Nautical Terminology

The more you study the history of language, the more you realise that language and grammar pedants are generally vociferously trying to mandate a form of language or grammar that is not historically "correct", but the particular version they picked up when they were younger, and in their environment.
Often their version would have been condemned by their equivalent pedants of the age who were 40 years older at the time.

A lot of our current nautical terms are adaptions and odd interpretations that do not relate to original use. But that is fine, language is an evolving moving thing.

And please do not confuse language pedantry with practical nautical experience.
 
dunedin said:
And please do not confuse language pedantry with practical nautical experience.
Click to expand...

The evolution of language is continuous and essential, since the world it refers to is continuously changing. But not all changes are equal. Probably the measure on which most people would agree is accuracy and precision. Some changes involve the loss of clarity, nuance and fine distinction and diminish the language. Others enrich it, either by reflecting new or changed things and ideas. Then there is the aesthetic aspect, upon which people will certainly not agree. Some changes are depressingly clumsy and ugly. Others are slick, entertaining, fun to use.... And some are neutral. They neither diminish or enrich the language - they are just different.

But things do have to be called something and that something has to be commonly known by the people who inhabit the environment in which those things are common. Otherwise it isn't a language and it isn't any use for communication. And all those names have antecedents, often rooted in the far distant past. It's irrelevant to the use of the language now.

But if people are unhappy with one area of language because they don't know the words or what they mean, then I suggest the time has come to invent a new nautical language upon which the vast majority of sailing people can agree. The key is to rename all the things that don't have equivalent or comparable counterparts on land. I'll start. Henceforth I shall refer to my mizzen topping lift as the back sail beam holder upper.

Once the new nautical dictionary is complete, the lexicographers must brace themselves for moans and groans about their work and angry calls for a return to the earlier, simpler language. So it goes.

Edited to add: Perhaps I should add the word horizontal to the new term I have mentioned, less some eager beaver confuses it with the vertical sailbeam and takes a spike to the bottle screw on the relevant after lower instead of the topping lift.

I shall pray daily to St. Thomas of Cunliffe that my fellow ketch and yawl owners be moved to follow my example.
 
Last edited:
dunedin said:
The more you study the history of language, the more you realise that language and grammar pedants are generally vociferously trying to mandate a form of language or grammar that is not historically "correct", but the particular version they picked up when they were younger, and in their environment.
Often their version would have been condemned by their equivalent pedants of the age who were 40 years older at the time.
Click to expand...

Absolutely. Who is attacking barbarisms like "cunningham" (it's a downhall, peasants), "bermudan rig" (Marconi, please) and spinnaker (sphynxster). I've even seen a discussion referring to "bungs" for broken seacocks, rather than snottledogs.

And please do not confuse language pedantry with practical nautical experience.
Click to expand...

It has been my general experience that great expertise in any subject goes with the ability to explain it simply. Those who hide behind walls of jargon are invariably the second raters.
 
JumbleDuck said:
It has been my general experience that great expertise in any subject goes with the ability to explain it simply. Those who hide behind walls of jargon are invariably the second raters.
Click to expand...

As Albert E remarked:

"If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough"
 
grumpy_o_g said:
Unfortunately the floor of a boat is not the same as the sole. The floor of the boat is the bottom of the boat itself
Click to expand...

I guess it's acceptable to be a pedant in this thread?

On which basis .....

I do not agree with your interpretation of 'floors'.

I thought that floors are the members that tie the frames and keel together.
 
NealB said:
I guess it's acceptable to be a pedant in this thread?

On which basis .....

I do not agree with your interpretation of 'floors'.

I thought that floors are the members that tie the frames and keel together.
Click to expand...

It isn't pedantry to refer to things by their proper names.
 
JumbleDuck said:
Things can have more than one proper name. Many things don't have proper names at all. Who decides what the proper name is for things on boats?
Click to expand...

The people who use those names to communicate. Such as shipwrights building wooden boats. The bits of those boats have names, just in the same way that a table and a chair have names. I will do you the courtesy of not assuming you are so foolish as to believe that language is nothing but a free for all in which we use whatever words we like to denote the things and ideas around us, thus rendering language impotent and communication chaotic.

The fact that there are exceptions, quirks, fluidities, twist and turns, variations in our use of language doesn't mean that the core is nothing. Without it, these characteristics are nothing.
 
NealB said:
I guess it's acceptable to be a pedant in this thread?

On which basis .....

I do not agree with your interpretation of 'floors'.

I thought that floors are the members that tie the frames and keel together.
Click to expand...

180!!!

You are quite correct.

The terms have come about over thousands of years of seamanship in navigating vessels from A to B with cargoes to earn money.

Yachting as a hobby has only come about since the 1650's or there about (Royalty) and for the masses certainly after the Second World War.

