Dolores dares you to say "it's just semantics"
According to the Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, the compact OED, and Wordie.com, kerfuffle is a noun, chiefly British, meaning “disturbance”, “commotion”, or “fuss”. It comes from an alteration of carfuffle, from Scots car- (probably from Scottish Gaelic cearr — wrong, awkward, or to twist or bend) + fuffle (to become disheveled). Synonyms include “hurly burly” and “flutter”.
There’s another good discussion of Kerfuffle at The Mavens’ Word of the Day (Random House): “a noun meaning ‘disorder, flurry, agitation’ or a verb meaning ‘to disorder’. It has also been spelled kafuffle, kufuffle, gefuffle, and cafoufle.”
Some attribute the contemporary popularization of the word to LJ and other message boards. Others point to sources like James Tranto of the Wall Street Journal who used it frequently in his columns during the 2004 presidential election cycle.
In recent web usage, kerfuffle connotes something fluffy, light, and unimportant. A trivial matter blown out of proportion. Like Rachel Ray wearing a controversial scarf in a Dunkin Donuts commercial, which the NYT reported on as “A Tempest in an Iced-Coffee Cup.”
“Fuffle” is supposed to be onomatopoeic, like, “bang”. I think of it like a flock of birds that gets disturbed:
Only to settle back down again as if nothing happened:
The idea that kerfuffles are trivial affairs that rile up superficial overblown emotions in a community, only to disappear like so much hot air, is not, I think, typically a good description of what is going on when Romanceland has its fights. I wonder why don’t we use words like “debate”, “argument”, “disagreement”, “dissension”, “dispute”, or “controversy” to refer to these events? Are we giving in to the idea that what we argue about is trivial? Are we, by making light, kowtowing to feminine conventions of agreeableness, cooperativeness, and niceness at all costs?
Think about some recent and/or famous kerfuffles:
- What authors owe to loyal readers of a series (Lori Foster’s recent book in a contemporary series features fantasy and time travel elements, Suzanne Brockmann’s latest in her SEALS series features an unexpected pairing, JR Ward, etc.)
- Whether the private beliefs and behavior of authors should influence readers’ buying decisions
- Whether online phrases and terms can be trademarked, formally or not, and what, if anything, is owed to their originators
- The variety of relationships a reviewer can have to an author, and whether and how such connections compromise the review
- Whether an author has to live it to write it ( “live it” being, mainly, sexual orientation)
- Plagiarism — what constitutes it, how to handle it as an individual and a community
- My own mini kerfuffle (kerfufflette): whether warning labels in erotica shore up claims that homosexuality is an immoral state of being (that post is my second most viewed post ever)
- Whether epubs count as publishers for the purpose of industry awards like the RITAs
- Whether (snarky) negative reviews are appropriate and whether there are limits on how they should be written
None of these issues is trivial. Yes, things get emotional, sometimes painfully so, but it’s not just “feathers getting ruffled”: these debates go to the question what we are doing here in Romanceland, whether we are authors, reviewers, editors, readers, academics, bloggers, or all of the above. Emotions are not just feathers that sit on top of the skin, responding to random changes in the atmosphere. Our emotions tell us what we value, and what we value tells us who we are.
I honestly don’t know whether progress is made on these topics in Romanceland, or even what progress would look like. Perhaps we do all just glide back down to earth like the geese and carry on as if nothing happened, only to be blindsided by the very same issue rearing up again a year later (this question is the subject of another post). It probably depends. I do know that each of these kerfuffles generated a lot of intelligent, thoughtful, respectful, heated, angry, and illuminating discussion, and I know that I’m a smarter, more informed person because of it.
I like the word ‘kerfuffle’, and I’ll keep using it. But I’ll use my favored connotation: smart committed people with differences on topics of significance, working them out.
