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Sick of "Sourcing"

Busboy

By Busboy
in Food Traditions & Culture

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Busboy

Busboy

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I don't understand what your problem is with that usage of "disrespecting." One can respect or disrespect a dish, right?

I like "disrespecting" because it's actually authentic slang, not the product of some marketing type or corporate wordsmith trying obscure the truth ("rightsizing," "sweetbreads") or upgrade some previously mundane task ("sales associate," "sourcing"). It's far from standard English, but it has place in making the the languge more vibrant.

I'm on the pavement

Thinking about the government.

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moosnsqrl

moosnsqrl

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However, as with the now outdated "Personnel" (replaced, as you are all no doubt aware, by the supposedly sexier, broader and more strategic "Human Resources

Megan, that is SO five minutes ago....it's Human Capital Management (HCM) now. Where have you been? :raz:

Judy Jones aka "moosnsqrl"

Sharing food with another human being is an intimate act that should not be indulged in lightly.

M.F.K. Fisher

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moosnsqrl

moosnsqrl

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So, if a person's full-time job to locate quality/rare/hard-to-find ingredients, (whether from a cave or not) and ensure there is a steady supply of them to keep a restaurant going, what do you call that person?

Judy Jones aka "moosnsqrl"

Sharing food with another human being is an intimate act that should not be indulged in lightly.

M.F.K. Fisher

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Megan Blocker

Megan Blocker

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However, as with the now outdated "Personnel" (replaced, as you are all no doubt aware, by the supposedly sexier, broader and more strategic "Human Resources

Megan, that is SO five minutes ago....it's Human Capital Management (HCM) now. Where have you been? :raz:

Good point! I stand corrected. HCM it is indeed - both a fancy name and a fabulous acronym. :laugh:

"We had dry martinis; great wing-shaped glasses of perfumed fire, tangy as the early morning air." - Elaine Dundy, The Dud Avocado

Queenie Takes Manhattan

eG Foodblogs: 2006 - 2007

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Busboy

Busboy

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So, if a person's full-time job to locate quality/rare/hard-to-find ingredients, (whether from a cave or not) and ensure there is a steady supply of them to keep a restaurant going, what do you call that person?

A buyer.

I'm on the pavement

Thinking about the government.

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bleudauvergne

bleudauvergne

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"Sourcing" implies doing some work to find stuff, rather than calling the one stop shop and taking what's handy. It implies that you know what you want, and worked to find it.

I also think the word has its place. I think that if you have ever had to search for good sources, especially ones that are rapidly dissapearing, you come to appreciate the term. Sometimes though, the mountain comes to Mohammed, and everything can be found in one place. That's when the word 'sourcing' no longer applies.

Lucy's Kitchen Notebook
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Megan Blocker

Megan Blocker

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So, if a person's full-time job to locate quality/rare/hard-to-find ingredients, (whether from a cave or not) and ensure there is a steady supply of them to keep a restaurant going, what do you call that person?

Supply-chain manager? :laugh:

"We had dry martinis; great wing-shaped glasses of perfumed fire, tangy as the early morning air." - Elaine Dundy, The Dud Avocado

Queenie Takes Manhattan

eG Foodblogs: 2006 - 2007

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moosnsqrl

moosnsqrl

Posted
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So, if a person's full-time job to locate quality/rare/hard-to-find ingredients, (whether from a cave or not) and ensure there is a steady supply of them to keep a restaurant going, what do you call that person?

A buyer.

Aha! I made no mention of purchasing anything. :raz:

Judy Jones aka "moosnsqrl"

Sharing food with another human being is an intimate act that should not be indulged in lightly.

M.F.K. Fisher

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moosnsqrl

moosnsqrl

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Supply-chain manager? :laugh:

Guess I had that coming, eh Catbert? :wink:

Judy Jones aka "moosnsqrl"

Sharing food with another human being is an intimate act that should not be indulged in lightly.

M.F.K. Fisher

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Carrot Top

Carrot Top

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The (so-called) word I hate is: disrespecting

i.e. "Don't be disrespecting those organic salad greens with Ranch dressing!"

Talk about chewing gravel!!! :wacko:

You're right. It is chewing gravel. The correct way to say that word is "dissin".

As in "Don't go dissin' that dish, or dis dishtowel's gonna disrespect yo face." (or butt rather than face, as the case may be, depending on how familiar the disser.)

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MarketStEl

MarketStEl

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I agree with you 100% Busboy. But I think I can trump this bastardization of English. Calling up my cell company for the first time last week, I got "Hold on a sec and we'll hook you up with one of our crew. In order to keep it real, this call may be monitored or recorded."  :blink:

Do you use Boost Mobile (ad slogan: "Where you at?")

They're not the first to use hip-hop lingo to push cell phones--I remember seeing ads in the subway promoting Omnipoint prepaid service (long since absorbed into T-Mobile) bearing the legend, "Contracts are Wack!"

But Boost has embraced it far more thoroughly.

But I always thought "source", in terms of produce at least, referred to the buyer actually making a deal with the farmer or co-op to grow specifically for them, sometimes even paying a portion in advance to grow something, or more of something, that otherwise wouldn't have been grown by that farmer at all. Am I wrong on this one?

