and of course, we’re always chatting and, you know, kind of talking to each other and having a good time.

And lately, I have used, I guess I’m getting a little older, and my vernacular isn’t quite what it used to be.

It’s so hard being 27, isn’t it?

Yeah, plus, plus, plus.

Let me just stop here a second.

You said riding lessons or writing lessons?

Riding.

Riding horses.

As in horses.

Horses.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So we have a lot of fun.

And the other day it was a little funny because one of the girls said something and I said,

Shut up, like, you know, as an exclamation.

And she looked at me like, why would you tell me to shut up?

And I think I hurt her feelings a little bit.

Oh, she didn’t get that?

No, she didn’t, and I thought I delivered it properly.

I don’t know.

How old is she?

12, 13.

Okay, and you are?

Let’s say I’m almost 50.

Okay.

And so, you know, I just was wondering if there was a, not that, you know, I have to be, you know, hip-hop or anything.

If there’s just some updating I can do to my vocabulary to, you know, not offend the kids.

Well, I have to be honest.

I thought people were still using shut-ups.

Yeah, I did too.

I didn’t know.

Yeah, I’ve been burned on this a couple times.

You know what we’re talking about, right, Martha?

I think.

This is the shut-up that just means, oh, you’re full of it or something.

Yeah, the disbelieving shut-up like Elaine used to do on Seinfeld, right?

Exactly.

That’s where you picked it up, Lisa.

Yeah.

Okay.

Or the Princess Diaries with Anne Hathaway.

There’s a clip that they played a million times when they were promoing this movie where she says,

Shut up, like all four.

So it’s just basically a way of saying, you know, I don’t believe you.

Yeah, like astonishment.

Okay.

I don’t know what the kids are saying.

I don’t either.

I thought that they were saying that.

But you know what we could do just to mix it up?

Maybe you should go even further back and get some archaic expressions.

Oh, I’m all over that.

Are you?

Yeah, that’s right in my childhood.

Well, one that I like, which I think is great, and you’ll see it in old movies,

And I don’t think anybody uses it really anymore, maybe except with some irony,

Is get out or get out of town or get out of here.

How about this one?

Do you remember?

What you talking about, Willis?

Yeah, that one’s totally.

No, I don’t.

Yeah.

You never saw that?

No, who’s Willis?

What you talking about, Willis?

With Gary Coleman on the, what was that, Facts of Life or something?

We love that show.

Yeah, we say that all the time around the house, but I know that one’s going to be lost.

Yeah, yeah, that’s done.

But believe it or not, using shut up as a form of disbelief, according to the New Partridge Dictionary of Slang, goes back to the 1960s.

Shut up.

Yeah, serious.

Wow.

Another one which I like, well, it’s kind of like get out of here as a form of disbelief, is go on.

Yeah.

Oh, I like that.

Go on.

Well, I’m glad you’re excited about these, Lisa, because I think they all sound sort of pedestrian.

I mean, I’m picturing them.

Martha’s still using the slang of the 40s.

Well, I’ve got to tell you, though, inadvertently, you’ve resurrected the shut up for me.

Knowing that it comes from the 1960s now, to me, that’s classic, baby.

Yeah.

Oh, I see.

I’m sticking with my shut up.

That’s right.

So go retro, Lisa.

Yeah.

Okay.

I think no way actually still has a lot of legs, even though that’s something that I remember from my childhood in the 80s and the 90s.

Oh, yeah.

Oh, please.

Yeah.

Oh, please.

So let’s just set this scenario up.

You’re riding horses.

Well, most of this takes place when we’re getting the horses ready.

Okay.

Right.

Or hanging out.

Putting in saddles, got the curry comb going, whatever.

Tightening straps.

And the girls are talking about, yeah, and then he kissed me and you need something to say.

And shut up is an expression of disbelief that they’re not getting.

So you need to say, no way.

And then they’ll go, way.

Yeah.

Do they still do that?

I don’t know.

Yes, we do.

We do actually.

No way is still reliable.

But it doesn’t work quite as well unless you get the response.

You have to volley and then get the volley back.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Way, yeah, way.

Way, way, way.

Totes, totes way.

Excellent.

Well, Lisa, I hope we’ve been some help.

It sounds like you’ve got a good thing going there with the girls

And a chance to kind of keep touch with your childhood.

Yeah, yeah.

They keep me young.

Thank you guys so much.

Take care.

Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

If you’ve got something you want to share,

Do you want to keep touch with your roots?

Do you want to find out what children are saying today?

Give us a call.

We don’t know either.

Maybe you can tell us.

1-877-929-9673.

That’s 1-877-WAYWORD.

Shut up.

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hey, guys.

It’s Jeff from Alexandria, Virginia.

Hi, Jeff.

What’s going on, Jeff?

Welcome to the program.

Thanks.

My partner was born and raised on Tobacco Road in North Carolina, and he moved up to D.C.

About 15 years ago to be with me, and shortly after that, he was cleaning out leaves from

The gutter, and he came inside, and he looked at me and said,

I would have liked to fall off the ladder.

And I looked at him kind of weirdly, and I said, why did you want to fall off the ladder?

And he said, oh, I didn’t want to fall off it, but I sure would have liked to.

