Misnomers, Misconceptions, Oxymorons and Malapropisms

I was writing something about misconceptions this week, which got me thinking about interesting words about words. I'm pretty sure most of us learned all these words in school, so this should just be considered a refresher course.

A misnomer is a name or term that is inaccurate, misleading, or wrongly applied to a person, place, thing, or concept. It occurs when a word's literal meaning contradicts the actual reality of what it describes. Here are some examples:

"Lead" pencil: A pencil's core is actually made of graphite and clay, not lead.
"Tin" foil: Modern kitchen foil is made entirely of aluminum.
Koala "bear": Koalas are marsupials, completely unrelated to bears.
"French" fries: This style of fried potato actually originated in California. (Just kidding. Belgium.)
"Guinea" pigs: These are rodents native to the Andes, not Guinea, and you probably already know they are not pigs.

I wanted to highlight misnomers because we seem to have become inundated with them. For example, if a gathering involves widespread violence, looting and property destruction, calling it a "peaceful protest" becomes a political misnomer. Conversely, critics might use a misnomer like "riot" to describe a completely orderly march to alter public perception.

In the realm of ethics we see a different kind of language abuse. Calling a natural disaster like an earthquake "evil" is often considered a conceptual misnomer in secular philosophy. Because an earthquake has no mind, intent, or moral agency, it can be "bad" or "destructive," but it cannot be morally "evil."

Misnomers are not precisely the same as misconceptions or oxymorons. A misnomer happens when a name is completely inaccurate to the physical reality of the object. The object is real, but the language used to name it is factually incorrect so it's actually the wrong label.

Here's another example: a jellyfish is not a fish, it's an invertebrate. And guess what? Panama hats are originally from Ecuador, not Panama. Again, these are misnomers.

A misconception on the other hand is a false premise, a myth, or a flawed conclusion that people widely hold to be true. It lives in the human mind rather than just the dictionary definition. We've all heard this one cited so often it's repeated as if it were true: "Humans only use 10% of their brains." Neurological imaging shows we use virtually every part of our brain over the course of a day.

Another "old wives' tale" (and I mean no disrespect to older wives here) is that cracking your knuckles causes arthritis. Medical studies have consistently shown no link; the sound is just gas bubbles bursting in the joint fluid, so it is a misconception.

Oxymorons are the fun one in this batch. An oxymoron is a deliberate pairing of two contradictory or opposing terms to create a poetic effect, add emphasis, or point out a paradox. It is a stylistic choice, not an error. Example: "Deafening silence." There is no such thing as a deafening silence. Silence cannot literally deafen you. Maybe it rings true because it highlights a stillness so intense that it feels heavy. I dunno. "Liquid gas" is another oxymoron. Matter generally exists as one or the other, but the phrase describes a substance (like propane) that's been pressurized into a liquid state.

In 2019 I wrote a blog post titled Oxymoronica: Paradoxical Wit and Wisdom for People Who Enjoy Word Play. It's a book review with plenty of exampes as well as a link to the book itself. 

The last word on this list also illustrates the humorous side of language. A malapropism is the accidental or comedic misuse of a word by replacing it with a similar-sounding word that has a completely different meaning. A number of Comedians like the Marx Brothers routinely used word play. Whereas Groucho was famous for puns and double entendres, Chico carried the water when it came to malapropisms, playing a character who seems to misunderstand English. When asked where he was from, he'd reply in a thick Italian accent that he was "from across the Atlantic Auction." 

I first became aware of malapropisms when our family moved to New Jersey. The Bowery Boys were a staple of New York television in 1964. and Leo Gorcey played a character named Slip Mahoney famously butchered the English language, talking about "optical delusions" and "I  depreciate it" (instead of appreciate). He tried to sound smart by using big words. 

And who can forget Archie Bunker's colorful mistake-laden language. "Patience is a virgin," he once said, intending to say virtue. Or "What do I look like, an inferior decorator."

