Prester John wrote:O Chap!
Chap wrote:Why the weird allocutionary style? What do you think this is, the Just-so stories? Or, like Alice, did you see it in your brother's Latin grammar?
Prester John wrote:
Are you certain that's a word, Chap? I am familiar with locution, illocution, and perlocution, but allocution? I suppose you're the linguist, and not I.
Good gracious, do you think that there is a list of 'real' words somewhere, brought down from the mountain by Moses? Every word had to be created sometime - and the high-end stuff comes from the way people like you and me talk. Dictionaries simply record our wondrous acts of creativity. But surely an educated person such as you ('familiar with locution, illocution, and perlocution') would surely have expected 'allocution' to pop up sooner or later in the sense of 'the act of addressing someone'? I mean Latin and all that. A guy like you will surely have met 'adloquor'.
But I can't claim credit for introducing 'allocution' to decent society. Just consult your online OED, and you will see:
Brit. allocution#_gb_1.8.mp3 /ˌaləˈkjuːʃn/ , U.S. /ˌæləˈkjuʃ(ə)n/
Forms: 16–17 adlocution, 16– allocution.
Frequency (in current use):
Etymology: A borrowing from Latin. Etymons: Latin allocūtiōn-, allocūtiō, adlocūtiōn-, adlocūtiō.
< classical Latin allocūtiōn-, allocūtiō (also adlocūtiōn-, adlocūtiō... (Show More)
Thesaurus »
1. The action or (more usually) an act of formally addressing a speech to someone, or of delivering an exhortation or moralizing address; a speech, statement, or (occas.) remark of this kind.
1615 T. Adams White Deuill (ed. 4) 109 That comfortable allocution. Good and faithfull seruant, enter into thy masters ioy.
a1656 Bp. J. Hall Invisible World (1659) iii. xi. 205 Entertaine them [sc. angels]..with awfull observances, with spirituall allocutions.
a1677 I. Barrow Treat. Pope's Supremacy (1683) 265 It is observable how the Synod of Chalcedon in their allocution to the Emperour Marcian do excuse P. Leo for expounding the faith in his Epistle.
a1716 J. Edwards Doctr. controverted between Papists & Protestants (1724) xv. 375 These Rhetorical Allocutions to the Dead were one Original of Praying to them.
1848 Thackeray Vanity Fair xlix. 435 After this vigorous allocution, to..his ‘Hareem’.
1869 Blackwood's Edinb. Mag. Sept. 345/1 The Don't-nail-his-ear-to-the-pump allocutions with which he exhorted his flock against landlord murder were read with admiration in England.
1899 H. James Awkward Age ii. v. 45 Her colour, during her visitor's allocution, had distinctly risen.
1921 S. Gordon Avenger vii. 202 ‘All I can say is’, Mrs. Cripps concluded her allocution, ‘get back to your own. Get back to Curley.’
1983 Gesta 22 32/2 As they [sc. deacons] prostrate themselves at his feet, he will say the allocution to the people, ‘Sit nobis fratres.’
2001 Hamilton (Ontario) Spectator (Nexis) 16 July b2 Bhutros Bhutros Gali..ended his short allocution with a hearty ‘vive la Francophonie’.
'Allocutionary' has been around for quite a while too, though I grant you it is a bit more limited in its number of active users:
Discourse Acts and Conversation: A Game of Allocutionary Choices
Goletti, Lucia
Studi italiani di linguistica teorica e applicata, ISSN 0390-6809, 01/1992, Volume 21, Issue 1-3, pp. 267 - 276
Allocutionary strategies in face-to-face conversation are the focus of an analysis of five French plays by Jean Anouilh. Roles & interpretive relations are represented graphically, & the influence of extralinguistic factors is assessed. The conversation is viewed as a verbal game in which the speaker manipulates lexical & pronominal forms of address to his/her advantage. In one excerpt, an act of physical violence is preceded by verbal moves santioning the transgressor's penetration of the victim's privacy. Successive moves are shown to destroy, in sequence, (1) understanding & the element of balance in (2) the interpersonal relationship, (3) pronoun selection, & (4) allocutionary choice. Changes in dyadic authority structure are marked by temporary freedom of allocutionary usage. References. J. Hitchcock
Prester John wrote:Chap wrote:Incidentally, what is your current provisional view on the substance of the question raised in this thread, i.e. the relation between DNA evidence, and the truth-status of the Book of Mormon?
I don't know, and I'm fine with that.
Don't know what, I wonder? Could it be:
1. Don't know anything about the general topic area of the 'relation between DNA evidence, and the truth-status of the Book of Mormon'?
2. Don't know whether DNA evidence impacts positively on the truth-status of the Book of Mormon, or negatively?
It can hardly be (1), because that would tend to imply that you wouldn't know anything about Perego, Southerton et al., which you obviously do. If it is (2), I suspect the existence of a heavily loaded shelf somewhere.
