Friday, April 19, 2013

“Well, the truth of the matter is, I don't report to a Commissioner…”

“I report to a committee. Some of whom are appointed, some elected, and the rest co-opted on a bi-annual basis. It's a quorum, so to speak.”

It hit me when I was reading GalleyCat the other day and came across an article titled “Best Quora Answer of the Year that I’d left a very important movie off my favorite laugh and quote list. I mean, So I Married an Axe Murderer is the quote movie of all time around our house. It made me wonder why I had forgotten to include it. Perhaps the lines have just become so ingrained in our daily use it’s like they were always there.

However, as far as I know it’s the only movie to use the word quorum.

Which of course is the perfect word for today’s post.

Perhaps this is cheating using a movie title that has nothing to do with the letter Q but hey, I included the article too and that really makes use of the Q.

So the article was about the winner who responded to this question: What does the first day of a 5+ year prison sentence feel like?

And for those interested, the Quora response in question was awarded during the annual Shorty Awards. I’d never heard of the award before so it seemed smart to look them up. Turns out it’s the social media content awards. Unfortunately blogs aren’t included unless they’re posted on Tumblr. Here’s the info. Despite the lack of Blogger or Wordpress to make the cut, the awards sound pretty interesting.

Strangely I had never heard the word quora before. Then as I was typing this up in MS Word I got the little red squiggle beneath the word indicating a misspelling. Suggestions included quota, quire, and quorum among others. I couldn’t get any results on dictionary.com either. Seemed strange.

I wondered if quora was the plural of quorum because quorums didn’t sound right. But Word didn’t say it was a misspelling so that furthered my confusion. So does anyone know what a quora actually is? It might be good to know in case I ever want to enter the contest someday. Someday if I ever decide to use Tumblr.

Now if you’ll excuse me, it’s time to “turn off the Bay city Rollers, the game’s about to begin!”

Posted for April 2013 A to Z Blog Challenge Q is for Quorum

10 comments:

Launna said...

I have not heard of the word quora... there is always something to learn:-D

I loved the Bay City Rollers :-D

Kathe W. said...

yep- always something new to learn! Have a great day!

Unknown said...

Jenn,

I have to admit I like to know things. More specifically, I do not like to not know things. So I went on a quick search to find out what the word quora means.

A Google Search for the word quora led me to the Wikipedia page for Quora. I know that as a user edited platform, you cannot trust Wikipedia, but it can be a good place to start. Apparently Quora is a question and answer website. (https://www.quora.com/) They claim to be "your best source for knowledge". On the site members post questions for other members to answer. My understanding is that anyone within the community can answer a question once it has been posted. They appear to be somewhat popular, and even have an app for Facebook, Android, iPhone, and more.

I was not entirely happy with this answer, as many sites are named after words that have an actual definition. So I looked into it further. When I am unable to find the meaning of a word in a standard dictionary, I turn to the Urban Dictionary (http://www.urbandictionary.com/), Wordnik, and Google Translate.

The only entry in the Urban Dictionary seems to refer to the Quora site as well. When typing quora into Google Translate, it says that it is Latin for the word whose. However, if you translate the English word whose into Latin, you get cuius, quorum, or cujus. According to Wordnik, quora is a noun, and the plural of quorum.

I may be even more confused now. The plural of whose?

Tracy

Karen Goltz said...

'Curricula' is the plural of 'curriculum' and 'data' is the plural of 'datum,' so it stands to reason that 'quora' is the plural of 'quorum.' However I never took Latin, so the logic may not actually stand.

I've also seen a suggestion that 'quora' may actually be a contraction of QUestion OR Answer, which would be consistent with the usage you cited.

Jak said...

I also looked it up much like T.L. I like Karen's explanation as being a plural form of "quorum" another word I wasn't familiar with, but now like a lot!

That is fairly interesting (The Shorty Awards) and I will have to check out the link you provided. I honestly can't stand Tumblr, though. Something about it bugs me. I was going to use it as my "entertainment" blogging site, but I just don't know. Maybe it isn't as jumbled/confusing as I make myself believe it is?

I've contemplated podcasting, and Blogger is a pain to use as a source for those as well due to the lack of integrated code/resources/whatever and you have to go some long round about, pain-in-the-ass way to make it happen. Blogger needs to step it up! haha

I haven't seen So I Married an Axe Murderer in ages. Oddly the part I remember the most is the very beginning with the credits and them showing the coffee cup being used/washed/reused. I have no idea why. At least, I think that was the opening of that movie.

Jenn Flynn-Shon said...

Love learning something every day!

Jenn Flynn-Shon said...

Thanks Kathe you too!

Jenn Flynn-Shon said...

Excellent info Tracy thanks so much for looking into this and sharing what you found. Love learning new things! Of course I'm a little confused now too I have to admit haha. Seems there are lots of options for this word/non-word.

Jenn Flynn-Shon said...

That's the same logic I was going on with quorum/quora though I never took Latin either so to be completely honest I wasn't even sure why I felt it would be the plural. I guess it just felt right. Those English teachers back in third grade would be proud, apparently something stuck!

Though the question or answer reference seems more realistic for this particular instance. Thanks!

Jenn Flynn-Shon said...

I hear you about Tumblr, seems tougher to really connect with people on there. But then again I started on Blogger and I'm pretty wordy most of the time so the micro-blogging format isn't really in line with my general writing style. Never done a podcast, I really dislike my voice on recording so that's likely not in my future. My written voice is so much smoother haha.

Yup, that's the opening scene "Excuse me? I believe I ordered the large cappuccino? Hello!"