Posted 3:41 PM by Gobbler
Who's gervase? Daniel, i won't have any of this silly nameryjiggery-pokery, it isn't fashionable. Good to see there has been a healthy response from all you ladies out there, though it would be nice if now and again you could say something other than 'mmm' . Also, would the cretinous creature who persists in employing the device " as opposed to ' please refrain. It may be fashionable currently to display appalling grammar in written dialogue, but i won't have it on my blog.
The weather continues charming, except for when it rained all morning today. I was at the woods with my uncle preparing the ground for the teddy bears picnic at high summer, and became severely moistened. I'm just glad I'm not going to Thailand during the rainy season. The rainy season only runs from
oh

Posted 2:53 PM by Gobbler
Urbanity Today


A
Short Treatise
on the
Synchronic – Diachronic Nature
of
Language
and the
Persuit
of
Linguistic Integrity


‘Suave; elegant and refined in manner.’ The Oxford Compact English dictionary thus defines the word ‘urbane’. It is the purpose of this treatise to expose this definition as an incomplete synchronic simplification of the word; to, in the process, elucidate and discuss the true nature of the word and, through this example, guide the reader through the first steps on the difficult road to linguistic enlightenment.

Before we can hope to enjoy a complete understanding of ‘urbane’, it is first necessary to explore the word’s diachrony. ‘Urbane’ and ‘urban’ emerged from the same linguistic stem; i.e. they have a diachronic relationship. ‘Urban’ is commonly defined as ‘Pertaining to, or characteristic of, occurring or taking place in, a city or town.’ This is virtually identical to the archaic and now commonly obsolete definition of ‘urbane’, ‘Of or pertaining to, or characteristic of or peculiar to, a town or city.’ That the definitions are similar is unsurprising as ‘urbane’ and ‘urban’ are both descendants of the Latin word urbanus.

While the definition of ‘urban’ remains practically unchanged, ‘urbane’ has evolved to define almost exclusively the manners and behaviour associated with urban life. Through this we get the more synchronic definition ‘Having the manners, refinement, or polish regarded as characteristic of a town; courteous, civil; also blandly polite, suave.’ This definition of the word came into common usage around the second half of the seventeenth century. At this time in England, key towns and cities such as London, Brighton, Bath and Bristol, were growing in importance, not only industrially, politically and geographically, but also socially. They became for the upper classes the places to be seen, the domains of the social elite. These urban dwellers were commonly considered to be suave, elegant and refined in manner, especially in relation to countryside dwellers, who, distanced from hives of high society, did not possess the necessary faculties to shine in comparison with the refined city gentry. It is noteworthy that the appalling poverty, endemic disease and shocking working conditions associated with the urban working classes of the time were little considered when defining ‘urbane’ by those who controlled the official status of the language: high society did not much consider the fortunes of the poor, and the unfortunate poor had little hope of impacting upon the vocabulary of contemporary publications or literature.

The definition suave, elegant and refined in manner is then derived from a generalisation of the nature of urban life, a description of the affectations of urban society, i.e., ‘Having the manners, refinement, or polish regarded as characteristic of a town…’ However, the characteristics of a town do not necessarily evoke images of suave, elegant or refined manners. Murder, gang warfare, and drug use is endemic to many urban environments in the U.S.A. and elsewhere; civil unrest and political turmoil is commonplace in many South American cities; in Cambodia in the seventies the Khmer Rouge considered towns and cities to be melting pots of social inequality, moral corruption and political evil. Here, ‘urbane’ would be understood very differently. That is to say, its meaning would be very different, but its definition as ‘Having the manners, refinement, or polish regarded as characteristic of a town…’ would remain unaltered. The characteristics would simply be understood in a different way, perhaps ‘bad mannered, overtly refined and arrogantly polished’. This extreme example is mirrored elsewhere, not least for example in the radical times of the French Revolution and the rise of Socialism. In the northern industrial hubs of England such as Manchester during the 19th and up to the late 20th centuries, the urban area was a centre of industry not culture, the domain of the steelworker not the sybarite.

Something that is ‘urbane’, when correctly understood, can therefore, aside from being suave and refined, describe some other characteristic of urban life. Rusholme, part of Manchester, is an urban environment. Its best-known characteristic is its curries, and it is quite usual to have a nan bread with a curry. It is ‘urbane’ to ‘follow the pursuits… [with] the sentiments characteristic of [a] town’, and it is usual to have nan with a curry; it is blandly polite to do so. It displays the manners, refinement and polish expected when visiting a curry house. But it is not exceptional. The purchasement of a peshwari nan such as that procured by Mr. Leach shows more than an understanding of the manners, refinement, or polish regarded as characteristic of a town, and indicates a cogent knowledge of the various dishes and perhaps also an unusual palate. The ‘urbane’ act or thing is therefore something quite unexceptional, but in keeping with its urban environment. It is polite, civil, courteous, inoffensive; it is the correct way to behave and act; the correct thing to do or have; it is the expected standard characteristic of a town environment. It is then not only an urbane action to order a nan bread, but the nan bread itself is urbane as it pertains to a peculiar characteristic of Manchester; it is typical of the manners, refinement and polish associated with and specific to Rusholme, more widely Manchester and indeeed the urban culture of eating out at varied international cuisine installations at large.

One could take the point further by examining the relationship between the increasing standardisation of urban life today: in the west one city is increasingly like another, possessing and propounding similar fashions, tastes, shops and services. The simple nan bread is here advanced to the status of a virtual iconic urbanity. The nan is uniformly replicated in every curry house; it is universally accepted as the appropriate accompaniment to a curry, and is bland and inoffensive to accommodate this; it is typical of the characteristics of a certain urban set, an exemplary urbanity. It is, in short, urbane. Quod erat demonstrandum.