The origin of the word actually comes from a character in an 18th century play called The Rivals, by Richard Brinsley Sheridan. One of the characters was Mrs. Malaprop who was full of 'em. One of her lines: "She's as headstrong as an allegory on tbe banks of the Nile."

All that to say language can be fun. Whether it's verbal sleight of hand or aural misdirection, it's magical when it works.

Drawn Near: A Fawn, a Sunset, and a Poem

As a Young Fawn, I

As a young fawn I, with awkward step
found an opening in the wood;
unfolding eyes beheld and touched
what I could little understand —
that though I’d freely come to see,
‘twas his hand that was drawing me.

I wished not that our eyes would meet,
my heart, berserk with wildness, quaked,
but when his eye fell fast upon me
I, too, even dared to gaze
shamelessly,
that eternal moment touching.

Though first my heart had bid me flee
I had to know just why he’d come
to this place, my forest home.
(And it’s funny how he heard my fears
from distant hills re-echo.)

Magnetic sunset pink and gold
was all I meant that hour to view,
yet clearly it seemed meant for us
together on that hill to share
a dramatic fairy tale
that wasn’t bound by miles of string.
                                    New Jersey, 1975

THE REST OF THE STORY
It’s generally considered bad form to explain the meaning of one’s poetry. This does not mean, however, that one should never discuss the experiences that inspired them. Robert Frost often discussed his poetry, sometimes illuminating its meaning and sometimes deliberately preserving its ambiguity.

I myself think there are times when it’s perfectly suitable to share the backstory, to explain the event or events that ignited one to craft a poem or song. I think here of Eric Clapton’s “Wonderful Tonight” as well as numerous Beatles songs. One of my favorite contemporary poets, Billy Collins, has frequently discussed the experiences and observations behind his poems, often with humor.

With that being said, As a Young Fawn, I was an attempt to capture an experience I had in 1973. One evening I had taken a walk at dusk with my sketchbook. I seated myself on a path at the top of a hillside overlooking a sunset. I was absorbing the peacefulness there, sitting still, taking it in, when very softly a young fawn came walking along a path that intersected with where I was seated. She was quite tentative, but curious.

I’d been contemplating what to draw and as the fawn and I made eye contact I began drawing her. As I did, she drew nearer, was breathtakingly near.

It was autumn and may even have been hunting season. Two rifle shots echoed from the distance and my new acquaintance suddenly took flight.

I wrote the poem two years later while reflecting on this unexpected, seemingly chance encounter which I saw as a vivid metaphor for my own life's spiritual journey.

The Writer's Craft, the Writer's Soul

The following are quotes about writing that I'd collected and shared on my original website in 1995. Writers, as you might imagine, are quite loquacious about the  subject. For a much lengthier collection of quotes check out Wikiquote.

John Gardner, an early literary influence

"The real rewards of writing are serious and bitter as well as sweet. And they are private, not public.
~ W. Sloan 

"With Schopenhauer he (Thomas Mann) holds that the epic writer's aim should be to conjure up the richest possible inner life by means of a minimum of external action: 'Art consists in the writer's affecting our inner life most strongly with the least display of outer life; for the inner is essentially the object of our interest.' Thus every detail of Aschenbach's outer life is so chosen as to illuminate the deepest recesses of his mind and to furnish the richest symbolical meaning."

~ Von Gronicka, in a critique of Mann's Death in Venice

"And yet, we know how fatal the pursuit of liveliness may be: it may result in ...tiresome acrobatics. ... Flashy effects distract the mind. They destroy their persuasiveness; you would not believe a man was very intent on ploughing a furrow if he carried a hoop with him and jumped through it at every other step."

~ Katherine Anne Porter

"Sin is easier to write about than grace, I suppose, because the territory is so familiar and because, too, it is the nature of grace, when we receive it, to turn our eyes not inward, where most writers' eyes turn, but outward, where there is a whole world of needs to serve far greater than the need for another book."

