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#6233 09/18/00 09:13 PM
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I like 'yomp', because the sound of it (and the feel of it if you say it) fit so superbly with the meaning.

Very true. Since I first heard it as a 14 year old watching TV coverage of the Falklands conflict, I have loved the way "yomp" rolls off the tongue, and it is very evocative. That could be largely by association, but the word brings back vivid images, and seems to hint at the exertion involved in yomping.


I've never heard this word before, and I can't figure out what it means, either. Perhaps I'm not picking up the clues, but I'm visualizing a yawn mixed with a chomp, but I truly doubt that's the meaning. Could you please enlighten me?


#6234 09/18/00 09:59 PM
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I've never heard this word before, and I can't figure out what it means, either. Perhaps I'm not picking up the clues, but I'm visualizing a yawn mixed with a chomp, but I truly doubt that's the meaning. Could you please enlighten me?

My Chambers defines it this way: "yomp, (esp. mil. coll.) v.i. to carry heavy equipment on foot over difficult terrain. [Poss. imit.]"

A quick search at Google reveals that the verb is now used very widely in British English to refer to hiking and tramping generally.



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(awaiting word from across the Pond....)

I'm across the other Pond, but "orientate" jars on me as well. My Chambers makes no reference to any particular variant being responsible for "orientate", but it sounds to me like a back-formation from "orientation" more than an example of the British fondness for extra syllables. My grandparents were sticklers for British pronunciation (trait=tray, mall=mell), and they would never let me get away with "orientate." Interestingly, Merriam-Webster's site tells us that "orientate" first surfaced in 1849, and dictionary,.com has some interesting specimens of its use. Just my $0.02


#6236 09/19/00 02:27 AM
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for OneLook, etc. see 'online dictionaries' thread in miscellany


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I remember when, about 35 year ago, I was laughed at by a native English-speaker when I translated the German "orientiert" by "orientated"! In the meantime it seems to have become accepted because something more vague than "oriented" was needed. You can say "oriented WSW", but "orientated" covers half the horizon .


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In fact, it would be hard to translate Helmut Ziegert's 1980 article, entitled "Objektorientierte und problemorientierte Forschungsansätze in der Archäologie" in any other way!

Said she intellectually!

We do like our extra letters.



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, I was laughed at by a native English-speaker when I translated the German "orientiert" by "orientated"!

GRR, she said, bristling up! It is VERY RUDE to laugh at
someone's innocent mistake. Just goes to show what kind of person they were, muttermuttermutter...

BTW, I hear that horrible word here, all too often.


#6240 09/19/00 07:42 PM
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does yomp=schlep?


#6241 09/19/00 08:00 PM
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I'd say that 'yomp' is more akin to 'slog' and doesn't schlep the negative baggage of 'schlep'.


#6242 09/20/00 02:04 AM
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My husband uses the term 'hump' for what I think yomp means.
For ex., he'll say the scouts humped the canoes over the
portage, or he and somebody humped the desk up the stairs.


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