PDF: A government official gives his take on the origins of some common phrases, and why they shouldn’t be used. (Page down to “Diversity Notes” article.)
Interesting, but I’m not buying it. “Rule of thumb” and “handicap” have both been debunked on snopes. That makes me doubt the whole article.
Here’s a noted authority debiunking the “rule of thumb” explanation:
Why one should think that “holding down the fort” refers to forts used against natrive Americans, I don’t know. There have been plenty of circumstances in history where forts would be used, and one was metaphorically invoking. Admittedly, the long history of Western movies might give that interpretation a bit of an edge, but it still seems to be a leap.
The conclusion of the article seems to be that one ought to be cautious to a large degree, which seems absurd to me unless you’re in a very publicity-coscious business, where you have to be concerned that a lot of your potential customers might, for instance, have heardd of the myth of the Rule of Thumb, but not its debunking. A better solution, it seems tome, if you’re in the government, is to acquire a better knowledge of history (especially of the people you’re dealing with), which would’ve kept Nike from making that “Black and Tan” gaffe.
There is a similar expression in Swedish and I wouldn’t be surprised if you can find it in other languages as well.
Personally, I thought the author should have taken just a few minutes to check out some of his claims. This ranks up there withe one congressman’s concerns about an island tipping over. OK, maybe not that bad, but still. . . .
*And in case you’re wondering how he could have done all the etymological detective work necessary to conclude that these phrases came from where he says they came from, and still have time to perform his Chief Diversity Officer duties at the State Department, wonder no more: Robinson doesn’t really know if any of this is true.
“Much has been written about whether the etymologies below are true or merely folklore, but this isn’t about their historical validity,” Robinson writes. “Instead, it is an opportunity to remember that our choice of wording affects our professional environment.”*
From here.
This reminds me of the Chevy Nova thing. I first read it one some old advertising at a place where I was working.
The story goes that Chevy tried selling Novas in Mexico, but sales were dismall. As it turns out, “Nova” in Spanish means “Doesn’t run.” It was a cautionary tale to not patronize a business that hasn’t done some basic research on the products it is selling and the culture they are selling to.
Snopes did a whole article on how companies that used that tale were, themselves, guilty of not doing much research. The story is about as far from the truth as it gets.
The big joke here is that the company I was working for was a language school. Spanish was our biggest seller!
Went to the link but couldn’t be bothered to wade through the entire site.
Sorry.
Defender el fuerte, in Spanish, or defensar el fort in Catalan (it can also be defendre el fort, depending on dialect); lit “to defend the fort”. On the other hand, rule of thumb for one has no Spanish straight equivalent I know of; there’s expressions with a similar meaning (for example medir a ojo or a ojímetro: measuring by eye, using the eyemeter) but not one that can be transposed directly.
“Hold the fort” could originate from any kind of fort-holding. “Hold down the fort” sounds like it has to do with a bouncy castle filled with helium.
Personally, the phrase bring to mind Beau Geste, the Foreign Legion, Crock, and, of course, Riff-Raff Sam, “the raffiest Riff who ever riffed a raff!”
You don’t know how to search a page?