~ F. Buechner  

"I have never produced anything good except by a long succession of slight efforts."

~ Andre Gide

"One should only become aware of the difficulties of a subject progressively and in the course of working at it; if one realizes them all at the outset, one loses heart."

~ Andre Gide  

"When virtuosity gets the upper hand of your theme, or is better than your idea, it is time to quit."
~ Katherine Anne Porter

"One great inhibition and obstacle to me was the thought: Will it make money? But you find if you are thinking of that all the time, either you don't make money because the work is so empty, dry, calculated and without life in it. Or you do make money and you are ashamed of your work. Your published writing gives you the pip."

~ Brenda Uelland

"The main purpose of art... is this, that it tell the truth about the soul, revealing and giving expression to all the secrets one cannot say in simple words. ...Art is a microscope that the artist focuses on the secrets of his own soul, and that then reveals to men the secrets common to them all."

~ Leo Tolstoy 

 

"The lifelong central theme of Mann's books has been an inquiry into the function of art and the artist, of culture and the intellectual in modern society."

~ Erich Kahler

"And yet, we know how fatal the pursuit of liveliness may be: it may result in ...tiresome acrobatics. ... Flashy effects distract the mind. They destroy their persuasiveness; you would not believe a man was very intent on ploughing a furrow if he carried a hoop with him and jumped through it at every other step."

Katherine Anne Porter

John Gardner, On Becoming a Novelist 

"It may feel more classy to imitate James Joyce... than All In the Family; but every literary imitation lacks something we expect of good writing: the writer seeing with his own eyes."

"Detail is the lifeblood of fiction."

"The study of writing, like the study of classical piano, is not practical but aristocratic. If one is born rich, one can easily afford to be an artist; if not, one has to afford one's art by sacrifice."

John Gardner, The Art of Fiction

"Though the literary dabbler may write a fine story now and then, the true writer is one for whom technique has become, as for the pianist, second nature."

"... whatever the genre may be, fiction does its work by creating a dream in the reader's mind."

"Thus the value of great fiction, we begin to suspect, is not just that it entertains us or distracts us from our troubles, not just that it broadens our knowledge of people and places, but also that it helps us to know what we believe, reinforces those qualities that are noblest in us, leads us to feel uneasy about our faults and limitations."

"What the young writer needs to develop, to achieve his goal of becoming a great artist, is not a set of aesthetic laws, but artistic mastery."

These reflections on writing share a common conviction: great literature is not merely a matter of technique, cleverness, or commercial success. It requires discipline, authenticity, imagination, and a willingness to explore the mysteries of human experience. Technique must become second nature, but virtuosity should never overshadow truth. The writer's task is to see with his own eyes, illuminate the inner life, and awaken something in the reader. Whether writing fiction or memoir, the ultimate challenge is transforming the chaos of experience into something meaningful and enduring.

If you are a writer, write on.

AI Meets the Art of Ennyman

A GALLERY OF ORIGINAL WORK

With the exception of the building, a foto taken in Florence in 2023, the images on this page are created using my original artwork, modified by ChatGPT. The top images was created from a painting I'd done called The Old Miser. The next image was my Samurai painting. ChatGPT called it upgraded version Kabuki Warrier. The girl in the following picture was painted in 1974 when I was in college. She looked like a rural peasant girl so I asked ChatGPT to place her in a rural setting. Beneath Lynn is a modified version of a pen and ink drawing I'd done. ChatGPT placed the drawingagainst an impasto background.

I had done several small studies of Marcello Mastroianni after seeing him in Fellini's 8 1/2 and La Dolce Vita. In the first one I used a background from a painting I'd done in 1974 and placed my portrait of him in the foreground. For the painting of Marilyn I selected a woven wallpaper sample in the background, My original painting of Marilyn was red paint on illustration board. 

