A note on genital de-flipflopping, with an apology to Tsou boki

Abstract

The commission of errors or booboos can be counted an occupational hazard for comparativists and I have made at least my share of them. I'd like to ascribe them all to my juvenilia but for those after age 50 or 60 this becomes disingenuous. My very worst. in fact. dates only from 1975 (Austro-Thai: Language and Culture [ATLC]): it was adopted by Matisoff in 1978 (Variational Semantics in Tibeto-Burman) and further promoted in my 1979 "A note on Karen genital flipflop" (LTBA 5.1:21-35). For me as. I suspect, for most linguists. words and roots tend to have lives of their own and one must cringe to see them amputated, eviscerated or otherwise mutilated or mistreated. I owe an ap010O' to Tsou boki, as will be evident from the following.