The Oxford Dictionary of New Words
.pdfand 2 raps.
Tower Records' Top Feb. 1988, p. 7
D.J.'s Matt Dike,...and Mike Ross,...got Los Angeles rapping.
Interview Mar. 1990, p. 52
rap and scratch
(Music) (Youth Culture) see scratch
rare |
adjective (Youth Culture) |
In young people's slang: extremely good or impressive; 'hip', 'cool'.
Etymology: A revival of a colloquial sense of the adjective rare which first developed in the fifteenth century, but was considered archaic in the early twentieth century. The usage probably found its way into young people's slang through US Black street slang and rap.
'Rare!' is an expression of wonder, gasped rather than spoken.
New Statesman 16 Feb. 1990, p. 12
rate-capping
(Business World) (Politics) see cap
18.2 reader-friendly...
reader-friendly
(Lifestyle and Leisure) see -friendly
read my lips
phrase (Politics)
In US politics, a catch-phrase promoted during the Republican presidential campaign of George Bush to emphasize commitment to lower taxes; also sometimes used as an adjectival phrase to
refer to the tax policy of his administration or to its policies in general.
Etymology: The phrase comes from Mr Bush's speech to the Republican Party convention in New Orleans in August 1988:
Congress will push me to raise taxes, and I'll say no, and they'll push, and I'll say no, and they'll push again, and I'll say to them 'Read my lips: no new taxes'.
During the election campaign that followed this was repeated to reporters and questioners as read my lips followed by the silently mouthed words 'no new taxes'. The phrase itself is, of course, older than this in other contexts; the imagery is that
of someone talking to a deaf person, or of a parent emphasizing something to a child and urging visual as well as aural concentration on what is said, the equivalent of 'I really mean this'--or even the television catch-phrase 'I will say this only once'. There is also sometimes a suggestion that what follows read my lips represents a sub-text, a deeper meaning or message that can only be mouthed and not spoken aloud. In these broader uses the phrase read my lips was well known by the time Mr Bush used it at the convention (it had even been the title of a rock-music album).
History and Usage: So often did Mr Bush use the technique described above during the election campaign that it became a hallmark of his promised policies, so that the phrase read my lips alone became enough to signify a promise of no new taxes during his presidency. It also became a yardstick by which the
American public could measure his administration and assess once and for all the reliability of election promises.
It appears the 'read my lips' President is simply giving lip service to his environmental concerns.
Philadelphia Inquirer 20 Sept. 1989, section A, p. 16
Sen. Phil Gramm,...aiming to rescue the administration's 'read my lips' strategy, plans an alternative amendment.
Washington Post 1 Oct. 1989, section D, p. 7
Truth caught up with Mr Bush last week when he tiptoed into Congress and agreed, no doubt with everyone reading his lips, to raise $25 bn in new taxes.
Punch 13 July 1990, p. 20
realo (Environment) see fundie
recycling noun (Environment)
The conversion of waste (such as paper, glass, etc.) into reusable materials.
Etymology: Formed from the verb recycle, literally 'to return to an earlier stage in a cyclic process'; when a waste product is recycled it is returned to its raw-material state so as to be formed into a new product.
History and Usage: The idea of recycling paper waste in particular is several decades old, but the whole concept of reusing waste rather than dumping it in the environment gained a new impetus and a more positive public profile as a result of
the success of the green movement of the eighties. Whereas it was only a few keen environmentalists who took the trouble to save and reuse domestic waste in the seventies, the eighties saw the development of government-sponsored recycling programmes, collection points for recyclable containers (such as the bottle bank and the can bank) appeared in many towns, and in certain areas (including Canada and some States in the US) the division of domestic waste into recyclable and non-recyclable elements was required by law. The availability of recycled products also improved, as did their quality and market image, with
advertisers working hard to convince shoppers that they could 'do something for the environment' by choosing recycled paper, containers, etc. Manufacturers keen to present themselves as ecologically aware had to consider the recyclability of the packaging that they used as well as the possibility of using recyclables in the product itself.
Manufacturers have jumped on the bandwagon, slapping 'biodegradable', 'ozone friendly', 'recyclable',
and...any other environmentally correct slogan...on
everything from diapers to deodorant.
New Age Journal July-Aug. 1990, p. 10
A pilot Blue Box scheme which covers 3,500 homes in Sheffield--the first recycling city--is proving to be
the most successful collection method in the UK.
Earth Matters Summer 1990, p. 4
So far, Canada has accepted seven [EcoLogo] sectors: Zinc-Air Batteries, water based paint, fine recycled paper, miscellaneous recycled paper, recycled newsprint, heat recovery ventilators, and cloth nappies.
Earth Matters Summer 1990, p. 9
Recycling was encouraged by...the buy-back value for recyclables (paid out at privately owned drop-off centers).
