heh, no moderator me - nor power nor will to curtail any discussion. I'm just a monkey clever enough to find that lobbing a stone in the waterhole creates some pretty patterns and sometimes gets the other monkeys' interest... wink

Thanks for some thoughtful responses. I particularly found useful the associations you drew through analogous terns, nuncle. But all have been interesting.

My thoughts were stirred in this direction by a talking-heads radio show on the BBC recently. Melvyn Bragg has assembled some leading brains around a table and discusses the sequential evolution of this term including its sociological connotations, initially in a British cultural context but swiftly branching into less insular waters. I think the programmes may be available as a download - I shall go look in case anyone wants to sample their thoughtful expositions.

Yes, I think you can download each programme as an mp3 here

or are we supposed to say "you can gif it here"?!

Last edited by maverick; 01/06/2013 1:28 PM.