The Profane History Of Swearing

Language Matters

Common Profanities: Leith writes: “Melissa Mohr's title, then, is more than just an attention-grabber: the history of swearing is one of a movement back and forth between the holy and the shit. At different times in the history of the west, the primary taboo has been to do either with God, or with the functions of the human body.”

Photo Credit & Source: The Guardian

An article, by Sam Leith,  in The Guardian, reviews a book on swearing, the use of vernacular and “street language” in everyday conversation. The book’s title is Holy Sh*t: A Brief History of Swearing by Melissa Mohr; I guess the publishers use of an asterisk in the book’s title says it all.

Leith writes:

Swearing doesn't just mean what we now understand by "dirty words". It is entwined, in social and linguistic history, with the other sort of swearing: vows and oaths. Consider for a moment the origins of almost any word we have for bad language – "profanity", "curses", "oaths" and "swearing" itself .

Melissa Mohr's title, then, is more than just an attention-grabber: the history of swearing is one of a movement back and forth between the holy and the shit. At different times in the history of the west, the primary taboo has been to do either with God, or with the functions of the human body. (The latter, though, does subdivide in a meaningful way between the sexual and the excremental. Really, this book should have been called "Holy Fucking Shit".)

Though Mohr is mainly interested in English, she is generous in roping in examples from outside it. A helpful and interesting chapter on ancient Roman filth does much to sketch the background, too. How do we know what was obscene in a dead language? By literary genre, essentially: if it was written on the toilet wall but didn't appear in satire, it was likely to be properly rude. English has a "Big Six": "cunt", "fuck", "cock", "arse", "shit" and "piss" (though Mohr plausibly suggests that "nigger" should now be in there). The Romans had a "Big 10": cunnus (cunt), futuo (fuck),mentula (cock), verpa (erect or circumcised cock), landica (clitoris), culus(arse), pedico (bugger), caco (shit), fello (fellate) and irrumo (er, mouth-rape).

So the Romans, like us, had a primary relationship between the body and the idea of obscenity – though their sexual schema was a little different, with shame attaching, above all, to sexual passivity. Sexual obscenity also, to complicate things, had a sacramental function – as witness the fruity ways of the god Priapus. Some of that shit was holy.

Some people abhor swearing or the use of any vernacular, whether written or spoken; my wife is one of those individuals; as are many women today. Perhaps it has to do with a heightened sense of religious morality; or perhaps it has to do with a fear of words. Profanity in itself is an act of dissent from religious authority. It’s somewhat ironic or amusing that many of the swear words in Quebec among the French-Canadians centre on the Catholic church and its rituals. (Some common examples include osti: host; tabarnac: tabernacle; maudit: damn; brûle en enfer: burn in hell, and it various permutations and combinations.)

Some people think that use of profanities marks the end of civilization; that its continued use reflects loose morals. Historical evidence says otherwise, as swearing has a long uninterrupted period of use. Censorship or self-censorship will never work for the reason that people like and enjoy using profanities. Swearing, in my estimation, has its place in society; and most people, if pressed, would admit they swear or would like to.  Even so, the use of profanities in personal attacks has no place in society and serves no purpose. More so, swearing too often soon loses it appeal. A well-timed use of a profanity can have the appropriate and intended effect.

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You can read the rest of the article at [Guardian]

Reform Stalled In Iran

Iranian Politics

Founding Father Denied Presidential Run: “Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, inside, far left,
with Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini as he greeted supporters in Tehran in 1979, when the
Islamic republic was born,” the NYT writes: “A founding father of the revolution and
a former president, shocked Iranians, particularly those among the 70 percent of the

 population that is under 35 and grew up when he served in many leading positions.”

Photo Credit: David Burnett/Contact Press Image

Source: NYT

An article, by Thomas Erdbrink, in The New York Times says that two candidates from the scheduled June 14 presidential elections have been disallowed by the clerics, who are essentially conforming to the wishes of Iran’s Supreme Leader.

Erdbrink writes:

The exclusion of Mr. Rafsanjani and another thorn in the conservatives’ side, Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei, could foreshadow even greater repercussions, analysts and commentators said. Since its founding in 1979, the Islamic republic has been characterized by opposing power centers competing constantly and often publicly, a back-and-forth that gave ordinary citizens and private business owners the ability to navigate between the groups.

Barring further surprises, the winner of the June election will now be drawn from a slate of conservative candidates in Iran’s ruling camp, a loose alliance of Shiite Muslim clerics and Revolutionary Guard commanders. That would put the last major state institution under their control — the first time since the 1979 revolution that all state institutions were under the firm control of one faction.

Analysts have long speculated — and some conservative clerics have confirmed — that the ruling faction is determined to abolish the office of president, which has served as a locus of opposition under the populist incumbent, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and before him the reformist Mohammad Khatami, who pushed for more personal freedoms. While by no means certain, it is now a greater possibility.

At the very least, the anti-climactic election campaign seems likely to further reinforce the alienation of the urban classes, which make up a large portion of the electorate and mostly gave up on politics after the suppression of the 2009 uprising following Mr. Ahmadinejad’s re-election, widely dismissed as fraudulent. A major boycott of the vote could further undercut the government’s already diminished legitimacy.