So, you know, over the years I’ve come to understand that like to or would have liked to is a southernism for I came close to or I almost did.

But what I find so weird is, at least when he uses it, it’s usually in a physical sense.

Like I came close to doing something or I almost did something, and it’s almost always a negative outcome.

I would have liked to run over that woman on the way home.

And I look at them, I’m thinking, is it road rage or is it, you know, a tragic accident?

So my question is really how did like come to mean in Southernism come to mean, you know, close to or almost?

Or is that y’all’s experience?

Oh, it’s definitely my experience.

My folks are from western North Carolina, and Aunt Mazo said that all the time.

I’d like to falling off of my chair.

My family from southeast Missouri has got a dose of that as well.

Oh, yeah?

Yeah, yeah.

You like to do something.

I’d like to die is a very common one.

Right.

Usually about something embarrassing.

Yeah, and you don’t want to do it.

But I think the idea is just that like has to do with similarity.

And when you’re talking about a near miss, it’s sort of as if.

And it just evolved into using it for not only good outcomes but bad outcomes.

Yeah, you know, and it’s been around for a long time, not just in the South.

Shakespeare used it in As You Like It.

Oh, wow.

Touchstone says, I have had four quarrels and like to have fought one.

I love it.

There’s a quality about that expression that immediately tells me that I’m going to be comfortable with the person using it.

Well, he’s full of, you know, nice Southernisms, but that wouldn’t confuse me for quite a while.

I should say that, you know, it is definitely a Southernism.

There’s a beautiful little map in the Dictionary of American Regional English that shows all these little dots in the Southern United States.

It’s so Southern, it’s not even funny, this expression.

Now, people in the North may know it.

They may recognize it and understand it if they hear it, but they definitely don’t, for the most part, use it.

Okay.

Well, it sounds like you guys have worked it out.

You’ve been comfortable with each other for 15 years now.

Yeah, I still like him.

There we go.

And he didn’t fall off the ladder, so we’re happy about that.

No, he would have liked to, but he didn’t.

Very nice.

Well, thanks for calling, Jeff.

Thanks, Jeff.

Thanks, guys.

All right.

Bye-bye.

Yeah, we’d love to hear your cross-cultural encounters with people from other parts of America.

Give us a call, 1-877-929-9673, or send an email to words@waywordradio.org.

You know, Grant, you got me thinking about those things that railroad conductors say, like Peekskill and Croton-Hawman and that kind of thing.

And I keep thinking about that because it strikes me that, I don’t know, I’m feeling really nostalgic about those days when you could hear that kind of thing because you don’t always anymore.

I’ve been on so many metro lines recently where the voice is prerecorded and kind of disembodied in a way.

The next stop will be, you know.

Stand clear of the closing doors, please.

Boom, boom.

Yeah.

Mind the gap.

You know, we’ve kind of lost something there.

I mean, not to get too maudlin about it.

But there’s still, you know, I was in New York through the transition from the live conductor giving those messages to the recorded voices on the new trains.

And frankly, for one thing, you can actually hear them on the new trains even if they’re recording.

That’s kind of nice.

But there’s still room for interpretation there.

My wife and I used to make fun of a particular train in Brooklyn where the woman says, next stop, Burrell Hall.

And she says it in a weird way.

I don’t know if she was told to say it like that.

I’m kind of exaggerating for effect, but it’s like, next stop, Burrell Hall.

Anybody who’s lived in Brooklyn and rode this particular train line will know what I’m talking about.

Oh, man.

I’ve got a link for you, Martha.

We’ll put this on the website.

It’s Voices in the Deep.

This is sound files from metros and subways around the world.

Oh, wow.

It’s beautiful.

Something lost but something gained, right?

We’ll put that on the website.

Oh, man.

Got my Friday night planned out now.

Thanks.

If you want to share your memories of something that used to be said over and over in public places,

Give us a call, 1-877-929-9673.

Or you can send your memories to words@waywordradio.org.

You’re listening to A Way with Words.

I’m Grant Barrett.

And I’m Martha Barnette.

And joining us now is our quiz guy, Sir John Chaneski.

Oh, I’m a sir now.

That’s great.

You are.

Arthur, Grant, how are you?

Good to see you.

Good to see you.

All right.

That’s your surname.

My surname.

Ouch.

Today’s quiz is all about names they give to dances in different places.

What kind of dance might you do at a country house in Russia?

A, oh.

Dacha something.

Right.

I think a dacha cha cha cha.

Sure, you might do some sort of Russian dance, but I think it would be more appropriate to do a dance that has the rhythm, you know, one, two, one, two, three, because it would be a dacha cha cha cha.

Now, each of the following will have a rhyming answer, all describing types of dances.

Okay, here’s the first one.

If Carmen Miranda limited her fruity headdress to certain large ovoid tropical fruits, what kind of dance would be most appropriate for her?

She’d do it in mango-go boots?

Mango-go boots.

That’s a nice alternate answer.

That’s for a different puzzle, though.

What kind of rhyme with mango?

Oh, tango.

Mango-tango.

Yes, very good.

Oh, she’d do a mango-tango.

She would do a mango-tango, yes.

Okay.

I got it.

Okay.

Now, speaking of dancing with the stars, I see a lot of this next rhyme.

That is to say, many missteps while dancing to the music of Johann Strauss.

