30. US Election Lexicon
The Allusionist
Helen Zaltzman
4.7 • 3.8K Ratings
🗓️ 17 February 2016
⏱️ 17 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The 2016 US election isn’t going away anytime soon, so let’s seek refuge in etymology. Consider the linguistically appropriate age of a senator, and whether Congress should get sexy.
And we revisit the UK Election Lexicon – http://theallusionist.com/electionlexicon – for the origin of words like ‘campaign’, ‘ballot’, ‘democracy’, ‘poll’, ‘debate’ and ‘argue’.
There’s more about this episode at http://theallusionist.org/us-electionlexicon. Tweet @allusionistshow, and convene at facebook.com/allusionistshow.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is the allusionist in which I, Helen Zoltzman, vote for language regardless of the terrible things it does sometimes. |
| 0:11.0 | I'm pretty sure the 2016 US election has been going on for seven years already, but apparently it's nowhere near over, so we're going to go for a Prisk Walken talk through the corridors of the dictionary to find out a little about some political vocabulary. |
| 0:25.0 | As we did in the original allusionist election lexicon just before the 2015 UK general election. |
| 0:31.0 | In case you missed it, I'll tag that show on after this new one, so you need no longer wonder about the etymology of words like campaign, ballot, democracy, poll, debates and argument. |
| 0:41.0 | On with the US election lexicon. |
| 0:55.0 | Hello. |
| 1:04.0 | Hello. My name is Helen Zoltzman, and I'm calling on behalf of the lexicon craft party. How are you today? |
| 1:10.0 | I'm okay. I'm pretty busy. |
| 1:12.0 | Could I call back another time without being more convenient? |
| 1:15.0 | No, that's okay. I'm not interested. Thank you. |
| 1:18.0 | Hello. |
| 1:24.0 | Hello. |
| 1:25.0 | Hello. My name is Helen Zoltzman, and I'm calling on behalf of the lexicon craft party. How are you today? |
| 1:30.0 | I'm doing well. Thank you. |
| 1:33.0 | Please to hear it, sir. |
| 1:34.0 | Official records show that you voted in the previous election, and I'm calling today to thank you for being a voter, and to earn your support for the lexicon craft candidate this time round. |
| 1:43.0 | Who are you again? |
| 1:44.0 | The lexicon craft party represents a linguistic alternative to the major political players. Would you welcome more radical governance? |
| 1:52.0 | You mean more radical than the burn? I really feel the burn. |
| 1:57.0 | Well, we would like radical politics to return to its linguistic roots, which is root. |
| 2:02.0 | You would not accept a burn, B-E-R-N, you would want B-U-R-N, so you would reject the burn. |
| 2:08.0 | The lexicon craft suggests going right back to the Latin root of radical, which is the same as radish, would you welcome the return of radishes to politics? |
... |
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