A three-line whip

A three-line whip. Listening to the Radio (BBC Radio 4) just now I’ve discovered what this phrase actually means / comes from: British Parliamentary procedure!  Ex-MP Gyles Brandreth is interviewing people about Persuasion – no, not the Jane Austen novel – but the art of persuasion. He recalls how when he was a Parliamentary Whip he had to let MPs know if they had to be in the Chamber of the House (of Commons) to vote. The instruction was either underlined with one line – important – or two lines – very important – or, in extremis, three lines: Your presence in the House is absolutely vital, and you MUST vote with the Government on this...  And so this is a ‘three-line whip’!

BBC Radio 4, Saturday 31st March 2018, 10.30am: ‘Gyles Brandreth and the Art of Persuasion’ https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09x8qfh

Interestingly, when I look this up online, I see, repeatedly, that dictionaries give the actual meaning and use of the phrase ‘a three-line whip’. But I don’t find it easy to find examples of the metaphorical use. While I was growing up in the 1960s and 1970s a ‘three-line whip’ was a common phrase to say that something was being strictly enforced. If my father was repeatedly late for supper, for instance, my mother would say, “Don’t be late again – this is a three-line whip, Ron!” So I am surprised online dictionaries don’t seem to acknowledge this everyday usage. Maybe it’s fallen out of everyday use... or maybe I’m simply getting old...!

‘In the UK a three-line whip is an instruction given to Members of Parliament by the leaders of their party telling them they must vote in the way that the party wants them to on a particular subject.’  https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/three-line-whip (accessed 10.58, 31.03.2018)

‘A single whip is simply a guideline, while a double whip (or two line whip) is stricter - and attendance at the vote is required. The three-line whip is a 'vote with the party or get out'. The number of lines comes from the number of times that a vote is underlined by the Chief Whip in the parliament's schedule.’  https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/11593/where-does-three-line-whip-come-from (accessed 11.00 31.03.2018)

‘The Whip

Every week, whips send out a circular (called 'The Whip') to their MPs or Lords detailing upcoming parliamentary business. Special attention is paid to divisions (where members vote on debates), which are ranked in order of importance by the number of times they are underlined.

Three-line whips

Important divisions [opportunities for MPs to vote on the outcome of debates] are underlined three times - a 'three-line whip' - and normally apply to major events like the second readings of significant Bills.

Defying a three-line whip is very serious, and has occasionally resulted in the whip being withdrawn from an MP or Lord. This means that the Member is effectively expelled from their party (but keeps their seat) and must sit as an independent until the whip is restored.’

https://www.parliament.uk/about/mps-and-lords/principal/whips/ (accessed 11.25, 31.03.2018)

So what is a ‘division’ in the UK Parliament?

‘In parliamentary procedure, a division of the assembly, division of the house, or simply division is a method for taking a better estimate of a vote than a voice vote. Typically, a division is taken when the result of a voice vote is challenged or when a two-thirds vote is required.’

In parliamentary procedure, a division of the assembly, division of the house, or simply division is a method for taking a better estimate of a vote than a voice vote. Typically, a division is taken when the result of a voice vote is challenged or when a two-thirds vote is required.

A division is also called a rising vote, where members stand up from their seats. According to Robert's Rules of Order Newly Revised (RONR), the numbers for and against are not counted in a division. However, they may be counted by order of the chairman or by order of the assembly through majority vote. The assembly may also have a rule that the division is counted.

Historically, and often still today, members are literally divided into physically separate groups. This was the method used in the Roman Senate, and occasionally in Athenian democracy. Westminster system parliament chambers have separate division lobbies for the "Ayes" and "Noes" to facilitate physical division. In several assemblies, a division bell is rung throughout the building when a division is happening, in order to alert members not present in the chamber.’

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Division_of_the_assembly (accessed 11.13, 31.03.2018)

Snowmageddon

‘Snowmageddon’ is what Inside Science’s* presenter today called the very cold snap of freezing Siberian-wind-driven weather that we’re currently experiencing here in the UK.

Snow + Armageddon: meaning clearly, and instantly recognisably, some kind of ‘disaster by snow’, which is what is facing large areas of the snowbound UK tomorrow, with airports, roads, schools, and dozens of other types of businesses closed.