False waltz?

Say again?

Klutz waltz is what I said, and she said false waltz.

False is close.

Waltz is right, but the word I’m looking for rhymes more precisely than false.

Oh.

Haltz, waltz?

Faltz.

Faltz, waltz, false.

We see a lot of waltz, faults on Dancing with the Stars.

Gotcha.

Gotcha, gotcha, gotcha.

Here’s another one.

I recently hired an assistant.

He’s sort of a gentleman’s gentleman.

Well, at least one of us is a gentleman.

Anyway, he’s a colorful character.

While he works, he indulges himself in dancing about, performing pliés and pirouettes.

Yeah.

So he does a valet ballet?

He does a valet ballet.

Yeah, it’s very good.

Thank you.

Okay.

Now, do you think lumberjacks would be caught dead performing a traditional Appalachian social dance

In which the dancer’s footwear beats a percussive rhythm?

Clogging something.

Something clogging.

Logging clogging.

Logging clogging.

Good teamwork there.

Good work, guys.

Good work.

A friend of mine works at one of the biggest communications and technology companies.

Now, I suggest that their lunchtime to be taken up with moving and grooving to the Bee Gees, Donna Summer and such.

Okay, so Cisco Disco?

Cisco Disco, yes.

Cisco Systems.

Disco Systems.

Cisco Disco.

Okay.

Now, you have to be careful at those things, by the way.

You know, I once got into quite a Donnybroke over my Tony Manero impersonation.

Do you know what that was called?

Let’s see.

Not a Saturday night fight.

No.

Nice.

Think of a certain disco dance that rhymes with a Donnybrook.

Oh, a certain.

A hustle tussle.

A hustle tussle, yes.

Oh, nice.

I got into a hustle tussle.

It may not have been the dance. It may have been my use of the word Donnybrook that got me into the fight.

Now, this is not very green, but, hey, you know, if you’re going to ignore trash cans and just toss your garbage on the street, you may as well be entertaining while doing it.

Try this wild type of swing dance popular in the 1930s.

The Litterbug Jitterbug?

The Litterbug Jitterbug, yes.

Very good.

And here’s the last. You know, a funky but easy-to-do dance from the 50s and 60s might not seem appropriate for Hungarian Rhapsody No. 1, but I think the composer might find it fun.

It’s not a list twist.

Funky dance.

What is it?

Funky.

Is it the twist?

Oh, yeah.

The list twist?

Is that what you said?

The list twist.

That’s very good.

Martha, nice work.

Nice going, guys.

Good teamwork once again.

Oh, no.

I think I was carried through that one.

I see Martha’s footsteps in the sand.

Oh, so you’re doing that kind of dance where she carries you and stuff like that?

I don’t even want to see that.

There are two left feet there in the sand.

But that’s the quiz, guys.

You were great.

Thanks very much.

All right.

Well, thank you, John.

We’ll talk to you again real soon, I hope.

Good.

Save a dance for me.

And when are we going to get the ones that I can do easily?

They’re coming right up.

Next one.

Okay.

Bye, John.

Bye.

Bye-bye.

If you want to talk about language, call us 1-877-929-9673 or send an email to words@waywordradio.org.

Hello.

You have A Way with Words.

Hi.

My name is Michelle, and I’m from Dallas, Texas.

Hi, Michelle.

Welcome to the program.

Thank you.

I’ve always wondered about the word ouch.

Is it a universal word or is it something you learn?

I mean, do people in German, when they stub their toe, do they say ouch? Or people in France, when they stub their toe, do they say ouch or do they say a different word?

Yes.

It’s funny you should bring up German because the Germans actually use ouch as well.

They spell it differently, but it sounds exactly the same.

Yeah, what is it?

A-U-T-S-C-H, right?

That’s right, yeah, ouch.

And they might also say, ow, too, and spell it a little differently.

But they’re not universal.

Every language does have these interjections that you’d say if you stub your toe or slam your fingers in a corridor or something like that.

Oh, that’s a nice word for it, interjection.

I’m going to say that next time I stub my toe.

Interjection.

Well, Michelle, it’s a class of language that you say kind of without thinking about it, right?

Yes.

Martha, do you know what the French say?

The French, they have a few.

They might say, ay, like that, or, oh, yeah, oh, yeah, or, oh, yeah, yeah, like that.

Ow, la, la.

Well, they get those weird French vowels.

You know those French vowels, Michelle?

They go, oh, yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

And then the Spanish, as Martha will tell you, say, ay, or ay, or ay, ay, ay, which is, we know as English speakers so well that it’s kind of part of our parody of Spanish speakers, right?

Ay, ay, ay.

Yeah, exactly.

There is a lot of similarity here.

They’re short.

They’re quick.

They’re vowel-heavy, easy to say.

They don’t require a lot of elaboration.

They’ve just kind of come out of your mouth.

And a lot of times, they don’t really have any semantic content, if that makes sense.

They don’t necessarily contain within them any other value except to say, wow, I’m surprised and I’m a little hurt.

So it is something that we learn.

It’s not something…

Yeah.

Yeah, the French don’t have the same one, say, as the Norwegians.

It’s similar, but it’s not exactly the same.

We do learn them, but every language does have one.

