You sometimes see a rhetorical device were the author compares himself (or another) to some related group of people, real or fictional, and says that while one might have hoped to be _x_, it turns out one is actually _y_. So, for example, here’s one inspired by reading “Untold Stories”:http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0374281033/ref=nosim/kieranhealysw-20 the other night. “When I was younger I hoped I might be “Peter Cook”:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Cook, or even “Jonathan Miller”:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jonathan_Miller, but then I discovered I was really Alan Bennett.” As can be seen from this example, there is usually a strong element of faux-modest self-promotion in the apparent putdown, at least when the author is the subject of the comparison. When there is some other target, this scheme is a vehicle for insult. In these cases, the comparison individuals will be related not by a substantive tie but only by name.
{ 9 comments }
riffle 04.17.06 at 11:15 pm
I nominate “triangularison.” The act of creating a trangularison is “triangularing”
If it’s not already obvious, the term is a blend of triangulate and compare.
Not quite perfect, since it doesn’t capture the sequential approximation implied in your scheme (Triasymptote?).
I will refuse your generous cash award for this neologism.
Kieran Healy 04.17.06 at 11:19 pm
I will refuse your generous cash award for this neologism.
I think _that’s_ called paralipsis.
Ian 04.18.06 at 1:46 am
When I was younger I hoped I might be paralipsis, or even cataphasis, but then I discovered I was really feeble self-deprecation.
Arturis 04.18.06 at 2:53 am
I’d like to call it scarecrowing, because I like the word. But to justify it, I could make up some story about the most famous use of this rhetorical device involving an elaborate reference to the Wizard of Oz.
Mostly, I like the parallels scarecrowing has to the straw-man fallacy.
Harald Korneliussen 04.18.06 at 3:04 am
Triangularison seems reasonable to me.
What I wonder if you academic types have a word for is when an author makes some sort of compilation, and then generously inserts his own work, possibly as “anonymous” or “unknown”. Usually done in quotes, poetry and music. I don’t think you’d get away with it much elsewhere.
foo 04.18.06 at 10:30 am
No one reads the Language Log? C’mon folks: “snowclones”. They’ve been on this beat over there for a couple of years, now…
Cryptic Ned 04.18.06 at 2:19 pm
Comment #6 makes no sense. This post was about the particular phenomenon of somebody saying “I thought I was X, but really I was Y.”
vivian 04.18.06 at 9:31 pm
I think there might be several species of this, perhaps needing different names. Sometimes it’s more sequential, but others are about shifting goals across fields or subfields. And sometimes the modesty is faux, others verite; some comparisons are more self-flattering than others.
(comment 6 is intelligible, but off by one level of abstraction: yes, if this becomes too much of a cliche, it will be one type of snowclone. Still needs a name though.)
I suggest something eponymous: healey-ocentrism?
foo 04.19.06 at 10:00 am
I don’t think that a “snowclone” has to be particularly “cliche” — the way the LL folks analyze it, it’s exactly the sort of schematic statement that K.H. is describing here: a sentence or phrase where key parts can be replaced by variables, essentially…
Anyway, I didn’t mean to be snarky. I suppose it’s fine to go ahead and name this particular form of a snowclone.
I just felt like, if you’re going to mention language-schemas on a blog these days, a link to the LL is definitely worthwhile.
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