Beneath that picture is one of 15 paintings I have created in my Mapped Life Series in which I used Rand McNally road maps as background and painted portraits over the maps. My prompt was "Make his face more three dimensional like a sculpture." This was the result. It is otherwise very similar to my original painting.

The second picture of Marcello uses another section from a 1974 painting as background, with another version of his face over his other shoulder. ChatGPT painted the realistic image inthe foreground with expressionistic flourishes. For the very last painting here I had ChatGPT amp up my painting Man's Fate by making the sky and sea more turbulent. 

I share these to give others ideas regarding what ChatGPT is now capable of. I'll quit when I'm bored. 

All images on this page Copyright 2026 by Ed Newman. 

Manufacturing Consent: Do We Really Live in a Democracy?

THINGS I AM THINKING ABOUT DEPT.

I've been intrigued by the concept of "manufacturing consent" as popularized by political theorist Noam Chomsky and economist Edward S. Herman in their book Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media. "Manufacturing consent" has to do with the way media, governments, and powerful institutions shape public opinion to align with their interests, often subtly guiding what people think and believe.

It's a two word phrase--manufacturing and consent--loaded with implications.

Manufacturing is the process of producing products from raw materials using tools, machinery, and human labor. It involves transforming materials like metals, plastics, or chemicals into finished products, such as cars, electronics, clothing, or household items. It often follows a series of steps, including design, fabrication, assembly, and quality control, ensuring that the final product meets specific standards. It is considered crucial to the global economy, creating jobs, supporting industries, and providing the essential goods that society relies on every day.

Consent is the voluntary agreement or permission given by a person to allow something to happen, often in the context of personal boundaries, relationships, or legal matters. It requires that individuals have a clear understanding of what they are agreeing to, without any pressure, manipulation, or coercion. Consent is a foundational principle in ethics, emphasizing the importance of mutual respect and understanding between parties.

The idea is that media outlets, often controlled by large corporations with vested interests, influence what stories are covered, how they are framed, and what information is highlighted or omitted. This process can create a kind of consensus among the public that supports certain policies or viewpoints, even if they may not serve the broader public interest. Essentially, rather than being purely objective, media and institutions may "manufacture" agreement or acceptance of specific ideas, shaping public perception in a way that maintains the status quo or supports the interests of those in power.

 

In Manufacturing Consent Herman and Chomsky argue that media plays a significant role in American society is to prepare it to willingly accept the values of the ruling elite. 

When did this switch happen or has it always been this way? Instead of serving as a means for the public to obtain information needed to have sufficient control over the politicians and the flow of power in the country, the press now blatantly serves as a means for the elite to promote its agenda, to defend the economic, social, and political agenda of privileged and dominant groups in the society.

Edward Said addresses this media manipulation from the specific manner in which our media controls Americans' view of the Middle East and the Islamic world. The author of Covering Islam: How the Media and the Experts Determine How We See the Rest of the World shows how the American news media have portrayed "Islam" as a monolithic entity, synonymous with terrorism and religious hysteria. 

One question I have here is, "Who's calling the shots?"

And the follow up: "To what end?"

The manner in which legacy media covered up President Biden's foibles and mental decline (How many times did we hear that he was "sharp as a tack"?) was such a partisan non-neutral effort to influence public opinion that it ought to prompt us to question other things they spew. 

What's going on?  

As one Amazon reviewer explains, "This book tells ALL about our media prejudices and the shortcomings of our journalists, writers, intellectuals, academics, etc., when it comes to Islam, Arabs and the Middle East. It is a great analytical essay about false propaganda and the wrong views dispersed about the Middle East." 

* * * 

So, the title of this blog post asks if we are really living in a Democracy? I ask, then, how can we have a democracy without an informed public? How much do we know from first hand experience? How much do we know of what we believe we know? So much of what we believe we know has been mediated to us. How much is spin? 

* * * 

"Tell me why you're crying my son

I know you're frightened like everyone.

