(yōō'fə-mĭz'əm) n. The act or an example of substituting a mild, indirect, or vague term for one considered harsh, blunt, or offensive: "Euphemisms such as 'slumber room' . . . abound in the funeral business"(Jessica Mitford). [Greek euphēmismos, from euphēmizein, to use auspicious words, from euphēmiā, use of auspicious words : eu-, eu- + phēmē, speech; see bhā-2 in Indo-European roots.] eu'phe·mist n., eu'phe·mis'tic (-mĭs'tĭk) adj., eu'phe·mis'ti·cal·ly adv.
Since my "theme" this week is writing love and sex scenes, I thought I'd avoid the topic by listing a bunch of euphemisms for naughty bits. In fact, I'm going to avoid it completely by posting some links.
This site is proof that men spend an inordinate amount of time thinking about themselves and...themselves. Even my three-year-old is obsessed. He'd talk about it all the time, if I let him. He'd tell everyone all about it. He'd even be proud to show it off.
LOL - nice. So these are lists of words to avoid then, right? ;-)
ReplyDeleteUm...I dunno. Personally, I'm looking forward to using "chesticals" in my current w.i.p.
ReplyDeleteI guess using something like "He poised his lady dagger at the entrance to her tool shed and readied to strike" would be a bit purple. Or something...