Garbage Nov.-Dec. 1990, p. 27
red-eye noun Also written red eye (Lifestyle and Leisure)
In colloquial use: an overnight flight, especially one on which the traveller crosses one or more time-zones.
Etymology: So named because the passengers can be expected to arrive red-eyed from lack of sleep.
History and Usage: The term red-eye (at first in attributive form, as red-eye flight or red-eye special) has been in colloquial use in the US since at least the late sixties. In the late eighties, with transatlantic commuting a reality, it became a fashionable term among British business executives for the
overnight flight from New York to London; arriving at breakfast time on such a flight, the traveller has a full business day
ahead and a time difference of five or six hours to cope with.
Three days ago (is it?) I flew in on a red-eye from New York. I practically had the airplane to myself.
Martin Amis London Fields (1989), p. 1
Participants...were ushered aboard the late night 'red eye' for the non-stop flight to Tokyo.
Gramophone Feb. 1990, p. 1547
red route noun (Lifestyle and Leisure) (Politics)
A proposed expressway (marked by a red line along the edge of the road) designed to ease traffic congestion on certain urban roads and similar in operation to a clearway, except that more severe penalties would be incurred by the driver of any vehicle which stopped or otherwise infringed the rules.
Etymology: Formed by compounding: a route marked by a red line.
History and Usage: The idea of the red route as a way of easing urban traffic congestion in the UK was devised by a group of Conservative politicians called the red route group in the second half of the eighties. Initially intended to solve some of London's traffic problems, their scheme would place tight restrictions on parking, unloading, stopping, and roadworks on the selected routes and would provide for a special force of traffic wardens to impose the steep fines which anyone infringing these restrictions would incur. The proposals did not meet with unqualified enthusiasm from the general public or the government.
Red routes, designed to speed the flow of vehicles of all kinds indiscriminately, could only make things worse.
Independent 20 Dec. 1989, p. 18
reflagging
noun Also written re-flagging (Politics)
The practice of registering a ship under a new national flag or flag of convenience, especially so as to enable it to qualify for protection in disputed waters.
Etymology: Formed by adding the prefix reand the suffix -ing
to flag.
History and Usage: Although the word reflagging was not new to the language in the eighties (it had been used in specialized sources for some years before that), it was only during the mid and late eighties that the issue was brought into the public eye through widespread reporting of the situation in the Persian
Gulf and the word was therefore used frequently in the newpapers. Most of the reports concerned the difficulties experienced by Kuwaiti ships passing through the Straits of Hormuz with cargoes of oil in 1986-7, during the Iran-Iraq war; the question was whether they should be allowed to avail themselves of naval protection from NATO countries or from the Soviet Union after one or other of these countries had offered
to reflag them under its own national flag. In practice, this
was done mainly by the US, whose warships subsequently escorted the reflagged Kuwaiti tankers safely through the Straits, and
the lead was later followed by the UK, but the rights and wrongs of this approach were hotly disputed both in the US and in the UK.
Reflagging Kuwait's tankers as 'American' vessels.
US News & World Report 8 June 1987, p. 20
Two reflagged Kuwaiti tankers hoisted the Stars and Stripes and signalled to their escort of four American warships that they were ready to sail.
Daily Telegraph 22 July 1987, p. 1
We reflagged the tankers because the Kuwaitis were going to ask the Russians to do it.
USA Today 21 Oct. 1987, p. 6
reflexology
noun (Health and Fitness)
A complementary therapy based on the application of pressure to specific points on the feet and hands.
Etymology: Formed by adding the suffix -ology 'subject of
study' to reflex, the term used for the pressure points on the feet and hands which are used in this technique (because each point has a corresponding effect--a secondary manifestation or reflex--on a particular part of the body).
History and Usage: Reflexology is also known as zone therapy of the hands and feet; like acupressure, it is an ancient
oriental therapy whose techniques date back thousands of years, but which has only this century been taken up and widely practised in the West. It was rediscovered in the twenties by William Fitzgerald, an American ear, nose, and throat specialist, popularized in the US by Eunice Ingham, and brought to the UK in the sixties by a student of hers named Doreen Bayly. However, it was only in the eighties, with the growth and success of alternative and complementary therapies, that reflexology was taken up by significant numbers of people. The underlying principle is very similar to that of acupressure, except that an entire 'map' of pressure points affecting the whole body is found in the feet, and it is mainly these reflexes (together with occasional use of a corresponding set in the hands) that are worked on to produce an improvement of circulation to the corresponding part of the body, a relaxation
of tension there, and eventually a return to balance. A practitioner of reflexology is a reflexologist.
