The cutesy/obnoxious words mentioned bug me a little bit too, but I sort of think the “I resemble that remark” is funny…I guess people haven’t used it too much around me, so I’m not sick of it. “Yell-OH” bugs me too – augh, death – but “Significant Other”? That term is not meant to be cutesy, is it? I think it’s a very useful term for someone who is signficant but whose status hasn’t been completely determined…or might be changing…or for when “girlfriend” or “boyfriend” will sound too much like high school…LoadedDog, how would you guys describe someone in one of those categories? Partner?
ISO (InSignificant Other) is also useful (or was, in days gone by) to describe the sexy artist guy without a job who might not be around next week but will be fun to bring to the party…
Well see, you’ve got me here. I have no answer for you, and I tend to agree. “Significant Other” sounds way too cautious for me, but I don’t know what to replace it with. You’re right that boyfriend / girlfriend sounds like we should have acne, and well, “husband” or “wife” doesn’t sound quite right if you’re not married. “Partner” doesn’t seem to suit a heterosexual couple at all, and if I were gay I’m still not sure I’d be comfortable with it (sounds a bit too much like a business arrangement).
I’m right at the sharp end of this. I’m a heterosexual guy in his thirties in along-term (we’ve just bought a house) relationship with a woman in her thirties, but we have no intention of getting married. So what do I refer to her as, in the third person? Well, “girlfriend”, “Significant Other”, “SO” (even worse), and “partner” are out. I’n not opposed to marriage as such, so I’ll refer to her as my “wife” if the situation warrants it, or if it would just be easier (like when talking to an old lady on the bus whom I am never going to see again). Normally, I just call her Kim.
“Significant other,” as I understand it, actually originated in the gay community when we didn’t have any proper words to describe one another.
I find it useful because it encompasses bf/gf, lover, partner, life-partner, mate, fiancé/e, spouse, etc., if you don’t happen to know exactly how two people refer to each other.
“Partner?” “Sounds like we run a law firm.” “Mate?” “Right, like a pair of whooping cranes.” “Life mate?” “Sounds like a brand of pacemaker.” - Alison Bechdel
I hate hate hate the expression “preggers”. It just seems so demeaning, as if everything else about the women was diminished. And it gives me a visual image of scrambled eggs, which doesn’t help.
:: shudder ::
But I’ve never heard of a word specifically to describe this sort of cutesy folksy expression.
It’s a very mild annoyance when I see fellow Americans use “preggers” - until recently I’ve only heard this used in British media and it just seems…I don’t know, sort of imitative for Americans to say it. Sort of like how a disturbing number of people begin inserting “sod off” into their everyday speech after being introduced to a few episodes of Blackadder.
So yeah, my reasoning is pretty silly…but I did mention that it was only a mild annoyance.
I hate the word preggo/ preggers, edumacate, and sammich. It irritates me when people use them in 'grown-up" conversation, but not when one is being silly or sarcastic. I feel so hypocritical sometimes
There are no good, common words for a longterm romantic relationship where the people aren’t married! I know a woman (an old friend of my father’s) who was with a man for about ten years without being married, and she called him her “sweetheart”, which I thought was lovely. But it’s not a common enough word to be able to say it without it calling attention to itself. (They’re still together, but they just recently got married. I don’t know why they felt the urge after being together for this long, but I hear it was a lovely wedding.)
And I’m gay, but I still want to cringe when I hear “partner”. “Lover” is sweet and all, but to me it sounds completely sordid; it feels like it’s an explicit mention of the sexual component of the relationship. “Boyfriend” may be ok, but it seems weird as hell to be in a long-term, till-death-do-us-part relationship for years and still just be “boyfriends” or “girlfriends”.
Sorry, but that bit confused me, and rather than merely saying “but surely Monica Dickens was English anyway?”, I thought I had better check. Yes, she was English, so that doesn’t help with a U.S. origin (not that I imagine you want it to have a U.S. origin!
As for all those irksome cutesy “look at me, getting the word wrong SO wittily” things…no, I have never heard a proper term for them, but there has to be one.
I thinkI’d try to describe them as something like"ironic demotic" since such usage seems to come from peole who certaily know the correct form, but are being “funny” on prupose. And a loto of the time, they can be funny: I think the problem is that they do get very old very quickly.
Not that I’d be “casting nasturtiums” at anyone’s favourite example, dear me no!
Opps - nearly forgot - genuine question here - one that I have often meant to ask someone.
Disinvite - (as used by a friend of mine of NYC origin) Is that ever a real word in the U.S., or is it another of these “expressions with no name as yet”?
Usage - “At the end of the staff party, the people behaved so badly that the police were called and they were “disinvited” to go back there ever again.”