That is my impression.

Unless, that is, we are using the word in its French sense ("source"= French for "spring"). Yes, I have seen US spring water "bottled at the source."

I certainly wouldn't call what TJ's does "sourcing."

But for those of you whose skin crawls at this use, consider that it may also be inspired by a truncation of a now commonly accepted term, "outsourcing" -- used to refer to the practice of a company contracting out work it used to do in-house.

Sandy Smith, Exile on Oxford Circle, Philadelphia

"95% of success in life is showing up." --Woody Allen

My foodblogs: 1 | 2 | 3

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Philanthrophobe

Philanthrophobe

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Posted
I've been hearing "conversate" a lot lately. It makes me want to chew gravel.

Seriously? Who has that kind of gall? Holy man. Do they mean to invent a new, obnoxious way of saying "converse," or do they just not know that the word to suit their needs already exists?

I attend the University of Nevada at Las Vegas (or, as it's called in the movie Dodge Ball, The University of Las Vegas Learning Annex) and "conversate" seems to have captured the fancy of the young'uns (I'm 48). They seem to use it when they wish to impress. Has anyone familar with the show/comedy group "The Kids in the Hall" seen this episode with the "Ascertain" skit? (click on the link, then scroll down for the transcript.--oh, and while you're there, read the transcript for the "Worst Waiter" skit, too!)

"She would of been a good woman," The Misfit said, "if it had been somebody there to shoot her every minute of her life."

--Flannery O'Connor, "A Good Man is Hard to Find"

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moosnsqrl

moosnsqrl

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So, if a person's full-time job to locate quality/rare/hard-to-find ingredients, (whether from a cave or not) and ensure there is a steady supply of them to keep a restaurant going, what do you call that person?

A schlepper.

Wait...did I see the word "carry" or "transport" in there? No. Sorry. No schlepping going on here.

I'm afraid I can make a case for this being a separate activity. Whether or not TJ's or the foragers at the little shack on Shattuck deserve to crow about it is another question.

And although I generally come-down firmly on the side of fairly strict grammar, why is it that we're all troubled by turning a noun into a verb when we've been adding -er to verbs to make nouns since the beginning of time?

Judy Jones aka "moosnsqrl"

Sharing food with another human being is an intimate act that should not be indulged in lightly.

M.F.K. Fisher

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Philanthrophobe

Philanthrophobe

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This afternoon, my archaeological ceramics professor used the word "source" as meaning "to determine the origin of." As in, "I haven't sourced that sherd yet."

It's everywhere, I tells ya!!

"She would of been a good woman," The Misfit said, "if it had been somebody there to shoot her every minute of her life."

--Flannery O'Connor, "A Good Man is Hard to Find"

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moosnsqrl

moosnsqrl

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This afternoon, my archaeological ceramics professor used the word "source" as meaning "to determine the origin of." As in, "I haven't sourced that sherd yet."

It's everywhere, I tells ya!!

I would've thought they would use provenance or something, as with art. No? Maybe that implies a trail of ownership vs ruins of origin?

Judy Jones aka "moosnsqrl"

Sharing food with another human being is an intimate act that should not be indulged in lightly.

M.F.K. Fisher

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Human Bean

Human Bean

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archaeological ceramics professor

Archaeological ceramics - is this a euphemism for "crackpot"??? :biggrin:

Never mind.

Food. Supposed to talk about food to be on-topic. I like food.

And I can't get too worked up about "sourcing," providing that it means something more than merely a Sysco purchase order.

These terms do tend to degrade over time though, viz. 'artisinal;' I'd hardly be surprised if the fine folks at Sysco now offer 'artisinal' canned or frozen products for all your food-service needs.

Sigh.

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Megan Blocker

Megan Blocker

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archaeological ceramics professor

These terms do tend to degrade over time though, viz. 'artisinal;' I'd hardly be surprised if the fine folks at Sysco now offer 'artisinal' canned or frozen products for all your food-service needs.

Sigh.

Yeah, I suppose that's where I have issues with things like this, too - when the term becomes a buzz word rather than a true descriptor.

Sourcing is not one of my personal pet peeves, at least as far as food is concerned, but "artisanal" definitely is. So is "homemade."

"We had dry martinis; great wing-shaped glasses of perfumed fire, tangy as the early morning air." - Elaine Dundy, The Dud Avocado

Queenie Takes Manhattan

eG Foodblogs: 2006 - 2007

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Susan G

Susan G

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Sourcing: I believe this is a gerund: A noun functioning as a verb. Not that it makes it right, or pretty, but it's legal.....at least, in a grammatical sense.

(This flexibility of English is one of the reasons it's a world language....the *new* lingua franca!)

Latin scholars care to weigh in?

I'm a canning clean freak because there's no sorry large enough to cover the, "Oops! I gave you botulism" regrets.

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Fresser

Fresser

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So, if a person's full-time job to locate quality/rare/hard-to-find ingredients, (whether from a cave or not) and ensure there is a steady supply of them to keep a restaurant going, what do you call that person?

Broker.

Oh...you mean a ronnie_suburban!

There are two sides to every story and one side to a Möbius band.

borschtbelt.blogspot.com

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