We seem to spend a lot of time subtly changing the words and then incorporating them into our lexicon of leisure; crutches/rowlocks, faking/flaking etc.
 
Serin said:
The people who use those names to communicate. Such as shipwrights building wooden boats. The bits of those boats have names, just in the same way that a table and a chair have names. I will do you the courtesy of not assuming you are so foolish as to believe that language is nothing but a free for all in which we use whatever words we like to denote the things and ideas around us, thus rendering language impotent and communication chaotic.
Click to expand...

Actually, that's precisely what English is - a glorious free-for-all in which we can all use the words we ant and the successful ones stick. L’Académie française tries to do things differently across the channel, but they fight a losing battle against le weekend and le shopping.

Which is the right term, by the way - "flat top" or "square head"?
 
JumbleDuck said:
Actually, that's precisely what English is - a glorious free-for-all in which we can all use the words we ant and the successful ones stick.
Click to expand...
Actually it isn't. No language is. All languages depend upon a core of words that are generally understood in similar ways by the majority of their speakers. Their evolution also depends on this. There is a profound difference between the gradual changes that happen as more and more people start to use a new common term and the free for all you describe.

Way back, I taught in a university with a lot of foreign students, all studying for professional qualifications. Some were being marked down for using their own versions of standard English. These versions, words and usage, were no less correct English than whatever it was I was speaking. English is the possession of everyone who speaks it. (May I recommend that thoroughly sensible book "English for Natives"? Can't remember the author's name but is is worth reading)

I argued that it was completely unfair to mark people down for using the English that would be spoken by professionals in their field at home. But, as many intended to practice here, we also had a responsibility to help them learn the language as spoken by professional in their field in this country. Otherwise they would certainly face discrimination (or, rather, extra discrimination) in their professional lives. So we recognised the validity of their English and helped them to communicate with their fellow professionals here as well. The students I consulted about this were unanimously in favour of the approach we agreed (despite determined opposition from the English Department)

Like many things, this is a matter for balanced judgment, not extremes. If you want to bring the Academie Francaise into the debate, that's your choice. It's entirely irrelevant.
 
Last edited:
Serin said:
Actually it isn't. No language is. All languages depend upon a core of words that are generally understood in similar ways by the majority of their speakers. Their evolution also depends on this.
Click to expand...

That's what I was saying. Languages evolve; evolution requires mutation and selection.

English is the possession of everyone who speaks it.
Click to expand...

But you have been claiming that it isn't, and there are "correct" terms to which all English speakers must adhere. You can't have it both ways. We all own English, we can all change English.

Like many things, this is a matter for balanced judgment, not extremes. If you want to bring the Academie Francaise into the debate, that's your choice. It's entirely irrelevant.
Click to expand...

It's wholly relevant, because it's an example of the sort of formalised linguistic absolutism which you have been recommending for nautical terms. My point is that English, including nautical English, leaves it open to anyone to use any terminology they want. That's the mutation, but the evolutionary selection is just as important. If people don't understand you, you probably need to change your wording; if they adopt your version the language has changed slightly.

Yachting example, from upthread: yes, we all know what a "floor" used to be, and what it still is to the wooden boat world. To most people, the "floor" is the thing they stand on.
 
Serin said:
Actually it isn't. No language is. All languages depend upon a core of words that are generally understood in similar ways by the majority of their speakers. Their evolution also depends on this.
Click to expand...

That's what I was saying. Languages evolve; evolution requires mutation and selection.

English is the possession of everyone who speaks it.
Click to expand...

But you have been claiming that it isn't, and there are "correct" terms to which all English speakers must adhere. You can't have it both ways. We all own English, we can all change English. Correct nautical English is what works, not what you, I or the Blessed St Tom want it to be.

Like many things, this is a matter for balanced judgment, not extremes. If you want to bring the Academie Francaise into the debate, that's your choice. It's entirely irrelevant.
Click to expand...

It's wholly relevant, because it's an example of the sort of formalised linguistic absolutism which you have been recommending for nautical terms. My point is that English, including nautical English, leaves it open to anyone to use any terminology they want. That's the mutation, but the evolutionary selection is just as important. If people don't understand you, you probably need to change your wording; if they adopt your version the language has changed slightly.

Yachting example, from upthread: yes, we all know what a "floor" used to be, and what it still is to the wooden boat world. To most people, the "floor" is the thing they stand on in the cabin.
 
Repeating your post doesn't make it better or more accurate. :) Most of it (and Serin's)' is way over my head anyway. However, I must take you up on "Floors'. Most people who know anything about boats, and particularly about their construction, know that the term refers to a cross-member, and has nothing to do with the surface that is walked on. Why change this? And why deliberately bring in imprecision and confusion?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Share this page

Top