Dawn

Dawn

Sunday, July 19, 2015

Los Toros; Newish English words; 'New' Spanish(?) word; India's Parsees; & Daughters!

To the horror of rabid (and not-so-rabid) aficionados, Spain's new left-wing councils are either threatening to stop fiestas involving one form of bull-baiting or another or actually ending them. Some councils are going halfway and putting their plans out to referendums (referenda, if you're Alfie Mittington). This is another blow to the Fiesta Nacional. Will it survive the 21st century? And is Hemingway spinning in his grave?

A new-to-me English word:- Churnalism - "A form of journalism in which press releases, wire stories and other forms of pre-packaged material are used to create articles in newspapers and other news media in order to meet increasing pressures of time and cost without undertaking further research or checking".

And a not-so-new related word: Clickbait:- "A pejorative term describing web content aimed at generating online advertising revenue, especially at the expense of quality or accuracy, relying on sensationalist headlines to attract click-throughs and to encourage forwarding of the material over online social networks. Clickbait headlines typically aim to exploit the "curiosity gap", providing just enough information to make the reader curious, but not enough to satisfy their curiosity without clicking through to the linked content."

Finally on words . . . A new-to-me Spanish word: Jibarizar, which isn't in the Royal Academy dictionary but may mean: 'To reduce to the essentials/basics'. And might be Argentinean Spanish. As in:- El gobierno argentino acusa a Repsol de “jibarizar” a  la  petrolera así como de “maltratar” los recursos naturales y los yacimientos argentinos.

I heard a podcast yesterday on the Zaroastrian Parsees of India. Parsee is the same word as Farsi, as F and P are interchangeable in Persian, and I knew about Iran's Parsees. Indeed, I've even seen some of their famous Towers of Silence, outside Yazd. But I didn't know that India's Parsees are known for their keen sense of humour. Which sounded to me rather like the Scouse brand. Must visit them sometime and cross swords. Meanwhile, there'll be a good Parsee joke tomorrow, when you've digested the links. If not, you won't understand it.


Finally . . . Sitting at my usual outside table at my favourite tapas bar last night, I overheard this comment from a teenage daughter to her father: "Don't be a moron! Please, please. Don't be a moron!" It brought back happy memories. Though I don't recall the politeness, in my case.

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