Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Yu_Bum_suk]

A thread on another forum got me thinking about we continually try to come up with polite terms to describe, well, retards, but then the new term becomes an insult and we have to make a new one. In the field of education, this means keeping many committees very busy. I'd like to put together a list of the progression of retarded euphemisms in the English language.

- Idiot - widely in use for centuries.
- Feeble-minded - early to mid-twentieth century?
- Retarded / Mentally retarded - medical and clinical term, not in my 1934 OED as pertaining to mental development.
- Mentally handicapped - I can remember this term being widely used in the 1980s when I was at elementary school.
- Mentally disabled - came about when physically disabled became more popular than physcially handicapped.
- Mentally challenged / developmentally challeneged- late 80s / early 90s, I guess.
- Special / Special needs child / student - this one seems to have co-existed with the above three and is still around.
- Differently abled - I can remember this ridiculous term coming out in the late 90s.

Are there any others I've forgotten?

[Rapacious Mr. Batstove]

Interesting post to wither away those exam week blues Mr Suk. I've made one lesson for next semester, that's enough for today. Here's my offerings:

Simple minded
A little slow / slow / a slow child

[Bibbitybop]

A few sandwiches short of a picnic basket

Missing a couple chromosomes

Michin


Wait, polite? Nevermind.

[passport220]

One Korean teacher uses �weak-minded� to describe students

[jkelly80]

I think they call that a Euphemism Treadmill. It's rather interesting.

I'm pretty sure retard means delayed in French, so its original use was probably quasi-scientific. However, I think this is just euphi-baiting.

[Captain Courageous]

[Yu_Bum_suk]

[saw6436]

Not totally on topic but I used to do volunteer work for the Special Olympics. You would be suprised at the number of parents who refered to their kids as "Retards", "Tard", etc...I'm guessing 50%. Bear in mind that the terms were never used in a spiteful way. More of a matter-of-fact way.

[jackson7]

I have worked for several years with physically and mentally-limited individuals, and these are the terms we have been asked to, and prefer to use.

Using "limited" let's one consciously and sub-consciously focus on the the abilities that exist in the the person afflicted, rather than the affliction itself. It is more of a "glass is half-full" type of thinking.

Disabled seems to imply that ability is absent completely, even though of course we know that is not what we believe or are thinking (most of the time, I have worked with autistics that are almost completely devoid of the ability to communicate and function in an acceptable manner).

Anyway, as was mentioned above, it is usually best to err on the side of polite and PC (damn Western cultures and our PCness hehe). I have many black friends that refer to themselves as "black," but I don't think they extend that privelege to others they don't know. Double standards, or suspicion that the stranger using the term might mean it maliciously? I don't know. I also have met parents that refer to their children in very un-PC ways, but again, my Italian family jokes about the men in our circle being a bunch of "hairy Wops," in a loving, kind, way of course

[patongpanda]

Ones my Elementary students have used:

"He's busy" and "His mind is broken"

When I was at school we used "Joey Deacon", "Flid", "Spazz" and "Clever Trevor".

The last one only works if the retard's name is Trevor.

[Yu_Bum_suk]

My students seem to be familiar with the term 'special student'.

My friend had a new class with one student who clearly was't all together mentally. One student told him 'she is head [pointing at her head] air!'.

Oh, so she's an airhead. Well, good to know.

[hugo_danner]

"tard" "retread"

[kermo]

"touched in the head"

[cwemory]