straight men trying to make Serious war dramas and accidentally making incredibly tender homoerotic cinema is the funniest thing
In his essay, “Masculinity as Spectacle,” Steve Neale seeks to extend Laura Mulvey’s work on the male gaze and to challenge her assertion that the male or male-identified spectator can never look upon the male body as an erotic object. To challenge Mulvey’s assertion, Neale identifies the mechanisms mainstream Hollywood cinema uses to represent the male body as erotic. One way of doing this, Neale argues, is by making the male body the target of violence. In the war film, a soldier can hold his buddy – as long as his buddy is dying on the battlefield. In the western, Butch Cassidy can wash the Sundance Kid’s naked flesh – as long as it is wounded. In the boxing film, a trainer can rub the well-developed torso and sinewy back of his protege – as long as it is bruised. In the crime film, a mob lieutenant can embrace his boss like a lover – as long as he is riddled with bullets. Violence makes the homoeroticism of many “male” genres invisible; it is a structural mechanism of plausible deniability.
Apparently the French word for “unicorn” used to be “unicorne”, which makes perfect sense. But it sounded too much like “une icorne”, so they though “icorne” was the name of the animal, and so “the unicorn” was “l’icorne”. Then later they decided that no, “l’icorne” was the whole name of the animal, so “the unicorn” became “la licorne”. The takeaway being that French is a ridiculous language and linguistics is cool
exactly! on the same vein, a lot of English words come from Old French. For example, “gown” comes from “gonne” (and had the same meaning as it has today)
Also, there were no punctuation signs on medieval manuscripts, and they had a tendency to separate letters inside words and to agglutinate words together, which explains the Unicorne/Licorne thing 🙂
yall
remember that post that went like…… “why is french… Like
That”?
well,
time for An Education from ur
local french literature student
SO,
BASICALLY, WHAT HAPPENED
first
of all, well, it’s like the 9th
century and the king is like…… hey what if….. and bear with me
on this one but….. what if…….. we wrote………. the
things about our country………… in the language……. actual
people living in this country….. speak?
and
people were like “holy shit youre the king so okay” and then the
king was like “i want YOU to write this laws and THINGS in FRENCH!”
and the monks were like “aw okay” so they started doing that
EXCEPT
that
they had a big fucking problem. what
was that problem, you may ask? well,
the problem was thaT THOSE MOTHERFUCKERS DIDNT HAVE AN ALPHABET TO
WRITE THIS FUCKING EXCUSE OF A LANGUAGE
lemme
explain. all
they knew was latin and the latin alphabet. bc
like knowing latin was the whole thing when u were a monk. also
latin was like… the Serious Language. but
french doesnt sound like
latin like at all. french
sounded like some bitch ass demon had bitten their tongue and was
trying to order a latte in the middle of an exorcism incantation. and
i
say “sounded” on purpose bc their pronunciation was wild, man. like
ultra wild. like
even WORSE than what we have to deal with now. and
it had NOTHING to do with motherfucking
latin.
so
what did the monks do? well,
they were like “aw this is a mcfucking embarrassment of a
situation, ay” and had a choice. basically,
they could invent a whole new mode of transcription for french weird
ass sounds… OR they could do their best to try and adapt the latin
alphabet to its demonic sprouting.
which
is, pretty sadly if you ask me, what they went for.
so
they started planning strategies that were complex at shit bc like
how tf are you gonna write “cheval” with
a fucking LATIN ALPHABET???
so basically they all went with whatever felt best to write in
the moment and there were no
rules and it was a weird fucking mess of a situation lemme tell you,
ive seen the manuscripts, those men went APE SHITT
and
like…. some
of them never used the same spelling twice. also
there were like no accent and punctuation and things that allow you
to write like a fucking normal human being so jot that down
so,
that was a big fucking mess and they started adding letters e v e r y
w h e r e like……….. ok some of them were actually smart like
they did their best to add letters that no one pronounced
but it made it look like some latin thing. like
basically they put up a pink hairband on a fucking DEMON CHILD and
went “aaaawww look how CUTE it is, looks like its mommy so
much!!!!” and prayed to god it would end up
well (spoiler: no. no
it didnt. bitch)
so
you got things like “veult” for “veut” bc the “l” made it
look a bit like the latin “vult” or something. but
then as i said
some of them went APE SHITT and were like, WOOHOO FREE LETTERS and
started adding weird letters to words that had literally no
etymological link to that letter. so
they were writing “peut” like “peult” just because….. idk
they felt like to??
