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Sacred Cow (idiom)
Sacred cow is an idiom, a figurative reference to cattle in religion and mythology. A figurative sacred cow is a figure of speech for something considered immune from question or criticism, especially unreasonably so. This idiom is thought to originate in American English, although similar or even identical idioms occur in many other languages. Background The idiom is based on the popular understanding of the elevated place of cows in Hinduism and appears to have emerged in America in the late 19th century. The reverence for cows in the traditionally agrarian Vedic Hindu society stems from the reluctance to harm an animal whose milk humans consume after being weaned off the mother's milk. In Jewish tradition, there is a similar moral stigma against cooking veal (calf meat) in cows milk. A literal sacred cow or sacred bull is an actual cow or bull that is treated with sincere respect. One writer has suggested that there is an element of paradox in the concept of respect for ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Book Of Exodus Chapter 33-2 (Bible Illustrations By Sweet Media)
A book is a medium for recording information in the form of writing or images, typically composed of many pages (made of papyrus, parchment, vellum, or paper) bound together and protected by a cover. The technical term for this physical arrangement is ''codex'' (plural, ''codices''). In the history of hand-held physical supports for extended written compositions or records, the codex replaces its predecessor, the scroll. A single sheet in a codex is a leaf and each side of a leaf is a page. As an intellectual object, a book is prototypically a composition of such great length that it takes a considerable investment of time to compose and still considered as an investment of time to read. In a restricted sense, a book is a self-sufficient section or part of a longer composition, a usage reflecting that, in antiquity, long works had to be written on several scrolls and each scroll had to be identified by the book it contained. Each part of Aristotle's ''Physics'' is called a b ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Motto
A motto (derived from the Latin , 'mutter', by way of Italian , 'word' or 'sentence') is a sentence or phrase expressing a belief or purpose, or the general motivation or intention of an individual, family, social group, or organisation. Mottos (or mottoes) are usually found predominantly in written form (unlike slogans, which may also be expressed orally), and may stem from long traditions of social foundations, or from significant events, such as a civil war or a revolution. A motto may be in any language, but Latin has been widely used, especially in the Western world. Heraldry In heraldry, a motto is often found below the shield in a banderole; this placement stems from the Middle Ages, in which the vast majority of nobles possessed a coat of arms complete with a motto. In the case of Scottish heraldry, it is mandated to appear above the crest. Spanish coats of arms may display a motto in the bordure of the shield. In heraldic literature, the terms 'rallying cry' r ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
19th-century Neologisms
The 19th (nineteenth) century began on 1 January 1801 ( MDCCCI), and ended on 31 December 1900 ( MCM). The 19th century was the ninth century of the 2nd millennium. The 19th century was characterized by vast social upheaval. Slavery was abolished in much of Europe and the Americas. The First Industrial Revolution, though it began in the late 18th century, expanding beyond its British homeland for the first time during this century, particularly remaking the economies and societies of the Low Countries, the Rhineland, Northern Italy, and the Northeastern United States. A few decades later, the Second Industrial Revolution led to ever more massive urbanization and much higher levels of productivity, profit, and prosperity, a pattern that continued into the 20th century. The Islamic gunpowder empires fell into decline and European imperialism brought much of South Asia, Southeast Asia, and almost all of Africa under colonial rule. It was also marked by the collapse of the large ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Malapropism
A malapropism (also called a malaprop, acyrologia, or Dogberryism) is the mistaken use of an incorrect word in place of a word with a similar sound, resulting in a nonsensical, sometimes humorous utterance. An example is the statement attributed to baseball player Yogi Berra, regarding switchhitters, "He hits from both sides of the plate. He's amphibious." Malapropisms often occur as errors in natural speech and are sometimes the subject of media attention, especially when made by politicians or other prominent individuals. Philosopher Donald Davidson has said that malapropisms show the complex process through which the brain translates thoughts into language. Humorous malapropisms are the type that attract the most attention and commentary, but bland malapropisms are common in speech and writing. Etymology The word "malapropism" (and its earlier form, "malaprop") comes from a character named "Mrs. Malaprop" in Richard Brinsley Sheridan's 1775 play ''The Rivals''. Mrs. Malapro ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Literal And Figurative Language
Literal and figurative language is a distinction within some fields of language analysis, in particular stylistics, rhetoric, and semantics. *Literal language uses words exactly according to their conventionally accepted meanings or denotation. *Figurative (or non-literal) language uses words in a way that deviates from their conventionally accepted definitions in order to convey a more complicated meaning or heightened effect. Figurative language is often created by presenting words in such a way that they are equated, compared, or associated with normally unrelated meanings. Literal usage confers meaning to words, in the sense of the meaning they have by themselves, outside any figure of speech. It maintains a consistent meaning regardless of the context, with ''the intended meaning corresponding exactly to the meaning'' of the individual words. On the contrary, figurative use of language is the use of words or phrases that ''implies a non-literal meaning which does make sense ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Iconoclasm