We apparently have a role as human beings for some kind of expression to say when we do something foolish to ourselves.

Is there a word that’s universal just among humans, do you know?

Something that all humans say the same, regardless of what language.

I think that there might be, this is going to sound crazy.

There’s a bit of Hollywood insider kind of a joke.

There’s a sound clip that they play that was originally from the 1950s that they always use to refer to, or in scenes in movies and have for decades where somebody is falling or being impaled or the dinosaur is eating them or something like that.

I forget what it’s called.

Do you know what I’m talking about, Martha?

No, I have no idea, but I want to know.

It’s named after the character in the first movie in the 1950s, and it’s this, like that.

I know what you’re talking about, sure.

And I think, yeah, once you hear it, you’ll hear it in movie after movie.

I think that this is really close, in my opinion.

I mean, I’m not a scientist or anything, but in my opinion, I think it’s really close to the thing that you would say if in real life you were impaled or shot with an arrow or a dinosaur ate your leg.

Okay.

Well, that’s interesting.

I mean, we just, you know, we expel what’s ever in our lungs.

And it passes through our vocal cords.

And it’s a contentless utterance.

There’s no words to it and very little articulation.

It’s full force as much as we can do.

And it expresses our angst and agony.

Okay. Well, thank you.

I’ve always wondered about that.

Oh, it’s the Wilhelm.

The Wilhelm? Come on.

The Wilhelm. It’s called the Wilhelm.

Google it.

Of course, Wikipedia, which is poor on most academic subjects, but very great on pop culture, has a great page on it.

The Wilhelm?

The Wilhelm.

The scream is known as the wheel helm.

Okay, Michelle, you have your work cut out for you.

I would claim, Michelle, that that’s as close to universal as you can get.

Oh, my gosh.

Okay, well, thank you very much.

I appreciate it.

Super duper.

Thanks for calling, Michelle.

Okay, great question.

Thanks.

Thanks.

Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

If you’ve got a question about those common things that all of us humans share that are somehow vaguely related to expressions of emotion or language, give us a call, 1-877-929-9673, or send an email to words@waywordradio.org.

Hi, you have A Way with Words.

Hello, this is Dean calling from Lake Bay, Washington.

Hi-yo, Dean.

Hello, Dean.

Hi.

Are you on a lake then? Or a bay?

No, that’s just, actually we’re on Puget Sound.

Oh, okay.

All right.

I don’t know, I’m not quite sure how they got that name.

Okay.

All right.

Well, what’s up?

Well, I served in Vietnam, and I was assigned to a unit, and my job was I was a Kam Sha artist, and I procured excess psychological material. Basically, I appropriated things that weren’t tied down. For example, if we had refrigerators in the Mekong Delta, but we didn’t have the regulators, the regulators were up in Da Nang, I would go up to Da Nang and bring down the regulators.

You were reappropriating military material or you were taking it from the locals?

No, no, no.

No, we were, since I was in the Navy, we were getting it mostly from the Army.

Oh, yeah, yeah.

Always good to pick on the other services.

So you were borrowing it, is that right, permanently?

That’s right, with the intent not to return.

I see.

Taking it from Uncle Sam’s left pocket and putting it in his right pocket.

That is right, sir.

So you must have been pretty popular in the unit, right?

If you needed something, you came to see me.

I see.

Yeah, you know, I’ve seen this character in the movies. It’s kind of a stock character, but I never realized that those were kind of, every unit probably had one or every group of any real size, right?

Yes.

And so your question then is, what in the heck is a Kamsha artist, right?

Yes, sir.

Yeah.

All right, here’s the thing. We actually know, I think, with almost near certainty, where this word comes from.

Oh, how fast.

And it’s usually spelled in English, C-U-M-S-H-A-W, Cumshaw. And this is, you said you were in the Navy?

Yes, sir.

Yes, and it is well known in the Navy, but it has existed in other services. And the history of this word goes back, oh, I don’t know how far.

To at least the 1920s in this particular form, to refer to somebody in the military who is kind of a fixer slash thief.

If we can just lay the word out there, somebody who goes and kind of defeats the bureaucracy of the military to get things done so that a unit or a division or a company can operate at like a reasonable level.

You know, they get the gasoline for the Jeeps that have empty tanks, right? They find the tires when tires are needed, and they bring the whiskey when a party is called for, right?

Yes.

All of the dictionaries that you’ll check will tell you that it probably comes from the Xiamen or Amoi dialect of Chinese, which is from the Fujian province.

And it’s transliterated into Roman characters as Kamsia, K-A-M-S-I-A, with a long A.

And it roughly means grateful thanks in that language.

And for a long time, as far back as the 1800s, when the Brits were in that part of the world, they would often encounter beggars or supplicants or mendicants of some sort who would ask for things, and they would constantly just say this phrase over and over, Kamsia, Kamsia, as a way of asking for money.

You know, just say it, and then you give them money, and they go away.

But by association with the beggars, it came to mean a present, a bribe, or a gift.

And you will find this word kamshal then, which is the kind of corruption of it, you’ll find this word kumshaw used in manifests for shipping where they talk about the port duties that they paid and they use this word.

They use the word kumshaw.

So it had a kind of quasi-official status as a word to refer to the money that you just had to pay to the guy so that you could get your ship to the dock and that you could count on your goods not being stolen or held up in customs.

