English writing question - two dashes in a last name

[peliROJO]

What are the two dashes called under this raised C? What might you call the raised C? And is there a specific name for a raised C with two dashes underneath?

[DSchrag]

I believe that they hold no grammatical meaning whatsoever. Often in the case of proper names of Scottish/Irish descent, a double capital letter will be employed, i.e.: MacDonald or MaGrath.

Seems stylistic to me, and simply decorative.

[CameronJr9]

Is this a homework question or for a quiz or something? Or are you just curious to see if there is a name for the raised C? I'm not sure I've ever heard of the raised C having a name. I'm pretty sure it's of Scottish and Irish decent, though.

[si_civic]

It is called an extension for the hyperbolative prefix.

[CameronJr9]

Originally Posted by si_civic

It is called an extension for the hyperbolative prefix.

As an English minor and former English teacher...I have one request.

Explain.

[si_civic]

Proper English time:

I was joking around, CameronJr9. Obviously there is no extension for an "extreme exaggeration", let alone one for a prefix. My previous post makes no sense, of course. This is a water cooler forum sillygoose!

If you are an English minor, why are you using ellipses (...) ? Are you trying to make me pause while reading this? I don't appreciate that!

Sincerely,

Darryl Handcock

[CameronJr9]

Originally Posted by si_civic

Proper English time:

I was joking around, CameronJr9. Obviously there is no extension for an "extreme exaggeration", let alone one for a prefix. My previous post makes no sense, of course. This is a water cooler forum sillygoose!

If you are an English minor, why are you using ellipses (...) ? Are you trying to make me pause while reading this? I don't appreciate that!

Sincerely,

Darryl Handcock

Haha. Nice one. You had me totally confused. And as an English minor, I really don't care to use proper English ever second of every day. So, sometimes I use ellipses (thanks for the parenthetical explanation) to express emphasis or a pause. All apologies if you don't appreciate it.

[Corpsman]

I have always done well in English and am now helping my children with school work. I would like your opinions on a couple of things (sorry to thread jack, if it bothers you, let me know and I will start a new thread). If you start a sentence with: "In the math class" should 'math' be capitalized? If further in the sentence you end with the word 'math' without 'the' should it be capitalized?

[peliROJO]

Originally Posted by Corpsman

I have always done well in English and am now helping my children with school work. I would like your opinions on a couple of things (sorry to thread jack, if it bothers you, let me know and I will start a new thread). If you start a sentence with: "In the math class" should 'math' be capitalized? If further in the sentence you end with the word 'math' without 'the' should it be capitalized?

I don't mind. However, the difference between your question and mine is that I was able to easily find the answer to your question by performing a Google search.

The first two links answer it this way:
Do not capitalize the names of academic subjects (unless they are proper names, such as the names of languages). But do capitalize specific course titles ...
http://www.google.com/search?q=capit...n&lr=&safe=off

[peliROJO]

English majors - Is there a name for this stylistic, decorative, exaggerative C?

[DSchrag]

Peli: no, there is not.

[peliROJO]

I'm sure a language expert has named that.

I'm looking for people with expertise in this subject. There are a lot of smart and experienced people on here and that is why I am asking on the 8thcivic. I've searched for the answer but any suggestions on better searches would be helpful.

[CameronJr9]

Redhead, I'll ask my boss. He's a big dork, just like me. Maybe he'll know.

[CameronJr9]

My boss's response:

That's a good question. It's not really a ligature.

I've never encountered a name for that. I bet there is one.

I'm not even sure what sort of keywords to put in a Google search. "Font" "typography" "Mc" maybe?

[CameronJr9]

Well, from what I've learned in the past five minutes or so, I'd say that your exact example doesn't have a true name.

What I understand is that "Mc" is simply a letter combination derived from Irish and Scottish (Gaelic) decent meaning most simply "son of." The stylized version you've presented (superscript, lowercase C over two lines) is simply a choice of font.

[peliROJO]

interesting. thanks for your input.

[CameronJr9]

No problem. Next question?

[Sli(ks]

My family comes from Scotland, and I don't even know what the hell those lines are for, heh.

My mom was born and raised in a town south of Glasgow and her maiden name was McCallum. Some of my cousins on my dad's side are named McColough or something like that (only met them once, heh)

Anyway, I've honestly never seen anything like those two lines before, or any of my relatives writing their names like that.

My best guess is that it's for pronunciation. Like, I'm pretty sure the second capitilized letter is usually pronounced harder than the lower case letter between the two upper case letters. Like, the c in "McMillian" would be spoken failry softly and lead into the second capital "M" - which would be spoken as hard as the first M. But I don't know why somebody would see the need to include those lines to represent this, most people can figure that out for themselves. If that's not right then I'm not really sure, only other thing I guess it could be would be some sort of fancy font or caligraphy.