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Joined: Sep 2000
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Carpal Tunnel
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OP
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Sep 2000
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I just received an e-mail message from a chum in the Mother Country in which he used the word "computerate." From the context, I discern his intent to mean "someone who knows things about computers and who speaks the language which computer-familiar people speak." Ever heard of this? How you do like it?
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Joined: Oct 2000
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veteran
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veteran
Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 1,346 |
Hiya Paw, I think "computerate" stinks, and I hope I never do hear it outside the current context! However, being a potentially useful compression of "computer literate", I'll bet it's with us for generations.
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Joined: Oct 2000
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member
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member
Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 197 |
Having spent years with people who proudly deem themselves 'Computer Geeks' (most of whom have recently graduated from college and now make $50-80k in their first 'real' job ) I have heard computerate often enough. Usually, though, I hear it as a verb... "He is computerating." I doubt that you'll see any less of it for a long time, wheter it is used as a verb or a noun.
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Joined: Sep 2000
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Carpal Tunnel
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OP
Carpal Tunnel
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There is a lexicon of computer hacker termionology located at http://www.science.uva.nl/~mes/jargon/ ... but it does not contain "computerate."
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Joined: Sep 2000
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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I found the following at the website of the Chronicle of Higher Education:
computerate adj. Computer literate. Greg Ulmer, an English professor at the University of Florida, says universities must "teach students to be as computerate as they are literate." His students use hypertext and multimedia elements in their writing assignments, he adds.
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old hand
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old hand
Joined: Mar 2000
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It is almost instantly recognisable, and it doesn't corrupt an existing word by giving it a new meaning, and hence losing much-loved distinction (gay, tandem etc being examples of such). Long may it live with us.
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Joined: Apr 2000
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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but, alas, the verb form will ineluctably proliferate, take the past tense, and become entwined with computer-aided (as in ~ design [CAD]).
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Joined: Mar 2000
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old hand
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old hand
Joined: Mar 2000
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And won't that teach the ruddy Americans to distinguish their ts from their ds when speaking? Huzzah for RP - we shall rule the world through accent alone (with a touch of stiff upper lippery)! ;->
cheer
the sunshine warrior
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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who are you calling rutty??
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old hand
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old hand
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Day-em. An ah thote yuall'ed be pleeyuzd with thuh caampluhment.
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