For the reflexologist, there are 10 channels, beginning (or ending) in the toes and extending to the fingers and the top of the head. Each channel relates to a zone of the body, to the organs in that zone--the big toe relates to the head, for example. By feeling patients' feet in certain prescribed ways, reflexologists can detect which energy channels are blocked.
Brian Inglis & Ruth West The Alternative Health Guide (1983), p. 112
Apparently, the Princess of Wales, the Duchess of York and others are advised... on a form of...reflexology,
and it keeps those treated healthy, young and beautiful.
New Scientist 23 June 1990, p. 112
refusenik noun Also written refusnik (Politics) (People and Society)
Colloquially, any person who has been refused official permission to do something or who has refused to follow instructions, especially as a form of protest.
Etymology: A transferred sense of a word which was originally a partial translation of the Russian word otkaznik (itself made up of the stem of the verb otkazat' 'to refuse' and -nik, the agent suffix used in other English words such as beatnik and
peacenik). When first borrowed into English, refusenik was used only in the specific sense of Russian otkaznik 'a Soviet Jew who has been refused permission to emigrate to Israel'.
History and Usage: The plight of the Soviet refuseniks was first widely reported in the English-language press in the second half of the seventies and by the early eighties the word would have been familiar to the readers of most quality newspapers. By the mid eighties journalists had started to apply it in other contexts (in much the same way as other Russian borrowings such as glasnost and perestroika would later be applied in new and often trivial home contexts); perhaps under the influence of the punning style of newspaper headlines, or possibly just as a result of misunderstanding or forgetting the original import of the word (since many of the original refuseniks had been dissidents), they then began to use refusenik for the person who does the refusing rather than the one who is its victim, so that it became a milder synonym for dissident or protester.
The 30 'refuseniks' who would not go to Wapping have been joined by 50 people.
City Limits 10 Apr. 1986, p. 7
'Refuseniks' of Voyager lobby Hawke.
Courier-Mail (Brisbane) 1987, p. 19
See also returnik
remastered
(Music) (Science and Technology) see digital
Restart noun Also written restart (Business World)
A return to paid employment after a period of absence or unemployment; in the UK, the name of a government programme to facilitate retraining and re-employment.
Etymology: A specialized use of the existing noun restart.
History and Usage: The government's Restart scheme began in September 1988, a time when, despite high unemployment, employers complained that they were unable to find suitable staff to fill their vacancies. This situation was particularly acute in inner cities (especially inner London), so the schemes started there and a few months later spread nationwide. The scheme (parts of which, at least, are compulsory after six months' unemployment) includes opportunities for training in interview technique, self-presentation, etc. to help the candidates to 'fit' the employers' requirements.
If you're still unemployed after six months, you're obliged to attend a Restart interview. This gives you the first opportunity to retrain on a state scheme or join a Jobclub.
Which? Aug. 1988, p. 378
restructuring
(Politics) see perestroika
retro noun and adjective (Lifestyle and Leisure)
noun: A style or fashion that harks back to the past, a throw-back; a movement to revive past styles.
adjective: Reviving or harking back to the past; nostalgically retrospective.
Etymology: Although the prefix retrohas a long history in English, forming words with the meaning 'backwards-' on Latin roots (such as retrograde), it was actually through the French word r‚trograde that this word reached English. The French began to abbreviate r‚trograde to r‚tro specifically in relation to
fashion in late 1973, when the styles of the thirties were
revived by Paris designers. The abbreviation stuck in French, and it was only the abbreviated form that was borrowed into English.
History and Usage: The earliest uses in English closely follow the developments of 1973-4 in France, and use the word both as a noun and as an adjective, as was already the case in French. As nostalgia in a number of cultural areas became increasingly fashionable in the eighties, both the adjective and the noun
were used to form compounds such as retro-culture, retrodressing, retromania, retrophobia, and retro-rock.
The icy charms of the Group TSE's productions, beginning as far back as 1969, have been in the vanguard of the French vogue for 'retro'.
Guardian Weekly 18 May 1974, p. 14
Kevin was delighted...Any guy who wore a retro tux would have to be.
Erica Jong Parachutes & Kisses (1984), p. 157
Rebecca is a 19-year-old Retrogirl...[She] dresses in semi-hippie garb and offsets this with a studded belt and pointed black boots.
Courier-Mail (Brisbane) 27 Sept. 1988, p. 17
retrovirus
noun Also written retravirus (Health and Fitness)
Any of a group of RNA viruses (including HIV) which form DNA during the replication of their RNA.
Etymology: Formed by adding the initial two letters of REverse and TRanscriptase and the combining-form suffix -o to virus; one of the distinguishing characteristics of a retrovirus is the presence of reverse transcriptase, the enzyme which acts as a catalyst for the formation of DNA from an RNA template.
History and Usage: The family of retroviruses was first given the Latin name Retroviridae in the mid seventies; during the