Tuesday, January 17, 2012

Why Don't We?

From the completely random file:

Why on earth does English not have a symbol that adequately describes strong amazement?

I've just noticed my over dependence upon make-do symbols, like:
  • ?!?
  • ?! and
  • !?
{Selection of make-do symbol depends on strength of emotion and whether I'm more vehement or befuddled.}

Ideas, anyone? How do we get a symbol introduced into our language that conveys what we need it to convey? (Or is that ?!!?)

4 comments:

  1. Bob AJanuary 17, 2012 at 6:49 AM

    Actually, there is. It was introduced years ago (I remember it from at least when I was a teenager — Wikipedia says it was introduced in 1962) and is called an interrobang (Unicode U+203D). It's a combination of a question mark and exclamation point (‽). It's included in several font sets. If it showed up, the one in parentheses is from Arial Unicode.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Bob AJanuary 17, 2012 at 6:54 AM

    This comment has been removed by the author.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Bob AJanuary 17, 2012 at 6:55 AM

    On my screen, at least, it showed up‽ So, Bob's your uncle!! (Not me, of course — a British exclamation meaning, "There you have it." Sort of like the French, voilà!)

    ReplyDelete
  4. ShannahJanuary 17, 2012 at 8:03 AM

    Who knew‽

    Though I think some time and energy could be expended in developing a more elegant symbol, don't you think? (?!)

    :)

    ReplyDelete