Why Unrelated?

I’ll start with a disclaimer: I love words and language and semantics. I studied English Language and Linguistic Science at The University of York in the 2010s and I absolutely loved it, so what follows in this blog post, is probably (definitely) a far more in-depth than necessary narrative about why I decided to call my blog “unrelated”, but hey, it’s my blog so here we go…

I’ll start with the anecdote first. To put it simply, I am very lucky. I am very lucky because I have found someone who likes debate, discussion and in-depth conversation just as much as I do and is willing to put up with me (phew). That shared enjoyment does have some, let’s say “side effects” though. 

It means phone calls last a minimum of 90 minutes, even if the thing you initially called to say only takes 5 minutes to say! It means bedtime is often deferred because someone had an idea. And mostly, for us at least, it means WhatsApp chats are a constant stream of back and forth messages about everything from what happened at work that day, to the dream one of us had, to “what if” or “would you rather” questions. 

Or as is often the case for us, a brief side quest in the conversation that’ll usually be identified by an initiating message that looks like this: 

Unrelated…

The things that start with “unrelated…” are often some of my favourites. Usually because I’ll learn something new. It’s also how I get a lot of my news. I hate the news. It’s always bad, it’s always miserable and it’s always repeated more times than I’d care to count until something more miserable occurs to replace it with. 

So I don’t watch it, don’t listen to it, don’t read it. What I do get is highlights, snippets and useful bits distilled down into WhatsApp messages that start with “unrelated” and frankly, that’s just how I like it. Although my most recent news update was shouted through the bedroom wall. It can’t always start with “unrelated” I guess. 

So that’s the short story about how my blog came to be named “unrelated”. It simply felt right. Now this is your signal to stop reading if you’re not a logophile. 

If you are, please continue.

Getting into the nitty gritty of the word unrelated, let me start with the proper definition which is straightforward: it just means “not having a connection”. The Old English Dictionary’s earliest evidence of the word “unrelated” being used is in 1611 in the writings of a chap called Thomas Coryate. He was a traveller and a writer, and I think that’s the kind of person I could, ironically perhaps, relate to and I like that. 

The word itself is formed by derivation. This is one of the main ways we create new words in language. It’s the process whereby a new word is created by modifying a root word, with the addition of something like a prefix or suffix. In the case of unrelated, it’s the adding of the prefix “un” to the root word related. What’s that got to do with me and my blog? Only this; I like creating things and language is one of the most creative mediums available to us, and I like that too. 

In other words, I don’t think there is a more fitting name for my blog than “unrelated”. It’s something I regularly say to introduce a new topic of conversation. It absolutely describes most of my interests and its origin was fundamentally creative which is what I strive to be here. 

Wish me luck!