In this week’s episode, Martha and Grant discuss not-to-be-believed articles about language from the satirical newspaper The Onion, including one headlined “Underfunded Schools Forced to Cut Past Tense from Language Programs.” By the way, did you ever notice how “ONION” is ZO-ZO if you tilt your head to the right? This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “The Onion’s Satirical Language Headlines about Grammar and School Funding”
You’re listening to A Way with Words. I’m Grant Barrett.
And I’m Martha Barnette. And Grant, I was looking at one of our favorite publications the other day, The Onion, the satirical newspaper, and I love this headline.
Did you see this? Underfunded schools forced to cut past tense from language programs.
Yes, very funny.
Yes, I loved it. The story started out with a dateline of Washington.
Faced with ongoing budget crises, underfunded schools nationwide are increasingly left with no option but to cut the past tense from their standard English and language arts programs.
You’ve got to love that. The past tense as history.
One of my favorite all-time Onion stories is a copy editor’s revenge takes form of unhyphenated word.
And it goes on to say, Bruce Huntoon said the hyphenated compound modifier is the most extreme step he has ever taken, adding that he drafted a resignation notice that he will hand in should his superiors notice the omission.
And, of course, obviously they’re not going to notice the missing hyphen.
Ooh, sabotage.
By the way, you’ll find a link to that story and the other ones that we’ve mentioned on our discussion forum at waywordradio.org.
And if you want to talk with us about any aspect of language, call us at 1-877-929-9673 or email us.
The address is words@waywordradio.org.
