“Baronage (deriv. OFr. barnage, Lat. baronagium). In medieval England, the earls, tenants of feudal baronies, and other important feudal tenants in chief; all the titled and landed nobility collectively, not merely those entitled baron.”
Excerpted from: Cook, Chris. Dictionary of Historical Terms. New York: Gramercy, 1998.
Posted in English Language Arts, Quotes, Reference, Social Sciences
Tagged term of art
“As a young theater critic and aspiring playwright, Kaufman was assigned to cover a new Broadway comedy. In his review he wrote: ‘There was laughter in the back of the theater, leading to the belief that somebody was telling jokes back there.’”
Excerpted from: Drennan, Robert E., ed. The Algonquin Wits. New York: Kensington, 1985.
Posted in English Language Arts, New York City, Quotes, Reference
Tagged drama/theater, humor, literary oddities
“Restrictive Term, Element, Clause: A phrase or clause that limits the essential meaning of the sentence element it modifies or identifies. Professional athletes who perform exceptionally should earn stratospheric salaries. Since there are no commas before and after the italicized clause, the italicized clause is restrictive and suggests that only those athletes that perform exceptionally are entitled to such salaries. If commas were added before who and after exceptionally, the clause would be nonrestrictive and would suggest that all professional athletes should receive stratospheric salaries.”
Excerpted from: Strunk, William Jr., and E.B. White. The Elements of Style, Fourth Edition. New York: Longman, 2000.
“Federal Style: An American architectural style of about 1780 to 1820 which reflected English Georgian models, especially the influence of Robert Adam. Symmetrically designed facades, smooth surfaces, and restrained classical ornament typify buildings in that style.”
Excerpted from: Diamond, David G. The Bulfinch Pocket Dictionary of Art Terms. Boston: Little Brown, 1992.
“Little Shop of Horrors: A cult horror movie (1960) directed by Roger Corman (b. 1926) about a carnivorous talking plant that quickly outgrows the flower shop of its dimwitted owner and becomes a voracious man-eating monster. The success of Corman’s original inspired stage musical with the same title in the 1980s and an inferior film remake in 1986.”
Excerpted from: Crofton, Ian, ed. Brewer’s Curious Titles. London: Cassell, 2002.
Posted in English Language Arts, Quotes, Reference
Tagged drama/theater, film/television/photography, literary oddities
“Pythian * Isthmian * Nemean * Olympic
The Pythian Games were held in honour of Apollo at Delphi; the Isthmian Games, at Corinth for Poseidon; the Nemean Games, at Nemea in honour of Zeus. But the most famous in the ancient world were the Olympic Games, held in honor of Zeus at Olympia in the Peloponnese, which attracted city states from across the Greek (and later Roman) world.
Each of these PanHellenic Games were held at intervals of either two or four years and were arranged so that each year there was at least one competition open to any free-born Greek. The first recorded winner is from 776 BC though the practice was considerably more ancient. The Games seem to have been designed to select the very best in order that they could offer up a sacrifice that would be the most pleasing to the Gods. This also explains the sacred truce, the cult of heroic nudity, the simple garlands awarded to the victors and the decision of the Christian emperor Theodosius to close down the games in 394 BC.”
Excerpted from: Rogerson, Barnaby. Rogerson’s Book of Numbers: The Culture of Numbers–from 1,001 Nights to the Seven Wonders of the World. New York: Picador, 2013.
Posted in English Language Arts, Quotes, Reference, Social Sciences
Tagged games/sports, readings/research
“Ability: Developed skill, competence, or power to do something, especially (in psychology) existing capacity to perform some function, whether physical, mental, or a combination of the two, without further education or training, contrasted with capacity, which is latent ability.”
Excerpted from: Colman, Andrew M., ed. Oxford Dictionary of Psychology. New York: Oxford University Press, 2003.
As you get older, you take it for granted, but it’s still fun to experience synchrony. A friend of mine and I land on synchrony quite often while texting–often using the same words simultaneously. In this case, the same day I interviewed with some very nice, clearly talented, unusually engaged and deeply committed folks at a computer-themed career and technical education high school in the North Bronx, I pulled out this lesson plan on data storage, adapted from text I grabbed from Barbara Ann Kipfer’s The Order of Things. I expect this would work well at a school such as theirs. I hope they find their way to it.
For your students, here is the list as reading and comprehension questions, which is the work of this lesson.
If you find typos in these documents, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.
“Ability test: A test that measures a person’s current level of performance or that estimates future performance. The term sometimes denotes an achievement test, sometimes and aptitude test, and sometimes and intelligence test.”
Excerpted from: Colman, Andrew M., ed. Oxford Dictionary of Psychology. New York: Oxford University Press, 2003.
“If all mankind were to disappear, the world would regenerate back to the rich state of equilibrium that existed then thousand years ago. If insects were to vanish, the environment would collapse into chaos.”
Excerpted from: Winokur, Jon, ed. The Big Curmudgeon. New York: Black Dog & Leventhal, 2007.
Posted in English Language Arts, Quotes, Reference, Social Sciences
Tagged philosophy/religion, science literacy
 | A Measurement Conver… on An Elegantly Simple Cooking Co… |
| A Measurement Conver… on The Weekly Text, October 25, 2… |
 | markstextterminal on Cree |
 | panzer046a139293db on Cree |
| markstextterminal on Cree |
Mark's Text Terminal 
You must be logged in to post a comment.