WORD-CHOPPER (also \"word chopper\"?)

English translation: linguistic pedant

13:00 Sep 11, 2018

English language (monolingual) [PRO]
Slang / Facetious linguistic contrivance?

English term or phrase: WORD-CHOPPER (also \"word chopper\"?)

I tentatively infer that it means "one who's thorough [a stickler, if you will] in their choice of words", further input on the notion purported, as I lack conviction here. Contexts: (And thanks in advance!)

1- Now that nirvana has become an English word, it should have its own English verb to convey the sense of "being unbound" as well. At present, we say that a person "reaches" nirvana or "enters" nirvana (...). But nirvana is most emphatically not a place. It's realized only when the mind stops defining itself in terms of place: of here, or there, or between the two. This may seem like a word-chopper's problem — what can a verb or two do to your practice? — but the idea of nirvana as a place has created severe misunderstandings in the past, and it could easily create misunderstandings now.

2- Is this the best voice for the story? Have you considered recasting it in the first person? I realise I’m stepping slightly beyond my remit as a word-chopper here, but it strikes me that this is already a deeply internalised point of view, so much so that the grammatical demands of third-person limited might be unnecessarily cramping your steez.

3- Zophar was an accuser, a man of rough tongue; he could not be civil until after he had been rude. He told Job that he, the wasted one, was 'a man of lips,' in the Hebrew tongue, a word-chopper, a gabbler in the face of heaven's patience, and that Job knew nothing about his own case.

FNO

Selected answer:linguistic pedant

Explanation:
I'm really not sure as it's a difficult one to research. I have found it spelled "wordchopper" though.

This is certainly what the context sentences seem to be saying, as you yourself suggested.

--------------------------------------------------
Note added at 33 mins (2018-09-11 13:34:07 GMT)
--------------------------------------------------

The latest context supplied certainly points to a pedant, or a hairsplitter (also hair-splitter).

Selected response from:

Sheila Wilson
Spain
Local time: 14:30

Grading comment

Selected automatically based on peer agreement.
4 KudoZ points were awarded for this answer

SUMMARY OF ALL EXPLANATIONS PROVIDED

2 +7

linguistic pedant

Sheila Wilson

Summary of reference entries provided

Compare logic-chopper, logic-chopping, choplogic

Alison MacG

Discussion entries: 1

Answers

24 mins confidence:

peer agreement (net): +7

word-chopper (also \"word chopper\"?)

linguistic pedant

Sheila Wilson
Spain
Local time: 14:30
Native speaker of:

English
PRO pts in category: 7

Grading comment

Selected automatically based on peer agreement.

Peer comments on this answer (and responses from the answerer)

agree

Victoria Britten

5 mins

-> Thanks

agree

philgoddard: I've never seen this phrase, and the author shouldn't draw attention to it by using it three times. But from the context, I think this has to be the meaning.

12 mins

-> Thanks. No, I don't know it either although I did find it (as one word) in one book. I don't personally like it at all.

agree

JohnMcDove: Yes, this made think of "hair-splitter" as you mention. Like a "Korzybski fanatic". (With all my respects to Korzybski, by the by... ;-)

1 hr

-> Thanks

agree

Alison MacG: Yes, I think you are correct. Perhaps linked to logic-chopper.

1 hr

-> Thanks

agree

Yvonne Gallagher: Yes, has to be a pedant . Perhaps it's a literal translation of some Hebrew word like "man of lips". Apparently Heblish can be pretty bad.

2 hrs

-> Thanks

agree

Shekhar Banerjee: That looks to be the closest possible meaning.

2 hrs

-> Thanks

agree

acetran

12 days

-> Thanks

Reference comments

2 hrs peer agreement (net): +4

Reference: Compare logic-chopper, logic-chopping, choplogic

Reference information:
From The Oxford Dictionary of Phrase and Fable (2 ed.)

chop2

chop logic
argue in a tiresomely pedantic way; quibble (from a dialect use of chop ‘cut’ meaning ‘bandy words’). Compare logic chopping.

logic chopping
the practice of engaging in excessively pedantic argument. The expression chop logic is recorded from the early 16th century, and originally meant ‘exchange or bandy logical arguments’; in later use, chop was wrongly understood as meaning ‘cut, split’.
http://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/acref/9780198609...

From the OED

word-chopping n.
1858 Harvard Mag. Dec. 401 That Homeric epithet of our race, ‘word-dividing men’, is by no means inappropriate, since word-chopping is the employment of half our lives.
1943 Amer. Polit. Sci. Rev. 37 1092 Waiving the question of the expediency of trying to define the limits of military authority within another nation, it is word-chopping to try to decide when departure from the chivalric code of battle is justifiable.
2004 New York Sun (Nexis) 15 Jan. 17 Lattimore's main weapon was always word-chopping. Rather than declare whether he is a supporter of the United States or forthrightly condemn Stalinism, he argues over the meaning of the words ‘leftist’ and ‘Communist’.

Alison MacG
United Kingdom
Native speaker of:

English
PRO pts in category: 4

Login or register (free and only takes a few minutes) to participate in this question.

You will also have access to many other tools and opportunities designed for those who have language-related jobs (or are passionate about them). Participation is free and the site has a strict confidentiality policy.

Return to KudoZ list

KudoZ™ translation help

The KudoZ network provides a framework for translators and others to assist each other with translations or explanations of terms and short phrases.

See also:

ProZ.com term search

Search millions of term translations

WORD-CHOPPER (also \"word chopper\"?)

English translation: linguistic pedant

Answers

Reference comments

KudoZ™ translation help

Your current localization setting

Select a language

WORD-CHOPPER (also \"word chopper\"?)

English translation: linguistic pedant

Answers

Reference comments

KudoZ™ translation help

You have native languages that can be verified

Your current localization setting

Select a language