So, Dean, did you ever use it as a verb like I need to kumshaw a truck?

Do you have any?

No, we would just go out and steal it.

Well, I ask because I’m looking at the historical dictionary of American slang that has some examples of it used as a verb as well.

But, yeah, it goes back to this Chinese phrase, apparently.

Yeah, the short version of long story is that the grifters and the thieves who might get money from you in that way by pretending that there was a duty paid when really it was just a bribe would also use the camsha phrase.

And so it came to mean anything obtained by chance or by wiles or at no cost or, to quote the historical dictionary of American slang, means that are devious, ingenious, or unofficial.

All of which you did, Dean.

Wow. Well, thank you so very much.

Yeah, so it’s a Chinese expression that goes back quite a ways.

Wow. I’ve always wondered, and now I know.

Well, folks, thank you. I love your show, by the way.

Oh, well, that’s very nice to hear.

Thanks so much for calling, Dean.

We’re glad to be of help.

Thank you.

Thanks, Dean.

Bye-bye.

Tell us about your history.

We want to hear the story behind a word that you know and that you really like or that you want to find more information about.

Your story about language, 1-877-929-9673, or send us an email to words@waywordradio.org.

Hello.

You have A Way with Words.

Hi, this is Julie from Tucson.

Hi, Julie from Tucson.

How are you doing?

Great.

Welcome to the program.

What’s going on?

Well, I have a phrase that my husband uses quite often, and I have no idea where it comes from.

But he says, well, I’m going to tell them how the cow ate the cabbage.

Mm—huh.

So that’s kind of in a context where he says, oh, you know, this is how it really is.

I guess that’s how it goes.

Mm—

Okay, Julie, I have a question for you.

Might your husband be from Texas?

No. Oh, my goodness. And he would laugh so hard if he knew that you thought that.

Really? Is he from Massachusetts?

No. He grew up in Tucson, and he’s only been to Texas once.

Oh, is that right? And did he see any cows there eating cabbage?

Eating cabbage? I don’t think so.

No kidding, but he uses this all the time, huh?

Yes, and now he did live in Scotland for many years.

So I was thinking maybe it was Scottish.

But maybe that would be more sheep-eating cabbage.

Or sheep playing golf or something.

I’ll show you how the sheep putts or something.

Well, the reason I asked about Texas is because it’s an expression that’s strongly identified with that state.

I wonder where he could have picked it up.

Most people, I think, in this country, if they’ve heard that expression at all, probably heard it in the speech of Texas Governor Ann Richards at the Democratic Convention.

You remember the one where she said, poor George, he can’t help it.

He was born with a silver foot in his mouth.

Bless his heart.

Bless his heart, right.

Got to have that bless his heart at the end.

Oh, that’s hilarious.

Yeah, in that same speech, she also says, we’re going to tell how the cow ate the cabbage.

Oh.

Is your husband a fan of Ann Richards?

I don’t think so.

Okay, okay, maybe not, maybe not.

Well, it’s strongly identified with Texas, as I said, and Grant, I’m going to have to defer here to you because you grew up on a farm, and did you ever watch cows eat cabbage?

I’ve never done so, but I think there’s a joke to be told here, if we can tell it, that I think might explain why this expression got started.

The old lady in the cabbage patch?

Yeah, yeah.

The short version of the story is an elephant escaped from the circus and showed up on this lady’s farm.

She’s an older lady.

She couldn’t see very well.

So she was alarmed, and so she called the police and said, there’s a cow in her cabbage patch pulling up her cabbages with his tail.

And the policeman on the other end of the line said, a cow is eating your cabbage, ma’am?

Well, we’ll send somebody right out.

And she said, well, I never said he was eating them.

And the policeman said, well, what’s he doing?

She said, you wouldn’t believe me if I told you.

So in her mind, this cow was picking up the cabbages with his tail and putting them in his.

Oh.

And so when you tell somebody how the cow ate the cabbage, you’re telling something kind of surprising or something that they might not have thought of.

You’re telling them the fact of the matter, that it’s not quite the way they thought it was.

Oh, that’s exactly the correct context.

Well, thank you so much.

I really, really appreciate it.

Our pleasure, Julie.

Thank you for calling.

Bye-bye.

All right.

Take care.

Bye.

If you’ve got a question about something your spouse says that drives you batty, give us a call, 1-877-929-9673, or just something that they say that you think is funny.

Send us an email to words@waywordradio.org.

More Joy of Lex. That’s straight ahead on A Way with Words.

A Way with Words is sponsored in part by iUniverse, supported self-publishing.

Is there a book in you?

Information available at 1-800-AUTHORS or online at iUniverse.com.

You’re listening to A Way with Words.

I’m Grant Barrett.

And I’m Martha Barnette.

Recently, we got an email question that sent me rummaging all around the Internet.

And Grant, of course, those are the kinds of questions we love, right?

Oh, yes, please.

Well, here’s the story.

The email was from a listener who, several years out of college, and she’s interested in starting to learn Latin.

Good for her.

But with her busy life, she doesn’t have a whole lot of time.

So she wondered, where do I start?

And I realized as I thought about her question that it’s been so long since I started learning Latin that I wasn’t sure what was available these days for busy adults.

