May 4, 2011

"Wyomans."

“The dictionary-approved term is ‘Wyomingite,’ which is also the name of a type of lava, see Webster’s New International Dictionary 2961 (2d ed. 1957). I believe the people of Wyoming deserve better.”

A Scalia footnote.

17 comments:

RuyDiaz said...

This is the kind of post a law professor would write. Ugh.

Oh, wait....

TheThinMan said...

If you're a feminist from Wyoming, are you a Wyomyn?

Robert Pearson said...

Goes with Connecticuticans, I guess.

campy said...

Do I like Wyoming?

I don't know, I've never Wyomed.

MadisonMan said...

I grew up a Pennsylvanian. That's also a geologic sub-period in the Carboniferous period.

Somehow, people were able to keep the differences in definitions straight.

tim maguire said...

I find it especially funny that this line about Wyomans deserving better comes in a dissent arguing against their position.

rhhardin said...

Wyomen is the plural.

edutcher said...

Interesting point by MadMan. There are plenty of places around Philadelphia named Wyoming. Maybe it applies to people who come from those.

I have a reprint of a book from 1941 which refers to the people who named the town of Casper as Wyomans, so Scalia may be more correct than the dictionary says. Lord knows, we have gotten slipshod in our language.

MadisonMan said...

I'd forgotten about the Wyoming Valley in Pennsylvania. Scene of the famous Yankee-Pennamite War.

Damn Connecticuttians. Connecticutters. People from Connecticut.

chickelit said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Wince said...

Why, why, why... Wyoming?

Chip S. said...

AFAIK residents of the Nutmeg State are Connecticutters unless they're Yankee fans, in which case they're Connectic'nts.

traditionalguy said...

Scalia probably hates "ites" because he had to learn stupid rock names to pass an exam in Geology class. Most people would resent being called an Althousite. Maybe calling someone a Palinite is OK, but it still sounds like that person is a box of rocks. But calling someone a Trooperite has a good sound to it...maybe not so much in politics where the Church folks might suspect that it means an immoral person.

Karl said...

When I was in college, the old bookstore was repurposed as the "Women's Center".
Despite its name, it was not a good place to meet women if you were male.

Seems like many guys were misled by that name.

It's now called the "Womyn's Centre"

wv nicaliz - For womyn who want to quit...umm...smoking.

Col Mustard said...

Why, oh why, did I ever leave Wyoming?

Good question for someone attending his 50th HS reunion last July. Then again, there's July and there's the rest of the year.

One of my fave memories as an undergrad at (the real) UW was cheerleaders leading the crowd to spell W-Y-O! About half the time they started out; GIVE ME A "Y"..

mm (known as Wyomc here and there in blog/forum world)

Fred4Pres said...

Get over it Wyoming.

Known Unknown said...

You're doing Wyoman's work on this subject, Professor.