That well might take place as the people of Iran have grown weary and have become frustrated by the leader's archaic policies of repression and isolation. The clerics might wield some power, for now; but it won’t and can’t last indefinitely when the will of the people are not with them.

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You can read the rest of the article at [NYT]

The Totalitarian Mind:Not Open To Rational Ideas

Human Thought

“Totalitarianism is not only hell, but all the dream of paradise—the age-old dream of a world where everybody would live in harmony, united by a single common will and faith, without secrets from one another. Andre Breton, too, dreamed of this paradise when he talked about the glass house in which he longed to live. If totalitarianism did not exploit these archetypes, which are deep inside us all and rooted deep in all religions, it could never attract so many people, especially during the early phases of its existence. Once the dream of paradise starts to turn into reality, however, here and there people begin to crop up who stand in its way. and so the rulers of paradise must build a little gulag on the side of Eden. In the course of time this gulag grows ever bigger and more perfect, while the adjoining paradise gets even smaller and poorer.” 

― Milan Kundera, The Book of Laughter and Forgetting

Religious and secular extremists differ in most respects except one: their total commitment to their ideology and the historical narrative that informs it. Such a determined and inflexible view of things is part of what is is called totalitarian thinking. To say that such individuals are not open to any new ideas is to say the obvious.

Such people have no need for any new ideas, any new ways of viewing the world, any new ideas of personal identity. All of these human attributes have been taken care of and explained within a systematic and comprehensive world-view of their particular ideology. It provides such individuals, who see no need to explore the wide and deep world of thought, a level of comfort and meaning that might otherwise not easily be attained through sustained inquiry and interpretation. Totalitarianism always point to a future world—a paradise if you will—where everyone would think alike in harmony and peace.

I sense that totalitarian thinking will always be with us, as long as there are both leaders willing to seize the minds of willing acolytes and followers willing to give consent to stop being curious, thoughtful and inquisitive and explore the wider world. Totalitarian thinking generally operates by providing simple answers to complex human problems, and thus its appeal. For the followers who subscribes to the prevailing idea, it results in a loss of identity, which also leads to defensive (and sometimes offensive) measures, most notably the need to vociferously and often aggressively defend such ideas, given that the follower’s individual identity has become subsumed within the particular ideology that defines him or her.

In other words, there is no longer a real highly defined personal identity, but a collective mind operating within the many individuals who have adopted a totalitarian ideology. Cognitive dissonance comes into play, quite easily , which quickly throws out any rational idea that challenges the totalitarian ideology. This is because the ideology is so powerful and so entrenched that any counter view is seen as false, and a threat to the individual identity, be what it is.

An article, by Iwona-Baricka Tylek of Jagiellonian University in Krakow, Poland, says the following about the appeal of such ideologies:

Totalitarianism offers a special kind of unity which is enclosed in its ideology. First of all it formulates strict criteria of affinities that need to be reinforced within the society. The group–the society–is yet to be made, and it means that every individual must turn into citizen on terms proposed by the authorities.

So, the individual becomes a member of a group that has set ways of thinking and answers to all such questions.

In an article (“The Concept of Power”), by Pat Duffy Hutcheon, based on an interview with noted 20th century political philosophizer Hannah Arendt, we can find her defining concept of the ways and means of totalitarian thinking:

The defining characteristic of totalitarianism, according to Arendt, is the use of terror as the chief means of maintaining control. She explained that this is where such systems differ completely from mere authoritarian despotisms or typical closed institutions such as the army. All competing social and family ties must be destroyed, so "purges are conducted in such a way as to threaten with the same fate the defendant and ... all his connections." #14 Terror within a totalitarian state or organization takes the form of dominating human beings from within. Not only must one avoid expressing dissenting thoughts; merely possessing such thoughts is the ultimate crime. The spouse who overhears one's sleeping murmurs will feel compelled to inform in order to ensure personal safety -- or salvation, as the case may be.

Arendt explained that in its early stages the totalitarian regime establishes a volunteer espionage network and begins to ferret out those who have been known to oppose its ascendancy. The second stage involves the definition of the "objective" or "necessary" enemy -- one who, according to the governing ideology, might be expected to oppose the regime. And the identification of the "possible" crime -- what that person might have planned to do. After all these are disposed of the terror becomes purely arbitrary. In the case of governments, the concentration camp plays an indispensable role in the final stage.

In other words, dissent is never allowed, since it would question the prevailing regime and all of its ideas and goals; small wonder, then, that any and all dissenters are considered enemies of the state. In theocratic states, where religion is the dominant ideology, dissenters have no less power to question. In places where religion is not the state religion, as is the case in many western democracies, particular extremist fundamentalist religious groups within Christianity, Islam and Judaism discourage questions and dissent from the prevailing traditional narrative; and dissenters, like those living in political totalitarian regimes are ostracized but not killed for their dissent.

Even so, the message is similar that dissent in any form is unwelcome and a threat to group unity and religious social cohesion. The end result of totalitarianism, in all forms, is that it destroys the individual and thus robs society of new, unexplored ideas.