That is simply appalling and horrific... in plus, the term "stewardess" in itself is outdated. Although at the same time, I'm not surprised, especially if the book is set in the 1950s/60s.
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Words or phrases that annoy you (even if you can't explain why) . . .
- Thread starter usagora
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“Skirts”, “birds”, “broads”, and the like were a mid-20th-century class all unto themselves, lingering well beyond the 1960s and, in some cases, through the 1980s, just as more rigorous workplace harassment legislation, regulation, and company policies began to do something about it, remedially so (women’s liberation organizing during the late 1960s and 1970s laid that groundwork in place).
“Skirts” has also shown up in period films from the 1930s, 1940s, and 1950s — often, in film noir and B-movie settings.
The novel was one which shifted back-and-forth in time, from the 1960's to more-or-less current day). It's called Killers of a Certain Age, by Deanna Raybourn. It went back to the sixties for the start of some of the main characters' careers and then brought them forward into today's world.....where they now had become, indeed, "killers of a certain age." Those "Skirts" quickly proved themselves to be more than the stereotypical submissive airline "Stewardesses" of those 1950s and 1960s years (hint: they were actually never airline Stewardesses in the first place, just playing a role) ......
As someone who is also of "a certain age," I definitely remember when taking an airline flight somewhere was a big deal and one dressed up to do so. I flew for the first time when I was still in college (the 1960's), and it was a thrilling new adventure in my life for which I prepared with excitement and curiosity. I loved it, marveled at the entire experience.
At that time there were strict rules and regulations around who could be hired to become an airline Stewardess, and, yes, physical appearance, age, I think marital status (lack thereof), and a demonstration of willingness to please at all costs was part of the job..... Somehow a lot of us potential or actual airline passengers didn't think anything about this and how truly inappropriate it all was. We just got on the plane and anticipated a certain level of service from the Stewardesses.....
Thankfully over time and with serious efforts from those in the airline industry things did change and for the better!
As someone who is also of "a certain age," I definitely remember when taking an airline flight somewhere was a big deal and one dressed up to do so. I flew for the first time when I was still in college (the 1960's), and it was a thrilling new adventure in my life for which I prepared with excitement and curiosity. I loved it, marveled at the entire experience.
At that time there were strict rules and regulations around who could be hired to become an airline Stewardess, and, yes, physical appearance, age, I think marital status (lack thereof), and a demonstration of willingness to please at all costs was part of the job..... Somehow a lot of us potential or actual airline passengers didn't think anything about this and how truly inappropriate it all was. We just got on the plane and anticipated a certain level of service from the Stewardesses.....
Thankfully over time and with serious efforts from those in the airline industry things did change and for the better!
Not (just) limited to airline labour: thanks to all who’ve come before us to work to make things better for us. Our work is never done for those who will follow us.
In the 50/60s it was the norm, not outdated until after 70-80s when men started working as Flight Attendants as a result of a SCOTUS decision.
From Stewardess to Flight Attendant: 80 Years of Sophistication and Sexism
Tracing the timeline of the profession–and the uniforms—since the 1930s.
Looking back, and this kind of ties in, too, with an earlier discussion we had on here about how college/uni provides a broader scope of an educational experience -- so can moving away from home and being on one's own for the first time. I was a rather naive girl from a small town who attended a small college, where indeed I learned a lot from national events, books and living in dorms with my peers. However, my social learning was definitely not finished, as from there I went on to graduate school in Washington, DC, and the horrific events in that tumultuous spring of 1968 added a whole other layer of realization that the world and certainly my own country wasn't at all as peaceful and benign as I'd vaguely assumed..... Unrest was there, simmering just under and touching the surface, and it needed to be expressed.
Did we already mention steep learning curve?
Graphs based on changes over time always put time on the X-axis. For a “learning curve,” knowledge would therefore be on the Y-axis. A steep slope would mean a lot of knowledge gained in a short amount of time. So something that’s hard to master should be referred to as having a shallow learning curve! Or else steep learning curve should mean “easy to learn.”
Graphs based on changes over time always put time on the X-axis. For a “learning curve,” knowledge would therefore be on the Y-axis. A steep slope would mean a lot of knowledge gained in a short amount of time. So something that’s hard to master should be referred to as having a shallow learning curve! Or else steep learning curve should mean “easy to learn.”
One thing which never improved in my pursuit of education through the years was my ability to grasp mathematics and various concepts based on it! LOL! Thankfully, though, somewhere along the line one day it finally dawned on me that there is a distinct connection between mathematics and music, for instance. Wow! What a revelation! Well, duh, me......
In photography, there is the whole f/stop and depth-of-field thing which confuses a lot of people, as sometimes it is hard to grasp that an f/stop of, say, f/13, is going to have significantly different depth-of-field than an image shot at f/1.2..... The latter is referred to as a shallow DOF which a very, very narrow area which is actually in focus as opposed to the former, where most everything in the scene is in focus (but then other factors come into play but we won't get into that here!). So, yeah, there's that math thing again......
In photography, there is the whole f/stop and depth-of-field thing which confuses a lot of people, as sometimes it is hard to grasp that an f/stop of, say, f/13, is going to have significantly different depth-of-field than an image shot at f/1.2..... The latter is referred to as a shallow DOF which a very, very narrow area which is actually in focus as opposed to the former, where most everything in the scene is in focus (but then other factors come into play but we won't get into that here!). So, yeah, there's that math thing again......
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I remember that as one of the lessons I learned after watching Donald Duck in Mathmagic Land while in grade school. Thinking back now, it seems like they showed us this film quite a few times.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_in_Mathmagic_Land
My understanding of steep learning curve is that knowledge is on the Y-axis and effort is on the X-axis. Like going up a steep hill. A lot of effort is spent going up, for not much progress forward.