Iconoclasm (from Greek: grc, εἰκών, lit=figure, icon, translit=eikṓn, label=none + grc, κλάω, lit=to break, translit=kláō, label=none)From grc, εἰκών + κλάω, lit=image-breaking. ''Iconoclasm'' may also be considered as a back-formation from ''iconoclast'' (Greek: εἰκοκλάστης). The corresponding Greek word for iconoclasm is εἰκονοκλασία, ''eikonoklasia''. is the social belief in the importance of the destruction of icons and other images or monuments, most frequently for religious or political reasons. People who engage in or support iconoclasm are called iconoclasts, a term that has come to be figuratively applied to any individual who challenges "cherished beliefs or venerated institutions on the grounds that they are erroneous or pernicious." Conversely, one who reveres or venerates religious images is called (by iconoclasts) an '' iconolater''; in a Byzantine context, such a person is called an ''iconodule'' or ''ico ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Holy Cow (expression)
"Holy cow!" (and other similar terms), an exclamation of surprise used mostly in the United States, Canada, Australia, and England, is a minced oath or euphemism. The expression dates to at latest 1905. Its earliest known appearance was in a tongue-in-cheek letter to the editor: "A lover of the cow writes to this column to protest against a certain variety of Hindu oath having to do with the vain use of the name of the milk producer. There is the profane exclamations, 'holy cow!' and, 'By the stomach of the eternal cow! The phrase appears to have been adopted as a means to avoid using obscene or indecent language and may have been based on a general awareness of the holiness of cows in some religious traditions. Definition From the ''Dictionary of American Slang'' (1960): Usage and variations Expressions such as "Holy buckets!", "Holy underwear!", etc. also employ a play-on-words, "holy" implying "riddled with holes" oley Paul Beale, however, revised Eric Partridge's '' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Realist
''The Realist'' was a Humor magazine, magazine of "social-political-religious criticism and satire", intended as a hybrid of a grown-ups version of Mad (magazine), ''Mad'' and Lyle Stuart's anti-censorship monthly ''The Independent.'' Edited and published by Paul Krassner, and often regarded as a milestone in the American underground press, underground or Counterculture of the 1960s, countercultural press of the mid-20th century, it was a nationally-distributed newsstand publication as early as 1958. Publication was discontinued in 2001. History First published in the spring of 1958 in New York City in the offices of ''Mad (magazine), Mad'', ''The Realist'' appeared on a fairly regular schedule during the 1960s and then on an irregular schedule after the early 1970s. In 1984, it was revived as a much smaller newsletter. Articles and cartoons from the magazine were collected in a book, ''The Best of the Realist'' (Running Press, 1984). The final issue of ''The Realist'' was #146 ( ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Satire
Satire is a genre of the visual, literary, and performing arts, usually in the form of fiction and less frequently non-fiction, in which vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, often with the intent of shaming or exposing the perceived flaws of individuals, corporations, government, or society itself into improvement. Although satire is usually meant to be humorous, its greater purpose is often constructive social criticism, using wit to draw attention to both particular and wider issues in society. A feature of satire is strong irony or sarcasm —"in satire, irony is militant", according to literary critic Northrop Frye— but parody, burlesque, exaggeration, juxtaposition, comparison, analogy, and double entendre are all frequently used in satirical speech and writing. This "militant" irony or sarcasm often professes to approve of (or at least accept as natural) the very things the satirist wishes to question. Satire is found in many a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cornell University Press
The Cornell University Press is the university press of Cornell University; currently housed in Sage House, the former residence of Henry William Sage. It was first established in 1869, making it the first university publishing enterprise in the United States, but was inactive from 1884 to 1930. The press was established in the College of the Mechanic Arts (as mechanical engineering was called in the 19th century) because engineers knew more about running steam-powered printing presses than literature professors. Since its inception, The press has offered work-study financial aid: students with previous training in the printing trades were paid for typesetting and running the presses that printed textbooks, pamphlets, a weekly student journal, and official university publications. Today, the press is one of the country's largest university presses. It produces approximately 150 nonfiction titles each year in various disciplines, including anthropology, Asian studies, bio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Idiom
An idiom is a phrase or expression that typically presents a figurative, non-literal meaning attached to the phrase; but some phrases become figurative idioms while retaining the literal meaning of the phrase. Categorized as formulaic language, an idiom's figurative meaning is different from the literal meaning. Idioms occur frequently in all languages; in English alone there are an estimated twenty-five million idiomatic expressions. Derivations Many idiomatic expressions were meant literally in their original use, but sometimes the attribution of the literal meaning changed and the phrase itself grew away from its original roots—typically leading to a folk etymology. For instance, the phrase "spill the beans" (meaning to reveal a secret) is first attested in 1919, but has been said to originate from an ancient method of voting by depositing beans in jars, which could be spilled, prematurely revealing the results. Other idioms are deliberately figurative. For example, " br ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Paradox
A paradox is a logically self-contradictory statement or a statement that runs contrary to one's expectation. It is a statement that, despite apparently valid reasoning from true premises, leads to a seemingly self-contradictory or a logically unacceptable conclusion. A paradox usually involves contradictory-yet-interrelated elements that exist simultaneously and persist over time. They result in "persistent contradiction between interdependent elements" leading to a lasting "unity of opposites". In logic, many paradoxes exist that are known to be invalid arguments, yet are nevertheless valuable in promoting critical thinking, while other paradoxes have revealed errors in definitions that were assumed to be rigorous, and have caused axioms of mathematics and logic to be re-examined. One example is Russell's paradox, which questions whether a "list of all lists that do not contain themselves" would include itself, and showed that attempts to found set theory on the identificatio ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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