Why do we so love blending two words together? It seems to have become a real craze in recent years. ‘Brexit’ has got to be the most prominent new word-blend in our UK news and political discourse these days: Britain + exit (ie. from the European Union). I don’t remember so many new words being coined like this as I was growing up forty or so years ago... Or perhaps I just didn’t hear or read them, but they were always quietly being coined. For instance, new uses for old words like – well before my time – the making of a verb out of the noun ‘park’ (meaning a garden, but a static place for plants and pleasure, or the carefully cultivated area around a large country mansion or palatial house) and then appropriated for vehicles: we don’t think about ‘parking’ our cars these days, we just do it. And ‘parking’ as a noun has, it seems to me from my own observation when travelling or talking to people from a very wide range of other countries, become one of those many truly international English words, but usually used as a noun – many non-native speakers of English refer to ‘a parking’, as in, “We need to find a parking”: this use is still, it appears, non-standard English, but is widely used to mean either ‘a car-park / a parking lot’, or ‘a parking space’.

But these days new coinages are ‘out there’, worldwide at the touch of a button, so that’s maybe why I’m hearing so many day in, day out. And maybe it’s why so many coinages are occurring – it’s like a craze which has caught on and we’re all running with it. Well, whatever the reason, who cares? It’s as if we’ve seized the baton and we’re running with it: for the sheer exhilarating joy of language!

*Armageddon: an event of great destruction https://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/english/armageddon

** BBC Radio 4 Inside Science 16.30, 01.03.2018

*** park Middle English: from Old French parc, from medieval Latin parricus, of Germanic origin: related to German Pferch ‘pen, fold’, also to paddock. The word was originally a legal term designating land held by royal grant for keeping game animals: this was enclosed and therefore distinct from a forest or chase and (also unlike a forest) had no special laws or foresters. A military sense ‘space occupied by artillery, wagons, stores etc in an encampment’ (late 17^th Century) is the origin of sense 2 of the noun (early 20^th century) ie. 2.‘an area devoted to a specific purpose’ e.g. 'business park'.   (Google 01.03.2018)

The Beast from the East

The first day of March 2018, and ‘The Beast from the East’ is here! Severe weather warnings... amber warnings (‘be careful’) and red warnings meaning ‘life is in danger’. Blizzard conditions, ice everywhere, and snow deeply drifting on hills and in the valleys, streets and towns... Winter weather is here, but the name the UK media are using is typically dramatic: 'The Beast from the East' to describe the Siberian weather sweeping over the country today and, it’s forecast, well into tomorrow too.

And there is more to come: apparently, we are to also expect – also tomorrow – 'The Pest from the West' which will be in competition with the 'Beast'...  

There’s nothing more that UK journalists love than to create nicknames for people, things, weather fronts... whatever!

What I find so interesting about this, though, is how traditional and ancient poetic devices like alliteration, or as in these examples, rhyme are seized upon with such enthusiasm. Many people say they don't like poetry, or never read it, but perhaps they do, in a manner of speaking. There’s perhaps nothing more satisfying than monosyllables in word-pairs in nice balanced phrases: ‘a blast from the past’ is one of my favourites that I learnt at an early age from my mother, who relished words, word-sounds, and word-games.

And she is not alone. It’s not only the light-weight media, the ‘red-tops’ (the old ‘tabloids’ like the Daily Mirror or the Daily Mail etc) that love these rhyming words: even the ‘sensible’ BBC News teams have taken on these nicknames – and the BBC’s weather forecasters themselves are telling the public to stay indoors and not to venture out into the path of the The Beast from the East...

The British are fairly obsessed with soap operas, and now it seems they've made the weather into one!!!

But what a welcome into March... L

Floriography: what the heck is that?!

I've just learnt a new word: floriography, the language of flowers, in other words it means communicating through the symbolism of flowers. 'Floriography' seems to be a very new coinage: suggested as a 'new word' only a few years ago, on 19.07.2013 to one on my favourite dictionaries – the Collins.*

In the dictionary's online entry for 'floriography' we see this as a 'new word suggestion' for the inclusion in the dictionary, from DavidWachsman3, who defines floriography as 'a cryptological communication through the use or arrangement of flowers'.

However, the word seems to have already entered the language and is being used freely – for instance it caught my eye today as it appears in a local Oxford free magazine **, on the heading of an article about Valentine's Day and the approaching Mother's Day:

"As we approach Valentine's and Mother's Day, Peter Anderson explores the ancient art of floriography to help you send the right message..."

Oh heck! Another new polysyllabic word...! Can't we just use simple words? Can't we just "Say it with flowers" – which is also a well known advertisement slogan for a chain of florists in the UK.

But people have been 'saying it with flowers' for millennia: funerary flowers, birthday bunches, lovers' tokens, wedding posies, welcome garlands, petals and perfumes for almost every occasion...

