Sunday, February 21, 2016

Sunday Snippets - more on full bodied women, prehistory plus a tongue twister for you

Today's Sunday Snippets records things that I have noticed but not yet commented on.

From time to time I have written in support of full bodied women. In an article in Good, Tod Perry comments on Target Australia's Valentine Day advertisements. I quote:
Target has revealed a sexy new Valentine’s Day ad for lingerie — but, unfortunately for those of us in the United States, the campaign is running only in Australia. The ad features three women with realistic body types posing in seductive lingerie, proving that you can be sexy without having to be a size two.
I quite agree! Speaking as a mere male who has had to live through multiple dieting regimes, life would be a hell of a lot easier if women recognised that many body types are sexy, that they don't have to get thin to be attractive. Of course, if you wan't to diet for health reasons or because it helps your self-image do so, but it's not much fun making love to a rake. Rakes belong in the garden shed.

Staying with sex, the evidence continues to grow showing that different human species interbred. I'm not sure that I would go as far as this headline, Evidence mounts for interbreeding bonanza in ancient human species, but we clearly got around a fair bit!

Kind of helpful to remember at a time when there is so much focus on division and separation that, in the end, we are related to each other and may have some ancestors stranger than we realised.

Just as in Australia convict ancestry within us has moved from a matter of shame to considerable pride, so the Neanderthal within us is coming to become a matter of some pride.

Staying with prehistory, DNA evidence suggests a major shift in human populations in Europe towards the end of the last Ice Age. Hardly surprising, although we are only just coming to grips with the way climate change has affected the human past.

Meantime, new dating techniques have been developed that may allow us to more accurately date Aboriginal rock art.

Finally, and changing direction again, try this English tongue twister from 1922. How did you go?

Postscript

Following up on  the theme of full bodied women, kvd pointed me to this BBC piece on the life of Annette Kellermann.

Kellermann, the name is sometimes spelled with one n as in the BBC piece, had a truly remarkable career as a swimmer, star, performer and swim suit designer, constantly pushing the boundaries.

While I knew the name and a little about her, I had nor realised the full extent of her career, nor the fact that she was born in the Sydney suburb of Marrickville. That's somehow appropriate, given that Marrickville has become a very trendy suburb!    .

17 comments:

Anonymous said...

On the tonguetwister, how is this one? Town in Leicestershire England, which may well have two different pronunciations of the same letter group in one word: Loughborough. Happy to be corrected. GL

Jim Belshaw said...

English towns are devilishly tricky, GL. There are probably at least three possibilities, so ended up checking! Apparently luff! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loughborough

Anonymous said...

What about just a simple word - to read, have read, Exact spelling, different sound. No wonder people have trouble. GL

Anonymous said...

Got no trubble with that GL: read as in bleed, read as in bled. Would you like to meet sometime so's I can 'splain it personal?

kvd

Jim Belshaw said...

I fear that you might end in confusing GL, kvd, especially if you explained over sandy deserts.

Anonymous said...

I'm not confused by KVD, though I'm not sure/shore I need to be explained personal.
GL

Anonymous said...

Well said GL; not sure I could explain the difference anyway :)

kvd

Anonymous said...

Jim, in honour of your main point about full bodied women: http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-35472490

Born in Marrickville, so read the whole thing; don't just ogle the pictures :)

kvd

Anonymous said...

So does that make you a sarculophobe, dear JDB?
Perhaps you could adopt as your motto; ut sarcula tugurium habitent!

2 tanners said...

On a completely irrelevant note, but to inform and cast light on some of our disucssions, this article on charities in Australia. Of interest, not determinative value.

Anonymous said...

Someone tagged me in a post on Facebook the other day which attached a very difficult poem. Eat your heart out Loughborough:

http://www.thepoke.co.uk/2016/02/17/english-pronunciation-poem/

LE

2 tanners said...

Jim, reject the rake based tagging. E pluribus, disceptatio is far more down your alley. :)

Jim Belshaw said...

I fear, sadly, that this comment stream has exhausted both my latin and Googles’ capacity to translate!

Anonymous (JCW?) wrote at 12:31 on 22 Feb: “So does that make you a sarculophobe, dear JDB? Perhaps you could adopt as your motto; ut sarcula tugurium habitent!”

Then 2tjoined in: “Jim, reject the rake based tagging. E pluribus, disceptatio is far more down your alley. :)”

Please, pretty please, for the benefit of us all translations required!

2t, I have saved that link for later comment.

2 tanners said...

Ut Sarcula tugurium habitent: Essentially, the rake lives in the shed. Can't remember who once said that.

Mine was playing on the US motto E pluribus, unum (Out of many, one) to "out of many, disputation" which I think is a fair enough call for this blog. I'm just glad Anonymous didn't use Ancient Greek, the other tagging language. My high school didn't offer that.

Whereas I suspect that there are those here who could do Greek and other ancient languages with ease.

Anonymous said...

Well, if we understand that a sarculum is a rake, logically a sarculophobe is not a lover of rakes - that would be a sarculophile (cf aileurophobe/aileurophille = cat hater, cat lover). As for ut etc? quoting JDB; rakes belong in the shed.
Yes, JDB, My secret identity is exposed.

Jim Belshaw said...

What are fiendishly intellectual lot you all are. And don’t tempt classical greek speakers. They might outrun us all! Still, in all this, I am being forced to refresh my sadly diminished and not very great store of Latin.

The idea that the rake lives or belongs in the shed - while no doubt offensive to some in the context; who wants to be banished in such a way? - certainly appeals!. And, 2t, that’s an apt tag. Sprung indeed, JCW!

2 tanners said...

I suppose I should point out my shallowness, in thinking that your reference to "new dating techniques" was going to refer to Tinder or Ashley Madison, not carbon.