So I did some nosing around.

I found a book called Getting Started with Latin.

It’s by William E. Linney.

That’s L-I-N-N-E-Y.

And it’s a book designed for homeschoolers, but it’s really for students of any age.

And I like it because it’s well organized, it’s not intimidating, it’s easy to digest, and it’s something that’ll help you start to make sense of Latin, and the exercises will keep your mental machinery well oiled.

I also like that the author has posted audio files of Latin pronunciation and some additional commentary on his website.

Now, that website is gettingstartedwithlatin.com.

And as I told the listener, when you get through these lessons, the next thing I suggest you do is treat yourself to another book, which is called We Rent Owa, We Rent Perna.

You know that one, right?

No, I don’t.

That’s how Latin professors Jennifer and Terrence Thunberg translate the title of Dr. Seuss’ classic, Green Eggs and Ham.

It’s a book that looks just like the English version with all the illustrations and everything.

And it has a Latin glossary in the back.

And the translation here isn’t word for word, but that’s precisely the point.

Because the translators took pains not only to preserve the spirit of Dr. Seuss, but also that wonderful musicality.

I mean, there’s nothing like sitting down and opening that first page and reading.

I mean, hours of fun for the whole family, right?

Yes.

I might rather join the priesthood to learn Latin, but okay.

Well, it’ll be my guess, but that’ll be a little bit later Latin.

This is a classic.

But they did a whole series of these Seuss books translated into Latin.

And you know what, Grant?

I imagine that the late Ted Geisel, and that’s the real name of Dr. Seuss, would approve because it turns out, get this, that Geisel, too, was a big fan of Latin.

And, in fact, he once told an interviewer that the reason he loved Latin is because Latin, quote, allows you to adore words, take them apart, and find out where they came from.

He’s so right about that.

And you can get a taste of it if you check out these books.

The titles, again, are Getting Started with Latin by William Linney and Wierent Owa Wierent Perna by Jennifer and Lawrence Tunberg.

We’ll put more information about both those books on our website, waywordradio.org.

And if you’d like to talk about Latin or pig Latin or green ham or green eggs, call us, the number’s 1-877-929-9673, or send an email.

The address is words@waywordradio.org.

I do like Latin. I do like Latin and ham.

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hello, this is Hawk Reeves. How are you?

Hi, doing fine. Hawk?

Hawk, like the bird.

Like the bird, okay.

Oh, well welcome to the program, Hawk.

Thank you very much.

I have a question for you.

My family and I are extreme fans of Tyler Perry and his character, Medea.

We were watching the movie Medea Goes to Jail.

On this movie, Medea uses a terminology of speech that I’ve never heard anyplace before.

She’s speaking to one of the other characters.

She uses the terminology hell to the no instead of saying hell no.

Another time, an emphasis of her name, it’s ma to the D-E-A instead of just saying Medea.

This I found very curious.

I know that Tyler Perry uses a lot of cultural and ethnic enhancements in this character.

Oh, sure, yeah. He’s got to make her seem real.

He’s got to give her a real voice and a real kind of personality, right?

And that’s awesome, and she’s an awesome character.

His films are about as far out as I can go with letting my grandkids watch.

But noticing this, it made me start thinking, where does this speech pattern come from or this expression, type of expression come from?

Is it ethnic?

Is it cultural?

Is it geographical?

Is it gang-related?

Where does this come from?

Because if this is a speech pattern that’s fixing to spread through our society, I’ve got some grandkids that are going to be picking this up.

So let’s talk a little bit about this in a larger context.

Hell to the no, as I understand it, is just kind of a more popular manifestation of a form of rhetorical emphasis.

And I’ve made something really simple sound complicated.

But what it is, and it looks like it’s done the job on you.

It’s a way of emphasizing that you really mean hell no.

And you’ll find it.

You’ll find it not only in hip-hop lyrics, but you will find it.

Maybe not with the word hell, but you will find this type of spelling out a word to emphasize it in the speech of black preachers.

It is the type of thing that they do.

And even parents do this.

We’re all familiar with the idea of saying, I mean no, N-O, no, right?

And we spell it out to emphasize it.

And hell to the N-O, or hell to the no, or H-E-L-L to the N-O, which is another form of it.

All of these ways are just emphasizing through spelling that you really mean it.

And it’s a curious thing.

There’s not much been written on this.

I have asked some experts in black discourse about this thing, and they’re like me.

They think that this is the history of this, but they’re not 100% sure because so little research has been done.

It’s hard to track this stuff.

But I’m certain that you will find this in hip-hop lyrics as far back as 20 or even 30 years ago, where somebody says hip, hip to the hop, H-I-P to the H-O-P to don’t stop, blah, blah, blah.

Yeah, yeah.

They’re spelling it out.

And sometimes they spell it hip and sometimes they spell it hop, or they spell it some other word.

But it’s a way of emphasizing.

Actually, the other thing that it does, when you are doing something that’s got a cadence or a rhyme, such as a song or such as a speech, a speech is definitely something that’s got rhythm to it.

Especially within a black preacher.

That’s right.

Or white Southern Baptist churches where I’ve seen those.

Yeah, yeah, I’ve been there, and that’s a performance.

They’re not reading narration.