Is it the thunder in the dstance you hear? 

Will it help if I stand very near? I am here."

Peter, Paul & Mary

Day Is Done

The First-Class Passenger (Another Fun Chekhov Story)

Somewhere along my writing journey I remember someone saying there were only 36 dramatic situations from which all stories are built. It may have been a fiction writing class in college, or perhaps a writers' conference, but the number 36 stuck with me and I decided to see if I could find that source.

As it turns out Georges Polti, wrote a book in 1895 called The Thirty-Six Dramatic Situations (Les trente-six situations dramatiques) in which he argued that there are only 36 fundamental dramatic situations.

Digging deeper, it seems that Polti was expanding on an idea associated with the 18th-century Italian playwright Carlo Gozzi, who claimed there were only 36 tragic situations. Goethe later noted that Schiller had tried to find more than 36 but could not even reach that number. Polti’s list (supplication, deliverance, crime pursued by vengeance, pursuit, disaster, revolt, adultery, etc.) became a classic reference for writers and dramatists.

All this to say that I wonder if one of those plot situations might have been something akin to serendipity of the kind demonstrated in Hitchcock's Strangers on a Train. This is what came to mind as I revisited a hilarious Anton Chekhov story that I enjoyed perhaps three or four decades ago called "The First-Class Passenger." (Some translations call it "A First-Class Passenger." While being an entertaining read it also leaves readers with a few morsels of thought food.

Here are the opening two paragraphs.

A FIRST-CLASS passenger who had just dined at the station and drunk a little too much lay down on the velvet-covered seat, stretched himself out luxuriously, and sank into a doze. After a nap of no more than five minutes, he looked with oily eyes at his _vis-a-vis,_ gave a smirk, and said:

"My father of blessed memory used to like to have his heels tickled by peasant women after dinner. I am just like him, with this difference, that after dinner I always like my tongue and my brains gently stimulated. Sinful man as I am, I like empty talk on a full stomach. Will you allow me to have a chat with you?"

It's a perfect setup. Two characters have been introduced. They both come from the money class. Velvet seats, private compartment. The first has had too much to drink and in his self-introduction he admits to a habit of loquaciousness. That is, Chekhov is letting the reader know that this story is about to become a monologue, and the reader, like the man who shares this compartment, is pretty much trapped into going along for the ride. 

The first gentleman does have the courtesy to ask for permission, and the man sharing his vis-a-vis is apparently most agreeable.

As it turns out the first-class passenger is an engineer who has built bridges and aqueducts, written technical papers and made significant contributions to science. But it irks him that as he nears the end of his career, that he is still an unknown, whereas people with superficial talents are celebrated. 

The irony is that this engineer has some major accomplishments under his belt, but was bitter because what drove him initially--and perhaps throughout his career--was the longing for public recognition, that is, fame.

There was a time when fame was the domain of generals, political figures and movie stars. Over time, however, a shift was taking place and an astute Andy Warhol keyed in on it suggesting that in the exploding mass-media culture of his era, 15 minutes of global fame would soon be within reach of everyone. 

We've seen it with our own eyes. Obscure individuals fool Penn & Teller, or win America's Got Talent or Jeopardy or a hundred other game shows and they become momentary stars. In most cases the attention is shallow, mass-produced, and short-lived.

Warhol would likely not have been surprised to see how all this evolved into reality TV, TikTok, Reels and viral internet spots.

GETTING BACK TO OUR STORY, it's a relatively short piece and though it can be found in a number of standard anthologies, here's the fastest way to find and enjoy it.

https://www.readbookonline.org/readOnLine/1018/ 

When all is said and done, what gives your life meaning? 

The Cuban Revolution Didn't Happen in a Vacuum

A few thoughts about Castro and the Cuban Revolution.

Context is everything. Without understanding the circumstances surrounding an event, an idea, or a decision, we risk missing its meaning.

