Making a distinction that doesn’t exist.
A Beijing U student whose graduation thesis about an illegal underground (?) market made a splash, on the strength of which he was accepted into the PhD program at Oxford U despite knowing very little English.
Giving a presentation there, he was confused by the comment, ‘Outrageous’ twice. I was wondering if ‘outrageous’ is used as covert praise.
Like, ‘You’re terrible’ is, I think.
Here, Trump insults Adam Schiff
In an alternative scenario,
‘You’re terrible’ is only mild disapproval of action which warrants a greater response.
So acts as covert approval.
I was wondering if ‘outrageous’ is used similarly.
Ambiguously, are the comment or the prices outrageous?
“When I had to defend my fieldwork project, one of the professors said ‘outrageous’ two times. This may have been the first time in history that something like this was said at a place like Oxford.”
https://www.readingthechinadream.com/xiang-biao-excerpts-from-self-as-method.html
“You’re outrageous” could be covert praise?
‘Covert’ means things aren’t really as they appear.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Covert_prestige
Speakers of low-prestige dialects may have mixed feelings about the way they speak. They may agree they don’t speak good. But there ain’t no better way to speak, they think. Though they don’t say (or believe) it, they’re proud they speak the way they speak.
Likewise, expressions which appears to disparage some action are actually praising it.
Like, ‘you’re terrible.’
‘You’re terrible’ isn’t really very disapproving. It’s kind of praise.
enfant terrible — Noun: 1. An unconventional badly-behaved person who causes embarrassment or shock to others., 2. An unusually successful person who is strikingly unorthodox, innovative, and/or avant-garde. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/enfant_terrible
‘You’re terrible’ is something women say and men don’t? And ‘Outrageous’ is something men say and women don’t?
"Mon ami, but you're terrible at dominoes."https://www.fanfiction.net/s/13425150/1/Les-Aventures-de-Bahorel-et-Alberta
I picture a man saying that line, not a woman.
From Major Crimes TV series, 2014:
"I mean, what kind of person do you think I am?
I love my husband and my children, and I
certainly don't deserve to have... What is
it... The Miranda warning or whatever thrust at
me twice in the same day with my whole family
missing! It's outrageous!
Oh, I'm so sorry if we've offended you."She’s angry.
Britney Spears has a song Outrageous.
Some of the citations for ‘outrageous’ at COCA sound like faux outrage.
The COCA citations of ‘faux outrage’ seem to all occur in discussion of politics.
In the wikipedia page on outrage, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outrage_(emotion), faux outrage figures prominently.
It quotes Kate Fox, “righteous indignation is one of our [=the English people’s] favourite national pastimes, but the feelings expressed are nonetheless genuine”
I think I have a scenario where ‘Outrageous!’ is a compliment, but it depends on the existence of faux outrage.
Is faux outrage a thing or is it just an accusation directed at those who are returning in kind attacks you have made against them?
Because people don’t say what they mean and mean what they say, I think we can say it exists.
The Chinese student, not having a couple of published papers under his belt, felt ‘clouds hanging over him’ after inadvertently challenging a tenet of the discipline of social anthropology (my guess).
Asking other students what ‘outrageous’ meant, they probably said he had inadvertently challenged a tenet of the discipline of social anthropology, rather than that the prof was complimenting him on his iconoclasm.
Thanks to ##English on the freenode IRC network for comments.
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