On Sun, 31 Jul 2005 22:45:38 -0400, suzmccarth <suzmccarth@...>
wrote:

> At the rate we are going no system will be a syllabary and it will fall
> into disuse. Hmm.

It's looking as though the apparent attractiveness and distinctiveness of
the word "moraic" is likely to make it persist, even when careful
scholarship might deprecate it. (deprecate?)

{Wandering OT...}
I'm well aware of some technical or pseudo-technical terms that have had
unjustified popularity because they "sound catchy", or are quite
distinctive. Furthermore, they were, or are, sometimes misused to a
remarkable degree. Some of these are "baud", "PCMCIA", and "watts RMS".
The second one is curious because the PCMCIA, an industry group, realized
years ago that their name was outdated and becoming progressively more
incorrect. They suggested "PC Card", but like cats at play that love to
choose the difficult option, the semi-technical public held onto that
awkward initialism almost passionately.

As to "initialism", that's Richard Lederer's term for "letter clusters"
that cannot be pronounced, by contrast with acronyms. I really hope for a
less-clumsy term that is equally concise, though. "Anonym" seemed like a
possible candidate, based on an obscure configuration setup in Opera, but
I'm skeptical; too close to "anonymous".

Of course, "acronym" is another word that has a vitality because it sounds
"catchy", and is frequently misused. "If you can't say it, it's not an
acronym."

--
Nicholas Q. Bodley /*|*\ Waltham, Mass. (Not "MA")
The curious hermit -- autodidact and polymath
Fighting lost battles... (Q is for "Quixote" :) )