🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <1992Nov21.121330.19649@infodev.cam.ac.uk>, etg10@cl.cam.ac.uk (Edmund Grimley-Evans) writes:
|> |> ``The degree of synonymy (or near synonymy) in the vocabulary for genitalia
|> |> and copulation has no parallel elsewhere in the English lexicon -- except in
|> |> the terms for `whore.' There are reportedly more than 1,200 terms for `vagina'
|> |> and more than 1,000 for `penis' (with or without testicles), 800 for
|> |> copulation, and 2,000 for whore...'
|> 
|> When people talk about "The English Language" or "The English Lexicon" they are
|> usually making a major Denkfehler. Speakers of the same dialect of English may
|> use very similar grammars, but when it comes to vocabulary there are huge
|> differences even between similarly-aged siblings. What possible significance can
|> these numbers have?

Certainly the claim that there is ``An English Lexicon'' is must be taken with
a pinch of salt. The only point of the ``numbers'' is (taking up Pat Healey's
earlier point) that taboo subjects breed large numbers of euphemisms, these
being the closest that one gets to synonymity (in the sense of universally
subtitutable) in real language.


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