They are performing there, and there’s a melody that’s coming out from the front of the room.

In any case, to just kind of bring this all to our head, what’s happening is sometimes you need another syllable.

And so what you’ve got in front of you is a chance to spell a word to add another syllable in there.

And sometimes you need another rhyme.

And sometimes that letter that you’re saying is another rhyme.

And sometimes you just need a way of slowing it down or emphasizing the beats.

And you can do this by saying H-E-L-L to the N-O.

And you can feel the rhythm automatically come out of you when you spell something, right?

Okay, I can see that.

Yeah, I very much appreciate it.

Thank you for your guidance.

Thank you so much for calling us today.

Thanks, Hawk.

And I’m glad to be of some help to you.

Bye-bye.

Take care.

Bye-bye.

Martha, in looking into this further, hell to the No was used most memorably, I believe, in the first episode of the reality TV show Being Bobby Brown.

Whitney Houston used it.

Oh, really?

Yeah, it was much talked about in the newspapers the next day.

This is in 2005, although, as we said before, the expression is much older than that.

Hell to the No.

Hell to the No.

If you want to talk about language, call us 1-877-929-9673 or send an email to words@waywordradio.org.

Grant, I have a riddle for you.

Okay.

Here it goes.

I’m where yesterday follows today and tomorrow’s in the middle.

What am I?

Where yesterday follows today and tomorrow’s in the middle.

Is it the future?

No.

I don’t know.

I don’t know.

What’s the answer?

Grant, you’re going to kick yourself.

Probably.

You’re going to kick yourself so hard your great-grandchildren are going to be hurting.

You’re going to really kick yourself.

I’m where yesterday follows today and tomorrow’s in the middle.

What am I?

The dictionary.

Oh.

Oh.

Is that the sound of you kicking yourself?

No, that’s the sound of me being excited.

Oh.

Share your word games with us.

We’d love to play.

Email to words@waywordradio.org or give us a call on the telephone, 1-877-929-9673.

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Good afternoon.

This is Edward from Indianapolis calling.

Hello, Edward.

Hi, Edward.

How are you doing?

I’m good.

Fine.

I have a question about a word, scarf, used in a way of eating.

Mm—

Boy, you were really hungry.

You really scarfed that down.

Right.

Mm—

Where do you think that came from?

Well, it’s not related to the neckwear or the headwear, the piece of cloth that you write.

Of course, of course, yeah.

Yeah.

But it’s interesting.

It’s got a rich etymological history that I’ll kind of summarize by saying that it entered English probably from Scots dialect.

And the Scots dialect picked it up ages ago, probably from some Germanic language.

It could have been Dutch or a language like Dutch.

Because there’s a word, scarf, came from scoff, S-C-O-F-F, also spelled S-C-A-F-F.

And it meant food.

And what’s interesting here, the reason it meets food is because it’s related to another word, schoft, S-C-H-O-F-T, which is a Dutch word, which means a quarter of a day, and referred to one of the four meal times of the day.

I guess the Dutch eat more meal a day than I do.

And so all through this etymological path, it changed just enough.

So first it meant a quarter of a day.

Then it meant a meal that you ate in the quarter of a day.

And then it meant food.

And then it meant to eat your food.

And then it meant to eat your food with a lot of energy and really quickly.

Edward, I’m curious what got you curious about that.

I’ve heard it ever since I was a child, you know, like, boy, you really scarf that down.

You know, and I just wondered where it came from because I’m just curious.

Okay.

And I’m glad I got a chance to talk with you people.

Well, thank you for your call, Edward.

Thank you, guys.

Thanks, Edward.

Bye-bye.

Love your show.

Bye-bye.

Take care.

Do you have a simple word origin question?

By all means, give us a ring, 1-877-929-9673.

Or bracelet or necklace, or send us an email to words@waywordradio.org.

Hi, you have A Way with Words.

Hi, this is Javier from Dallas.

Hi, Javier. How are you doing?

Good, good. I have a question, and it sort of involves my background and my native tongue, which is Spanish.

I was born in Brownsville, Texas, which is right on the border with Mexico.

Right.

And both of my parents are Mexican, so they both speak Spanish as their first language.

And when they moved to the United States, they didn’t learn English until they were about, I’d say, 30 or 40.

So they speak it with a heavy accent.

In any case, it was natural for me to learn Spanish first, and I didn’t learn English until I was about five or six when I went to pre-K.

So it wasn’t until I moved to Dallas that I realized people seem to think I say some strange things, and it’s not really how I say it.

It’s more along the lines of the phrases I use.

And so I’ll give you some examples.

Great.

My current girlfriend, I took her out on a date, and this was maybe our third date.

And when I picked her up, I said, oh, I forgot my wallet.

So why don’t we go back to my place?

We’ll get my wallet, and we’ll go eat.

She said, okay, that’s fine.

So we drive back to my place, and when I get there, I pull up, and I stop the car and I say, hey, do you want to get down?

And she looks at me.

She’s very confused.

And I say it again.

I’m like, do you want to get down?

And she later told me she thought I was coming on to her.

And it’s the third date.

Yeah, it wasn’t until I told her, do you want to go inside?

She said, oh, do you mean do I want to get out of the car?

I said, yeah, that’s what I said.