Throughout my life I've heard pundits rail against Castro and communism. But if you live long enough and read widely enough, you'll eventually realize that to understand anything you have to probe a little deeper. To understand how a communist dictator came to power 90 miles from our border, you have to ask questions; you have to be curious. 

What happened? And why did it happen?

The Cuban Revolution of 1959 did not emerge in a vacuum. Fidel Castro came to power in a country where political corruption, economic inequality, American influence, and increasingly brutal repression had undermined the legitimacy of the existing government.

The name Batista meant little to me when I was young other than he was supported by the U.S. government. I can't even recall ever knowing or hearing his full name until researching this today. Fulgencio Batista. Whenever he was mentioned it was Batista, like Madonna or Dylan or Beck, Bono and Prince. Unlike the others, the name Batisita rolled off the tongue like a slur. And it's one of the ironies of the Cuban Revolution that the guy we (the USA) propped up helped create the conditions that ushered Castro into power. 

Batista was a force in Cuban politics from the 1930s and served as an elected president from 1940 to 1944. In 1952 he returned to power through a military coup. With presidential elections approaching and Batista facing an uncertain electoral future, he overthrew President Carlos Prío Socarrás and established military rule.

The coup interrupted Cuba's constitutional government and discredited peaceful political competition. Batista subsequently relied on manipulated elections, restrictions on opposition activity, and the security forces to maintain power.

At this point, and when your read further, tell me if it doesn't feel like an echo of the musical Cabaret? 

For Castro, who had been pursuing a political career, the coup became a powerful justification for armed resistance. Before long Batista's police and military became instruments of terror. As opposition intensified, Batista's government increasingly resorted to arresting and imprisoning political opponents, often without due process. Torturing suspected revolutionaries and political prisoners became part of the game. Killing opposition activists and leaving bodies in public places was designed to intimidate others. (cf. The Real Reason They Punish Horse Thieves.)

The censoring of newspapers and suspending constitutional protections also contributed to a growing desire for change. Add the fact that even though Cuba was prosperous, the prosperity was not evenly distributed. Urban professionals and wealthy Cubans enjoyed lifestyles comparable to those in the United States. Meanwhile, many rural families lived without adequate sanitation, electricity, medical care, or dependable employment. 

Nevertheless, the vibe in Cuba dark, menacing, and thinking people were privately questioning. What next?

Because of the Cold War, the Eisenhower admonistration maintained diplomatic recognition, economic ties, and military assistance for most of that period, viewing Batista as an anti-communist partner protecting U.S. business interests. American businesses, deeply embedded in Cuba, adopted a "see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil" attitude regarding the abuses of the Batista regime. U.S. interests were involved in sugar, utilities, manufacturing, transportation and other industries. Profits were good, investments were paying off. And after hours, Havana was one of Latin America's most glamorous cities, a Vegas of the Caribbean. What's not to like? 

There were, however, American leaders who spoke out against what was going on in Cuba. Senator Wayne Morse of Oregon was one of the most consistent congressional critics. He described Batista’s government as a vicious police state that liquidated opponents and objected strongly to U.S. military aid. Another vocal critic was the Senator from Massachusetts, John F. Kennedy. He characterized support for the regime as backing one of the bloodiest and most repressive dictatorships in Latin American history and linked it to broader economic exploitation of Cuba. Some conspiracy theorists state that this conviction, and his later interference with the Bay of Pigs Invasion, was the catalysts for JFK's assassination in 1963.

In summary, it's pretty clear why so many Cubans--including middle-class professionals, students, intellectuals, and businesspeople--initially welcomed Castro's movement. Families, professionals, and ordinary citizens who might never have supported communism increasingly wanted Batista removed. Ultimately, most wanted a restoration of constitutional democracy. They were not seeking a one-party communist state. 

In the end, they got what they wanted, the end of Batista's beastly reign. But they also got more than they bargained for.

TO BE CONTINUED