Effort does not relate to time. You can put a lot of effort in over a week to learn the basics of [insert topic here] or you can spread the same effort out over 3 months. The learning curve will be the same.
There's maths, and there's maths. You need to split it up into the various fields and find the one that suits you. Seems to be the area of harmonics is the one for you.
I am poor at Calculus but quite good at Statistics (as I needed to be as a biologist). You could trust me to give you an accurate estimate of the population growth of rabbits in your field (or, in fact, the accuracy of a political survey), but not to design a bridge over a river.
As for F/stops, I learnt that there is a direct relationship between the F-number and depth of field. Higher the number, greater the depth of field.
Well, wouldn't that sill be a shallow curve? The more effort you have to exert (further down the x-axis) to reach a higher level of knowledge (further up the y-axis) makes a shallower curve, not a steep one.
Better certainly for the respect gained by the flight attendants and their jobs. However, I definitely do NOT find the passenger experience better in any way regardless of how someone refers to the working employees.
And this word annoys you? (given the title of the thread?)
As a sample size of one, I have seen this word and you can tell from the origin section of your screenshot that it comes from the Middle Ages and Latin, so clearly not a new word.
I didn't say it was a new word. I simply said I've never heard it used before in my life. I thought it would be interesting to share. And, yes, it would probably annoy me if people started using it frequently vs. other more commonly used words. Sounds a bit pretentious in comparison.
And?
As @mollyc observes, given the title of the thread, does this word annoy you?
If so, why?
Agree completely, this is not a new word at all.
Moreover, it is one that you will find most certainly in print, usually in 'quality' publications and broadsheets, (and sometimes in speech) This Side of The Pond.
In fact, not only is it not a new word, it is not even an unusual word, and is one that some of us have been known to use whenever it was considered appropriate.
The use of proper English - a language with a rich and vast vocabulary - is not pretentious.
Anyway, as I have already remarked, the word 'largesse' is fairly commonly used (sometimes in politics, such as when referring to the annual state Budget) - and its meaning perfectly clearly understood - This Side of the Pond.
There must be some invisible part of my post that you and mollyc can see that I can't. I fail to see where I claimed this word was new to the English language. Also, I'm happy for you that you're very familiar with the word on "your side of The Pond," but having lived nearly 4 decades in the US (and one US territory), I've not heard it used once until today (again, at least to my recollection).
I think it sounds pretentious (at least it would in my apparently lower social class circles 🙄). I'm not surprised you don't. Again, congrats that you're familiar with a word I wasn't. That doesn't make you or your country superior to me or anyone else and vice versa (that seems to be the implication in your constant "us vs. them" posts about UK vs US).
And really, what's the point of arguing about our personal opinions about these words or phrases? As long as no one's making any false factual claims, debate is pointless, as our feelings are completely subjective.
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I suspect that you think "largesse" sounds pretentious because you are not familiar with it.
Lack of familiarity strikes me as an unusual (and entirely subjective) basis for deciding that a word is "pretentious".
It is an old, and perfectly functional word, (and commonly enough used in this part of the world for it to be reasonably well known and widely understood) and, when used correctly, it describes what it is supposed to describe perfectly accurately.
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What other basis is there for deciding if a word sounds pretentious? It's an entirely subjective matter. Again, if I post something factually incorrect about a word (which I have not in this case), then feel free to correct me, but arguing that an opinion about a word is "wrong" is nonsensical.
I'm done discussing that particular post, ok? Never dreamed such a simple post would be controversial, but here we are 🤦🏼♂️
Back on thread topic, and yes, a personal peeve of mine.
Personally, I really dislike (for, needless to say, we don't use these terms, but yes, naturally, of course, we do understand them), American colloquialisms such as "gonna" or "gotta".
"Gonna" (a contraction of "going to") is used in lieu of the future tense - what's wrong with "I will"?
However, the expression that really sets my teeth on edge is "gotta", obviously, a contraction of "got to", meaning, "must", or "have to". Why not simply say "I have to...", or "I must", instead?
The thing is, "gotta" emerged from "I've gotta" - originally, it must have been - "I have got to" - which is repeating yourself unnecessarily - but subsequently dropping the contraction of "have" by compressing the expression further.
I can understand it in speech, but deplore it in written form, even though I recognise that it is an expression of informal American speech.
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Unfortunately, I feel this thread may have strayed from @usagora 's original idea, or at least what I interpreted it to be.
Words or phrases that annoy you (even if you can't explain why).
I have an irrational hatred for some words that I genuinely cannot explain. It has nothing to do with their definitions or use, they just don't resonate with me for whatever reason.
As an example, I used to absolutely despise the work kiosk, I cannot explain it, I just hated the sound. Offering context, it was suggested at a previous employer that we have a computer available in common area(s) for employees, that as part of their job, do not have access to a computer so that they could have access HR resources. The idea was great until our department manager kept calling it a kiosk, I refused to say the word and called it a common area workstation. Can't explain why.
Another example, my current company refers to product advertising documents as "beauty sheets", I despise the term and refer to them as a much more standard "sell sheet", this of course confuses everyone at my current company but is widely accepted across many others.
Both of my personal examples are 100% irrational, they are just sounds we make that have been assigned a meaning by society. I cannot explain if my hatred stems from the actual sounds or if the sounds, to me, just don't fit their definition or usage.
I think that is what the OP intended, just to have some fun with our irrational behaviors, I could be wrong, he can chime in.
The word "largesse" certainly is used across the Big Pond, here in the US, too -- I've heard it spoken from time to time and I've definitely seen it written in the print media plus online.