And she said, no, that’s not at all what you said.

So that comes from the Spanish translation or the Spanish phrase, de quieres bajar, which literally translates to do you want to get down?

When I say that to native English speakers, they have no idea what I’m saying.

Another example, if I see a movie, let’s say Tom Cruise, Tom Cruise movie.

So I’ll tell my friends, yeah, I saw Mission Impossible.

You know, Tom Cruise came out in that.

And they’ll say, Tom Cruise finally came out?

No, no, no, no.

He was in that movie.

And so, again, it’s another translation from Spanish.

Direct translation means something completely different.

So I guess my question is, considering that there’s so many large influx of Spanish-speaking immigrants, is the English language, is it changing because of that?

Is it being influenced because of that?

And also, is this being seen in any other cultures, or has it been seen historically where, you know, one large group of people has changed a language because of that?

Mm—

I wouldn’t say that it’s influencing native English speakers so much.

I suspect that there’s more influence going the other way around.

Okay.

So you think the English language is influencing Spanish or?

Yeah, I would say so.

Wouldn’t you, Grant?

Yeah, there’s a couple things happening here.

Have you ever done any reading about the different varieties of Spanglish that exist in the United States?

Oh, sure. Yeah, I’m very familiar with Spanglish.

There’s one interesting thing that I think is relevant here, which is the varieties of Spanglish that are spoken, say, in Southern California or Northern California and Texas and Florida and New York.

And these are the big places where you can really identify a body of people who speak a kind of, to one degree or another, a mix of English and Spanish.

They’re different. They mix in different ways.

And so what you’ve got are some individual dialects.

And there’s a whole spectrum of almost completely Spanish and almost completely English.

And then all the gradations between.

What you’re talking about here is an almost completely English version of language that has just the barest hint of the Spanish influence.

And it is easy for those calcs.

I think Martha used that word.

No, I didn’t.

Oh, it’s easy for those patterns.

A calc is a pattern that’s taken from one language and adopted into another language.

So you put the words from the second language on top of the grammar of the first language.

It’s easy for those calcs to be passed from person to person, and then so they become normal.

If you look, for example, at the English spoken in Singapore, it’s very far from what could be called standard English pretty much anywhere else in the world.

And yet they all understand each other, and they all speak English in a way that’s considered nonstandard by Americans or Brits or even Australians.

And they’ve done it because they all are speaking this kind of calcified or calcified language that they all taught each other.

So that’s a little bit of what’s happening there.

And Javier, I think your question was also, are people who speak Spanish as a first language influencing native English speakers, people who grew up speaking English?

Is that what you’re asking?

Yeah, not necessarily influencing the people.

But, you know, considering the fact that Hispanic people are going to be the largest minority, I think, in the next decade or so.

It’s obvious if it’s going to be, you know, whatever it is, 30% and that continues to grow.

I’m just curious, what are people 50 years from now going to think of the way we speak now?

Is the language, obviously languages change, but is it going to change because of a direct influence from this population?

It will, and we’re already seeing it.

You can find studies done back as far as the 40s and 50s when big migrations came from Puerto Rico and Cuba in the 60s, of course, into the United States.

And ever since then, people have been tracking this.

And what you find that mostly what is borrowed into English from Spanish is the vocabulary.

Obvious stuff such as cultural words, food, music, and so forth.

And occasionally you’ll find names for things that didn’t exist in the English-speaking world until Spanish speakers brought them.

So types of tools or types of instruments, for example, for making music, that sort of thing.

But it’s the lexus, as they say, that changes the most and changes in the most obvious ways and not necessarily the grammar.

Does that make sense?

Absolutely.

Okay, cool.

Thanks, guys.

Thanks for answering my question.

Okay, let’s check in in 50 years, okay?

All right, will do.

Okay, bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

Well, if you have a question, we can unscrew the inscrutable for you.

Give us a call, 1-877-929-9673 or send an email to words@waywordradio.org.

Grant, I have an old-fashioned riddle for you.

You’ll appreciate this.

Oh, please.

It stands on one leg, and its heart is in its head.

It stands on one leg, and its heart is in its head.

I don’t know.

You don’t know?

I don’t know.

I thought you’d get this in a heartbeat.

I don’t know that one.

Cabbage.

It’s cabbage.

Wait, it doesn’t have legs?

It has one leg.

You know, just kind of a little stump.

Oh, okay.

One leg, heart and head.

Yeah, sure, heart and head.

I get it, sure.

Yeah, absolutely.

Share your riddles with us, 1-877-929-9673, or send your riddles to words@waywordradio.org.

That’s our show for this week.

If you didn’t get on the air today, you can leave a message anytime.

That number is 1-877-929-9673.

Or email us.

The address is words@waywordradio.org.

Or drop by A Way with Words online.

You can chat with fellow word lovers by going to waywordradio.org/discussion.

Our senior producer is Stefanie Levine.

Our technical director and editor is Tim Felten.

We’ve had production help this week from Josette Hurdell and Jennifer Powell.

From Studio West in San Diego, I’m Martha Barnette.

And from San Francisco, I’m Grant Barrett.

Thanks to Howard Gelman for engineering our show from the studios of KQED Radio.

Aloha.

See ya.

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Hi, it’s Martha.

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