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Joined: Sep 2000
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Carpal Tunnel
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OP
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Sep 2000
Posts: 2,788 |
The Diocese of Olympia -- the Episcopal Church in Western Washington -- is in the process of electing a new bishop suffragan to assist the Ordinary. There are five candidates to become the new assisting bishop. There will be an election soon and, in order to introduce all of the candidates to the electors all around the diocese, there is a sort of road trip process where a busload of candidates and spouses travel from place to play holding regional meetings. The diocese called this the "walkabout" although it might have been more accurately descriptive to call it "rideabout" given the mode of transportation actually employed. The term walkabout has been used by many others dioceses to describe this sort of cart-and-pony-show whereby candidates for election as bishop meet their constituency.
Someone raised an interesting issue. "Walkabout" is an Australian term which has religious significance to the people native to that continent. The question is: Does the appropriation of a religious term from another culture potentially offend those who use it to describe something sacred to them? I never gave it a moment's thought ... but I can be a callous lout.
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Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 3,065
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 3,065 |
Many boards have what they call avatars -- little pictures individual to each member which appear by the messages. Is this use offensive to Hindus?
Bingley
Bingley
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Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 1,027
old hand
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old hand
Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 1,027 |
Given that "walkabout" is an English translation of the (ab-)original word, I doubt that it's use in another English-speaking country will offend many Australian natives.
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Joined: Nov 2003
Posts: 81
journeyman
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journeyman
Joined: Nov 2003
Posts: 81 |
It's a thoroughly standard word applied to two things: the Queen, and a small missing object. The Queen goes walkabout whenever she visits anywhere, and you can complain that your pen has gone walkabout.
Now that's odd, I was just about to say a synonym for the missing things is "grown legs". But something that's gone walkabout is probably just misplaced and will reappear at some point, but something that's grown legs is probably gone for good and you have to get another one from the stationery cupboard.
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Joined: Mar 2002
Posts: 1,692
Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Mar 2002
Posts: 1,692 |
The Australians use the word to explain why someone is missing (is it always a male thing by the way?) from his usual places – “He’s gone walkabout.” In fact he’s gone off somewhere out of contact and on his own. This seems in keeping with our using the word to refer to a missing object, but not when we apply it to the act of the Queen, or whoever, when going around the fringes of a crowd and having a few words here and there. She is certainly not missing, she is there in plain view, just walking about. It's a neat enough way to describe the action though.
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Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 11,613
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 11,613 |
Father Steve, we all have our foibles, but since I don't believe (sorry, yeah, I know you're a man of the cloth, but) that you're "a callous lout", I think you must have been telling us about a lunch break: COLA, USUAL LOT; TACO ALSO, LULU. And I rather hope not LOLA, USUAL COT. 
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Joined: Aug 2000
Posts: 2,204
Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Aug 2000
Posts: 2,204 |
Surely, he meant CALL SOUL OUT ?
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Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 3,439
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 3,439 |
to describe this sort of cart-and-pony-show
Do you always say that? I've heard only "dog-and-pony-show."
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Joined: Sep 2000
Posts: 2,788
Carpal Tunnel
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OP
Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Sep 2000
Posts: 2,788 |
Google notes only seven uses of "cart and pony show" while it notes 23,700 uses of "dog and pony show." Once again, I find myself in a distinctly minoritarian posture. My spine is so accustomed to this that it is actually comfortable.
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Joined: Dec 2000
Posts: 13,803
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Dec 2000
Posts: 13,803 |
a distinctly minoritarian posture
If you're in the Diocese of Olympia you've got the entire Greek Pantheon on your side, so I wouldn't sweat a little minoritarianism.
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