The Republicans’ attempt to make the case that Barack Obama is hoity-toity and they’re hoi polloi has fallen under the sheer weight of the stunning numbers

That’s Maureen Dowd. Hoi polloi from the Greek literally means “the many.” Hoity-toity, a duplicative (think flimflam, dillydally, etc.) means, to put it informally, “all uppity and stuff.” And Dowd gets them both right.

Hoi polloi is often misused to mean the phrase’s very opposite—”the elite”—likely because of comparison or confusion with the similar-sounding hoity-toity. In an odd way, hoity-toity has experienced a similar reversal, though in the opposite direction. Hoity-toity, meaning “putting on airs” in a mocking sense, results from the verb hoit, which means, roughly, “to act the hoyden”—to be rude and boorish. Which is an accusation that the hoity-toity might be prone to assign to the hoi polloi.

(And if you persnickitors are going to grouse that “the hoi polloi” is redundant, bring it on. I’m ready for you.)

One bit of confusion I found at wilderdom.com, a site about something, though I’m not sure what:

Personality comes from the Greek word “persona”, meaning “mask”
The word ‘personality’ derives from the Latin word ‘persona’ which means ‘mask’. The study of personality can be understood as the study of ‘masks’ that people wear. These are the personas that people project and display, but also includes the inner parts of psychological experience which we collectively call our ‘self’.

Greek, Latin, Babylonian—hell, just toss out any ancient language origin. How about “Etruscan,” while we’re at it?

Turns out that yes, the origin described in nonboldfaced type is correct. The word persona is Latin. But now there’s a seed of doubt. Just as it isn’t Greek, perhaps it also doesn’t mean “mask.” Could that be true? Let’s ask some language experts: Kathlyn and Gay Hendricks, who say—

The English word ‘personality’ comes from two Latin words, per and sona, “through sound.” The Romans knew that the personality comes through in the tone of voice and other vocal aspects.

Well, that sounds good and all, but the word actually comes from one Latin word—persona—meaning, yes, “mask.” Think Dramatis Personae—the theatrical cast of characters. And, no, persona likely didn’t itself result from a “sounds-like” origin, as it probably came from Etruscan (gasp!)—the word phersu, also meaning “mask.”

Still, I’m very forgiving of language experts Kathlyn and Gay Hendricks, because they are actually body language experts, and they brought up the personality factor in analyzing the decipherable body language of one Sarah Palin. (At least her body language is decipherable, as her verbal language is hardly that.)

So I leave you with Kathlyn and Gay to analyze some bodyspeak from a current “personality” (read: mask-wearer) in this interesting article.

Oh, wait—a third less-than-optimal choice. I don’t have a dilemma; I have a quandary.

Or so the specious advice I’m about to quote would have it:

The words quandary and dilemma can be confused. A quandary is a difficult decision between many things. “She found herself in a quandary when all three of her boyfriends proposed marriage in the same week.” A dilemma is a difficult choice between two things. For example, “Caught in a major dilemma, she couldn’t decide if she should marry one of them or skip town.”

The only justifiable statement in that quote is “The words quandary and dilemma can be confused.” As demonstrated by how the author has confused them.

Yes, the di- in dilemma communicates “two.” From the Greek, a lemma is a proposition, and a dilemma two propositions. But because we don’t speak Greek and because language changes (it does! honest!) the word can now take broader meaning. In rhetoric, says the OED, a dilemma is “A form of argument involving an adversary in the choice of two (or, loosely, more) alternatives, either of which is (or appears) equally unfavourable to him.” If we’re going to insist that dilemma be used unchanged, then let’s apply the law of Xtreme Etymological Stasis (Xes) and insist that three difficult choices should be a trilemma. Try that one in everyday conversation sometime.

I wonder if the idea of the etymologically unrelated word quandary meaning “more than two” doesn’t come from extispic etymology (divination by examination of the entrails of a dissected word) and assuming that quan- means, um, “four.” Actually, no one’s sure how quandary originated, but none of the suggested etymologies involve numbers.

Such persnickitorial edicts—even when they are grounded in history or logic, which many persnickitorial edicts simply are not—elevate process over communication. Dilemma and quandary are simply synonyms with distinct implications. They impart subtle shifts in meaning and intensity; they speak with different sound. If dilemma properly evokes the level of severity of deciding among three options, then, simply, dilemma is the right word.

Also lost and/or confused in the example is that both these words suggest that the options are unpleasant. In the example, the three boyfriends must have been jerks if deciding which to marry induced quandary. (Then again, the woman was contemplating skipping town rather than marrying any of them, which would affirm that assumption).

So, back to my dilemma (yes, dilemma) about which of three choices to make: I’ve opted for the first. This is advice adapted from Vocabulary for Dummies. Make of it what you will.

Now, such catastrophic results could be could be good, and they could be bad, in that catastrophe began as a neutral word and now has negative meanings. This is quite the opposite of the words surveyed in Unfortunate English; those words were once pretty disgusting, but have risen to positive or neutral use. For instance, drat! sounds like such a soft interjection, until you discover that it is a contraction of “God rot you!”

A catastrophe in Greek theatre was the event that led to the conclusion. A loose theatrical/literary synonym for that usage is denouement. Now, much of Greek theatre isn’t exactly happy-go-lucky. Oedipus Rex, for example, is not a rollicking slapstick, and it has led to fewer Broadway musical comedies than, say, even the tale of Sweeney Todd. So you see how catastrophes got a bad name (“Daddy’s dead? And that’s Mommy naked under my sheets?! Where’s Sondheim when you need him?”).

The point is that my posting this blog entry was a catastrophe in that completion was the event that led to the result: the words now appearing on your screen and hopefully not straining your eyes too much. Now, if you’re reading this and agreeing with the modern sense of catastrophe, I thank you for your kind attention and note that the back button is likely on your upper left. If, however, I have convinced you of the innocence of catastrophe and the guilt of drat, maybe you’ll allow me to subject you to additional catastrophes another day.

And if you don’t return—well, then, Drat!