azureabstraction > out of the blue

Ur-poem

I was talking to Aaron last night, and I wanted to use the term "ur-poem", in a rather limited sense. But I wasn't quite sure if that would be precisely what I wanted to say, so I did a quick google search to see if it was common. For "ur-poem", I recieved rather disgusting results.

In the first two pages, there was only a single hit that was what I had intended (at the beginning of the second page). The next proper hit was five pages in. The others were all variants on the soul-reaving "i luv ur poem!"

This disgusts me.

The proper usage of the phrase "ur-poem" is not some stupid slack-jawed internet-shorthand. The prefix "ur-" means "original", and "prototypical" [wikipedia]. (Interestingly, the root is German. As in ursprache, protolanguage. I thought it would have something to do with the ancient Mesopotamian city of Ur.)

Just so you know.

One Response to “Ur-poem”

  1. kototyph Says:

    Thanks for the definition! When I see all the 'omg luv ur poem' results I despair for the future of critical discourse. Off to make a very short wikipedia page…

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