Today it's St Valentine's Day, 14th February, and the language of flowers is everywhere: out-of-season red roses have come to symbolise romantic love and affection. Which is a shame, as these red roses have to come at the expense of many airmiles from hot countries far, far away, while the delicacy of the perfect white of snowdrops emerging out of slim green blades of leaves would be so much more in keeping with mid February – here in Britain, in the northern hemisphere anyway.

But the red of the red rose has its own crypto-meaning in colour symbolism: passion, fire, vitality, fast-beating hearts... so red, and roses – the flower of love – it has to be.

Another shame is, however, how disappointing are the bland and scentless well-travelled red roses of a cold British Valentine's Day. Shakespeare was only too aware of the symbolism of flowers, but he would be the first to argue for the necessity of a rose having a fragrance:
'What's in a name? that which we call a rose
by any other name would smell as sweet..' ***

This (rightful) insistence on scentedness suggests that maybe Shakespeare wouldn't even grace the bland red UK Valentine's rose with the name of rose!... but we shall never know.

Well, today as the cold north wind blows and the winter continues to bite, we have early (very bright, upbeat and yellow) British daffs**** in our house, and lovely, seasonal and scented they are too :)



* The Collins English Dictionary https://www.collinsdictionary.com/submission/11342/Floriography  (accessed 14.02.2018)
** 'Round & About' February 2018
*** 'Romeo and Juliet' Act II Scene II, William Shakespeare
**** daffs = daffodils, of course!

Double-screening

A new verb: I heard this for the first time a couple of weeks or so ago (January 2018) on BBC Radio 4. 

Are you familiar with it: ...'to double-screen'? Perhaps you do it yourself. In fact, you probably do!

As explained by the radio commentator it means when people are watching the TV, live TV, but are simultaneously online, especially (it seems) on social media, in touch with their friends and the world, and quite possibly also commenting on the programme they’re watching in their various different locations. 

The Radio 4 programme was about the impact of social media, algorithms and so on, on people’s opinions and politics, with particular reference to the British General Election on June 8^th 2017. The commentators were arguing that Yes many people watch BBC's 'Question Time', and may or may not be influenced by discussion on it, but that these viewers are also discussing the topics at the same time with their friends online, via their other devices: double-screening.

The language moves on!

Othering

Back in July 2016, so about 18 months ago, I wrote this about a 'new-to-me' use of the word 'other', as a verb:

I was fascinated recently to learn that 'other' is now being used—by sociologists, psychologists and so on—as a verb, and we also now have the word 'otherness'. 'Othering', it turns out, is a really useful verb. It describes how we tend to talk about, and actively relate to, anyone who we feel is 'not in our group'. It doesn't only have to include (for example) 'foreigners'—it's absolutely anyone who we feel is 'different' from ourselves.

Well I was just as fascinated today, 15th January 2018, to hear it being used on a BBC Radio 4 discussion programme, 'Start the Week' by an author, Afua Hirsch, talking, amongst other things, about her book BRIT (ish). On Race, Identity and Belonging. She spoke of how, as a mixed heritage girl (mother from Ghana, and father a white British man with Jewish heritage) growing up in white Caucasian Wimbledon, she was always perceived as different, as other. Her school friends would tell her how they didn't view her as any different from them, how they thought of her as white... They othered her, even while they felt they were showing how much they liked and accepted her.

So the word 'other', used as a verb, is clearly well and truly out of the confines of sociology and anthropology – it has escaped from academe and is flying free in the wide world of everyday English.  

I had read about othering once or twice prior to hearing it this morning, but this is the first time I've heard it used with ease and conviction, and with a clear and strong effect, with no need to explain or define it. 

I see, however, that Microsoft Word still marks it with the wiggly red line of a spelling mistake, so it’s obviously not yet in the Microsoft dictionary.

But it is definitely out there, in the spoken, everyday world.

Good. It's a very helpful coinage. It’s a terrible shame we need such a word, but well done, sociologists, for this neologistic usage!

‘Start the Week’ 15.01.2018   http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09lw30p  with presenter Tom Sutcliffe, discussing three books with their authors:

Brit(ish), On Race, Identity and Belonging by Afua Hirsch

https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/1112508/brit-ish/

A Long Way from Home by Peter Carey - Penguin Books Australia

https://www.penguin.com.au/books/a-long-way-from-home-9780143787075

In Europe by Geert Mak | PenguinRandomHouse.com

https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/...europe...geert-mak/9780307280572/