so
its Like That in the middle ages and then people started thinking
about french as a language and they went like….. MAAAAW THERES A
WEIRD FUCKING STRAY WRITING OUTSIDE!!! MAAAAAAAW!!!! IS THAT EVEN A
FUCKING LANGUAGE???? BLINK
MOTHERFUCKER!! AAAAAAAAAAAA
and everyone was losing their shit alright
so like english students started
going to college in france and they were like “bitch
you live like
this??” and the french were like :/// whelp
and like they did their best to like
help non-native writing
french but it had no rules so it didnt work out well and like….. in
the 1500’s some guys were like “okay guys this makes no
sense from now on well use a
RATIONALIZED WRITING i
built MYSELF” and their idea was basically to write french as they
spoke it which i
know SOUNDS like a good idea but actually AINT
bc first of all there are a shitton
of words that have the same pronunciation in french and you
need those weird spellings to actually know what the word is there
for like….. they wrote like “me” for “mai” and “mais”
and “mes” and “met” and basically that was wild
and some
of those guys who knew a lot about grammar went like “ooookayyyyy
so were removing those letters we dont pronounce buuuuuuuuuut its not
alwayyyyyys like thiiiiiiiiis” and like…. right-wing
people like the 1550 equivalent of republicans or some shit went
like, foaming at the mouth like rabid fucking dogs when they saw “pe”
instead of “peult” “oooooohhhhhh but you DIDNT and its not EVEN
REALLY RATIONAL” and like they had a ton or arguments and it
actually became a kinda linguistic war and all
plus they didnt pronounce the same
things everywhere in france so in paris they wrote “otr” for
“autre” and in lyon they wrote “aotr” and they were like………
“we got a problem here” bc the whole thing was to get a language
that was the same everywhere in the country basically
so u got those reformist guys on the
one side and the reactionaries on the other side and honestly,
reactionaries’ arguments are so fucking funny they were like…
“okay so some of the letters are
useful bc it helps understanding that the word comes from latin”
this ones rational alright
“also some mute letters are used to
link the words from an
identical background together and
create semantic links like
“sang” (blood) does have a mute “g” bc it links it to
“sanguin” (sanguine) and other words like this” alright cool
but THEN you got some weird fucking
ideas like
“but actually writing IS the
standard bc written things Are More Noble, Actually” which is
like……. weird
flex but ok
“yes, it makes it harder to learn,
but so it repels women and non-educated people who would soil The
Language if they could write
it” like DUDE are you
FUCKING SERIOUS
and finally – their main idea –
“bUt iT loOkS FaNcY” aka
#aesthetics and thats basically it
also. the
printing press workers were like……… guys are you SURE you
want to get us to COMPLETELY CHANGE AND UNLEARN OUR WHOLE JOB LIKE
C’MON so it kinda weighed in favor of the reactionaries
also the reactionaries won in the
long term
tl;dr so french is Like That because 1.
its a demonic language that monks desperately tried to tie back to
latin and 2. old white men with bizarre aesthetic tastes hated women and The Poor
thanks for coming to my ted talk my
language makes no sense and neither does its history
This is hilarious and true at the same time. But then I’m Italian and I would love to know what you think about my language, because it is not easy at all. Also in reality french is really close to italian that is really close to latin, so in some way french is close to latin, and not because of some crazy monks.
Well i havent studied the history of italian linguistics! But from what i know about this language (i speak a bit), the main difference between french and italian is that godforsaken writing. like italian really is simple… compared to french, if were talking about writing! Im not talking about grammar rules or syntax bc im not qualified 🙂 but really the main difference is that… italian sounded a lot like latin since it was (i think? with romanian maybe) the most direct latin derivation. so they had no problem writing it down using the latin rules/alphabet (and also simplified it sooner (by far) than french, putting “f” instead of “ph” etc.)
so – when were talking about writing its like… italian has an actual, appropriate, useful writing, thats pretty much ideally phonographic (= you write what you hear) because it was forged with the right graphic system. whereas french… well…. didnt…
Actually, under Henri III, a french man named Rambaud (no, not Rimbaud – although Rimbaud wanted to create a new poetic language too… i know its confusing) created a new alphabet. i havent studied it in detail but apparently it worked pretty well with french sounds… also it doesnt look even remotely like what we write like nowadays haha
But yea… it didnt work in the end and we forgot about it. Probably because it was 1). Too late, and the monks didnt want or couldn’t learn a whole new transcription system and 2). Too far away from latin, the mother language, and Good Writing System.
wholesome student life things that we should collectively start romanticizing
waking up and being genuinely thrilled to go to class because today is THAT CLASS you love so much you’d like it to never end
coffee breaks with friends, chatting and joking about this particularly hard essay and the prof’s mannerism
coffee breaks on your own, as you absent-mindedly watch the people around you, while thinking about what you’re working on
finding this book you’ve been dying to read for so long, and borrowing it from the library
the feeling of excitement that goes through you whenever you remember The Book is in your backpack
understanding everything during demanding classes and being genuinely interested in the subject
buying a New Special Pen and taking colorful notes that look super pretty
not being able to shut up about your school projects (no your friends dont really care about the intricate details of what you’re working on, they don’t even have the same major as you, but they’re happy to hear you rant with such a burning passion)
actually doing the extra reading and having your curiosity so piqued by what you’re reading that you go on and on and suddenly its 1am and what happened
printing the project you’ve spent so much time and energy on and feeling the paper’s warmth
actually submitting that project without feeling awful about it because you know you did your best and aren’t responsible for what happens next
when you finally finish this Super Hard And Important Essay at like 3am, open the window and feel the cold night air on your burning cheeks and everything is dark and quiet and you can see the moon and you’re at peace with everything for a few minutes
when this professor you admire says you did a great job and/or that you’re talented!!!!
realizing two concepts that seemed so far away from each other and that you discovered in wildly different contexts are actually interlinked, then Realizing™ things and linking concepts/works/articles to each other at the speed of light & being super excited about it
being so deeply immersed in your work that you didn’t realize two hours have passed
finding the Perfect Spot at the library
that Pure Joy moment when you FINALLY understand that super obscure sentence/text
when you feel anxious because you’re not done with your homework & the deadline is super tight & your friend tells you they aren’t done yet either
same but with an even more intense relief feeling when you realize you both haven’t even started yet
when the professor starts a new reasoning and you can predict what the next idea/the final conclusion will be
when the professor mention your favorite novel/author/fictional character in class and you feel like your internal screech of joy could shatter glass
the Academic Salt™ that has you like 👀👀
when the professor tears apart an author or scholar you hate and you’re like YES I WANT BLOOD GIVE ME BLOOD
when you learn that Cool New Fact that makes you reconsider your whole life
leaving the library after a long productive day and feeling like nothing is real but experiencing everything more intensely
leaving the library at night after a long study session and everybody has left already and its just you and the long neon-lit corridors then stepping outside and smelling the crisp night wind
medusa-avenging-squad 