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Joined: Sep 2001
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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I don't think of 'tête-à-tête’ as the same as 'mano a mano.' 'Tête-à-tête’ seems to be more of a private discussion of personal matters whereas 'mano a mano' seems competitive in nature.
But maybe you weren't implying that the two were equivalents at all, dgeigh, and I just misread you.
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But maybe you weren't implying that the two were equivalents at all
No, I wasn’t. I was poorly pointing out how the original meaning of ‘mano a mano’ has become bastardized with erroneous meanings that don’t exist, such as ‘head to head’.
When I hear ‘mano a mano’ defined as ‘head to head’ I think, well why not just say ‘head to head’? It has fewer syllables and it’s clearer. Or, if you must use a non-English phrase to mean ‘head to head’, say ‘tête-à-tête’. So what if it doesn’t have the same meaning as the bastardized meaning of ‘mano a mano’? You’re not really interested in meaning anyway, or you wouldn’t say ‘mano a mano’ to mean ‘head to head’.
But at the same time, when someone uses any non-English phrase in such a way, I realize it’s usually not the meaning of the non-English phrase that people are trying to get across. Instead, it’s the ‘cool-value’ they think they will garner by using it.
The current misused, ‘cool-value’, non-English word is ‘caveat’. It has become a regular buzzword among the corporate wanna-be, up-and-comers around my office. I half expect balloons to drop from the ceiling, confetti to be thrown, and hearty congratulations all ‘round whenever someone manages to work it into a conversation – bonus points if one can work it in during a meeting. Just today I heard a person say, “This solution comes with a caveat: it cannot …” Here, and in practically every other sentence I’ve heard ‘caveat’ used, the person used ‘caveat’ synonymously with the English word ‘warning’. The problem is that ‘caveat’ does not mean ‘warning’. The Latin word for warning is ‘monitus’ not ‘caveat’. (By the way, the English word ‘monster’ is derived from the same Latin word as ‘monitus’: ‘monere’ to warn, advise. If one thinks of a monster literally as a warning, monsters like Frankenstein’s monster and Godzilla make much more sense – just food for thought.) ‘Caveat’, of course, came into popular usage through the Latin phrase ‘Caveat emptor’, which, as I’m sure most of you know, means, ‘Let the buyer beware’. ‘Caveat’ means, ‘let him/her/it beware’, and ‘emptor’, of course, means ‘the buyer’. So, translated directly, the sentence I heard today would be: “This solution comes with a let him/her/it beware: it cannot …” Ok, so one can make the logical leap and figure out what the person meant, but if one means ‘warning’, and really feels the need to try to garner some cool-value by using a non-English word, then why not say ‘monitus’?
Of course, it just doesn’t do to wee on someone’s balloon and confetti party by pointing out that they used ‘caveat’ incorrectly. As I mentioned in another post, “Team players speak the [corporate] babble.”
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Joined: Sep 2000
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Sep 2000
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>>>I don't think of 'tête-à-tête’ as the same as 'mano a mano.' 'Tête-à-tête’ seems to be more of a private discussion of personal matters whereas 'mano a mano' seems competitive in nature.
There is some measure of machismo involved when a guy says he wants to talk mano a mano.
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Joined: Oct 2004
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There is some measure of machismo involved when a guy says he wants to talk mano a mano
Here I go again, thinking of ‘mano a mano’ in the literal sense. When I think of a guy wanting to talk ‘hand to hand’ with another guy, I think of something, well, less than macho. ‘Fight’ hand to hand, ok, but ‘talk’? Talk hand in hand (or 'vis-à-vis', or 'tête-à-tête'); fight hand to hand.
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Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
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I've never used the expression and it's not common currency where I come from, but I've always understood it to mean go head to head in an aggressive manner. That may or may not include physicality.
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