Category Archives: Quotes

As every second post on this site is a quote. You’ll find a deep and broad variety of quotes under this category, which overlap with several other tags and categories. Many of the quotes are larded with links for deeper reading on the subject of the quote, or connections between the subject of the quotes and other people, things, or ideas. See the Taxonomies page for more about this category.

Term of Art: Semantic Memory

“semantic memory: Memory for facts, such as the information that would be contained in a dictionary or encyclopedia with no connection to time or place. People do not remember when or where they learn this type of information.

Semantic memory registers and stores knowledge about the world in the broadest sense; it allows people to represent and mentally operate in situations, objects, and relations in the world that are not present in the senses. A person with an intact semantic memory system can think about things that are not here now.

Because semantic memory develops first in childhood, before episodic memory, children are able to learn facts before they can remember their own experiences.

The seat of semantic memory is believed to be located in the medial temporal lobe and diencephalic structures of the brain.”

Excerpted from: Turkington, Carol, and Joseph R. Harris, PhD. The Encyclopedia of Learning Disabilities. New York: Facts on File, 2006.

Book of Answers: Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein

What was the alternative title to Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein? The Modern Prometheus.

Excerpted from: Corey, Melinda, and George Ochoa. Literature: The New York Public Library Book of Answers. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1993.

Monolith

“Monolith: A single block of stone carved into a pillar, statue, or column. Large size is implied.”

Excerpted from: Diamond, David G. The Bulfinch Pocket Dictionary of Art Terms. Boston: Little Brown, 1992.

Copywriting

“Copywriting (noun): The writing of promotional, public relations, or advertising copy. Noun: copywriter.

‘The narrator’s admission that he is using the language of the advertising copy-writer is a revealing one, and he resorts, later, to the same jargon: “The Aston-Martin started with a deep, healthy roar.”’ David Lodge, Language of Fiction”

Excerpted from: Grambs, David. The Random House Dictionary for Writers and Readers. New York: Random House, 1990.

Leviathan

“Leviathan: A word from the Hebrew, meaning literally ‘that which gathers itself in folds,’ and given in the Bible to a mythical sea serpent (Job 41:1; . 27:1; Ps. 104:26). The name is also applied to the whale and the crocodile, and by extension it has come to mean something vast and formidable of its kind.”

Excerpted from: Murphy, Bruce, ed. Benet’s Reader’s Encyclopedia, Fourth Edition. New York: Harper Collins, 1996.

Oscar Wilde on Experience and Mistakes

“Experience is the name everyone gives to their mistakes.”

Oscar Wilde

Excerpted from: Winokur, Jon, ed. The Big Curmudgeon. New York: Black Dog & Leventhal, 2007.

Term of Art: Strand

“strand: A group of related themes or concepts within an overall curricular area. For example, a social studies curriculum might be divided into such strands as citizenship, history, economics, geography, legal systems, political systems, and so on.”

Excerpted from: Ravitch, Diane. EdSpeak: A Glossary of Education Terms, Phrases, Buzzwords, and Jargon. Alexandria, VA: ASCD, 2007.

Rotten Reviews: The Tin Drum

“Bewildered by the torrent of fantastic incident, mystified by what Gunter Grass intends by it all, one feels like a zoologist who discovers some monstrous unrecorded mammal gobbling leaves. It may have beautiful horns, but what is it?”

New Statesman

Excerpted from: Barnard, Andre, and Bill Henderson, eds. Pushcart’s Complete Rotten Reviews and Rejections. Wainscott, NY: Pushcart Press, 1998.   

Atahualpa

“Atahualpa: (1502?-1533) Last free-reigning emperor of the Incas. He became ruler after defeating his half-brother in what may have been the greatest military engagement in Inca history. The conquistador Francisco Pizarro met Atahualpa just before the emperor’s triumphal entry into Cuzco and invited him to a feast in his honor. When Atahualpa and his unarmed retainers arrived, Pizarro ambushed them on horseback with cannons and guns, slaughtered thousands, and took Atahualpa prisoner. Pizarro accepted Atahualpa’s offer of a ransom of a roomful of gold, then, having received 24 tons of gold and silver, ordered Atahualpa burned at the stake, The sentence was changed to death by garrote when Atahualpa agreed to convert to Christianity.”

Excerpted from: Stevens, Mark A., Ed. Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Encyclopedia. Springfield, Massachusetts: Merriam-Webster, 2000.

Shawnee

“Shawnee: Algonquian-speaking people from the central Ohio River Valley. Closely related in language and culture to the Fox, Kickapoo, and Sauk, the Shawnee were also influenced by the Seneca and Delaware. In the summer the Shawnee lived in bark-covered houses grouped into large villages near fields in which women cultivated corn. The primary male occupation was hunting. In winter the village broke into small patrilineal family groups, which moved to hunting camps. In the 17th century the Shawnee were driven from their home by the Iroquois, scattering into widely separated areas. After 1725 the tribe reunited in Ohio. Following their defeat by General Anthony Wayne (1794), they broke into three independent branches that eventually settled in Oklahoma. Today they number about 4,000.”

Excerpted from: Stevens, Mark A., Ed. Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Encyclopedia. Springfield, Massachusetts: Merriam-Webster, 2000.