Learn From Yo Momma!

May 11, 2007 — -- "Yo momma's so lachrymose, she needs a quilt for a Kleenex!"

Are you insulted? To decide, you'd have to know that lachrymose means "sorrowful, inclined to tears" as in "Yo lachrymose momma sheds more tears than the last five minutes of 'Grey's Anatomy.'" Aw snap!

The erudite insult comes from "The Yo Momma Vocabulary Builder." (Erudite, by the way, means extremely learned -- as in "I schooled yo Momma so much, she's erudite.")

I wrote the book along with writer Christopher Schultz and comedian Steve Harwood. Together we head a group we call Classless Education.

The premise behind Classless Education (www.classlesseducation.com) is to use humor to teach, and "The Yo Momma Vocabulary Builder," intended both as a student SAT study aid and a vocabulary builder for adults, is just the first of a planned series of humorous educational books.

Yo momma's so voracious, her blood type is Ragu. Voracious means having a huge appetite for something.

Here's our thinking: There have been studies that show that emotion and memory are linked, which is why people remember traumatic experiences so vividly. We thought making a traumatic education book that rocks readers emotionally while dispensing information was a little much, so we did the next best thing: We used humor, which also helps with memory. I'm sure some scientist could back this up, but for now think about how we can remember every line to "Caddy Shack" but nothing we learned in eighth grade.

From the book:

Yo momma's so ________, she makes a mime look loquacious.

a. garrulous

b. taciturn

c. turgid

d. Harriet Tubman

Answer b. Taciturn means habitually quiet, and loquacious means talkative.

I first used "The Yo Momma Vocabulary Builder" for a workshop in a juvenile detention facility when I worked for a nonprofit organization called Street Poets Inc (www.streetpoetsinc.com). I would read some of the highbrow insults to the juvenile offenders, and ask them what the words meant. Originally intended as a one-time diversion, the exercise proved effective enough to become a staple in my workshops. Guising education in the form of insults made it OK to learn.

Yo momma's so ugly, her psychiatrist makes her lie prostrate!

Prostrate means face-down, often in submission or exhaustion.

Contrary to what people are often taught, the primary reason to seek a large vocabulary has nothing to do with impressing people, cultivating professional gain or building scholarly achievement. Increasing the words and ideas at your disposal deepens and broadens your understanding of the world, of others and of yourself. It makes life more interesting.

You know a guy who always says something but is never conclusive. You haven't pinpointed it exactly, but every time you talk to him, you feel like you didn't get a clear answer. Then you learn a word, "equivocate," which means "to use unclear speech, usually to avoid commitment." And you're like, "He totally does that. That's why he speaks like that. He equivocates." Then you learn the word "ambivalent," which means "having mixed feelings." So, "maybe he equivocates because he is ambivalent." Then you learn the word "insidious," or "stealthily harmful." So you say "No, he equivocates because he has an insidious agenda." Guess what? You just became interesting.

If yo momma can shave her back without using a mirror, she is both_____ , and_________.

a. hirsute, esophoric

b. hirsute, loquacious

c. vociferous, esophoric

d. specious, Eli Whitney

Answer: a. Hirsute means covered in hairs, and esophoric means cross-eyed.

There are a lot of quirks to the English language that are fun for us word nerds. There is actually a word "defenestrate," which means to throw out of a window. Evidently people throw someone or something out of a window enough to give the act a word. But there's no word "fenestrate" meaning to throw into a window, as in "I fenestrate my friend as the other kids through snow balls at us."

And then, there is the term "malapropism," which means using the wrong word that sounds like another word. Our malapropism is "Yo-Yo Ma" is so fat he needs to hold his breath to play the cello.

Before you get offended, remember that we of course did not invent yo momma jokes. In fact, it is our contention that yo momma jokes date back hundreds of years as in the colonial snap, "Yo momma's head's so big, she wears a four-cornered hat!" or the even older yo momma haiku:

Yo momma very old

Like roots of Mount Fuji

Stretching, forgotten.

(The challenge of haikulike comedy is to say a lot with a few words or to be "laconic.")

Learning words is about learning new ideas and should not be an arduous ordeal (like yo momma's face is). Words are tools to help form and communicate your perspective.

The next time you see a politician acting slimy and overly sincere, call him "unctuous" as in, "Yo momma's so unctuous, she sweats Crisco."

And this Mother's Day, don't just say "Happy Mother's Day." Tell yo momma she is the most comely, magnanimous, perspicacious momma around!