Do you spend so much quality time with your computer that you’ve given it an affectionate name? What is it about inanimate objects—particularly technological gadgets—that inspires us to give them special nicknames? Martha raises these questions and Grant reveals his computer’s name. This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “Nicknames for Inanimate Objects”
You’re listening to A Way with Words. I’m Grant Barrett.
And I’m Martha Barnette.
Recently, my friend Jane bought a Mini Cooper.
It’s this really cute little car. It’s black and beige.
But you know what? She doesn’t call it my car.
She always, always refers to this car as the pug.
And it sort of looks like one. It’s little and cute. It’s got the same coloring.
And Grant, that got me to thinking about why so many of us tend to bestow names on certain inanimate objects in our lives.
Do you do that?
I do, but it’s only when the thing itself asks me to.
What?
Well, no.
Are you hearing voices?
They’re speaking to me.
The dog, the meter.
What do you mean?
No, if you buy a new computer and you go through the install process, there’s a point at which it says, name this computer.
And usually it defaults to something like Grant Barrett’s computer, which is kind of blah, right?
So I tend to name those things after words that have caught my attention recently.
So my current computer is named utterly, U-T-T-E-R-L-Y.
What?
I just liked the way utterly, that adverb, came from another word having something to do with speech, but now it’s kind of used to mean to the limit or to the max.
Of course.
You named your computer utterly.
I have a friend who named her laptop Roxy.
You know, there’s something about making technology more friendly, and I think she felt that that laptop was kind of sexy, too.
Sure, and technology can be difficult, and maybe the humanizing aspect means that we are more likely to put up with its quirks.
Yeah, I think you’re right about that.
What inanimate object in your life have you felt strongly enough about to name, and why?
What was it about that object that cried out for an appellation?
You can email us at words@waywordradio.org.
And no body parts, please.
Thank you, Grant.
Only inanimate objects.
All right.
And if you’d like to talk about any aspect of language, grammar, usage, spelling, pronunciation, slang, word origins, whatever, call us 1-877-929-9673.
That’s 1-877-WAYWORD.
