What am I noting today?
October 16, 2018Today is Dictionary Day – the birthday of Noah Webster in 1758.
“A lexicographer’s business is solely to collect, arrange, and define the words that usage presents to his hands. He has no right to proscribe words; he is to present them as they are.” ~ Noah Webster
In 1807 Webster began compiling a fully comprehensive dictionary, An American Dictionary of the English Language; it took twenty-eight years to complete. To evaluate the etymology of words, Webster learned twenty-six languages, including Old English (Anglo-Saxon), Greek, Hebrew and Latin.
Hawkeye Pierce, on M*A*S*H was once asked what book he would take if he were stranded on a desert island. He replied, “A dictionary. Pretty much all the other books are in that one.”
Webster completed his dictionary during his year abroad in 1825 in Paris, France, and at the University of Cambridge. His book contained seventy thousand words, of which twelve thousand had never appeared in a published dictionary before. As a spelling reformer, Webster believed that English spelling rules were unnecessarily complex, so his dictionary introduced American English spellings, replacing colour with color, substituting wagon for waggon, and printing center instead of centre. He also added American words, like skunk and squash, that did not appear in British dictionaries. At the age of seventy, Webster published his dictionary in 1828, registering the copyright on April 14. Webster did all this in an effort to standardize the American language.
Why am I saying, “Here there be monsters?”
October 15, 2018
Huge sea monster tentacles protrude from the roof and windows of a warehouse at the former Philadelphia Navy Yard. The installation was perpetrated by UK artists Filthy Luker and Pedro Estrellas. They call it, Sea Monsters HERE. I think it is in a rather fitting location.
What am I sappy hummingbird blogging?
October 12, 2018Photographer Melanie Barboni is an assistant researcher at UCLA’s Earth, Planetary and Space Science Program where she installed a hummingbird feeder outside her office window in hopes of seeing the elusive birds and maybe snapping a photo. Two years and several feeders later, she estimates there are over 200 birds that now stop by her window every day, over 50 of which she’s bestowed with names because she can recognize them on sight. Barboni was raised in Switzerland where hummingbirds are practically non-existent and she only read about them in books. She likens the view from her office at UCLA as a dream come true, a place that she’s referred to as The Hummingbird Whisperer. (via Laughing Squid)
What am I knitting?
October 8, 2018
“Chain mail, needles, and dishwashing gloves: though not the materials you’d expect a dress to be made from, British artist Susie MacMurray uses them in her garment-inspired sculptures. MacMurray’s first piece in this body of work was Gladrags, made in 2002 from 10,000 pink balloons. Since then, the artist has produced several other seemingly wearable sculptures including Medusa (copper chain mail), Widow (leather and 100,000 dressmaker needles), and A Mixture of Frailties (1,400 household gloves).
“They have all been more concerned with the perception of women, their power and their vulnerabilities,” she explains to Colossal. “I am interested in how human strengths and frailties can often be one and the same thing. I suppose you could almost call them portraits… Much of my sculpture and drawing practice is concerned in one way or another with the perception and negotiation of female identity, both internal and external.”
MacMurray was formerly a classical musician, and she retrained as an artist, graduating in 2001 with an MA in Fine Art. In addition to her garment sculptures, MacMurray also creates drawings and architectural installations. You can see more of her work on her website and Twitter.”
