Indians (especially those of us from Andhra Pradesh), have many different avagations and we keep pursuing and talking about them often. "My son is not concentrating on studies, he is developing other avagations" is a common complaint in India; the said chap might be developing interest in cricket or art.
I know of parents (and even some teachers) gospelling to their wards that "studies are most important than any other avagations" - now, that is their grammar, read on to know why my grammar is better. One great teacher once advised me to cultivate "reading" as a habit if I 'needed' any avagations "other than studying". The same teacher averred that 'reading dictionary' is a 'good avagation'. I followed his advise and in fact in that year and later, I was acclaimed to be "very good at english" - vocabulary, they meant - "because of" the aforementioned teacher.
I had good command on grammar "because of" another teacher, who led us by example - the great BJRK of Kennedy English Medium School, Tenali. More on this school and the great BJRK in a later post.
But the dictionary on web - www.m-w.com - that I frequently use has no avagations! None!!
It in fact chided me to correct my spellings and offered to give meanings of a generous list of words ranging from "avocation" to "evacuation" and more.
I then turned to dictionary.com and it came closer to what I was looking for. It offered to help me with "evagation" instead of my avagation and I obliged. The meaning suggested is close to what my avagation is.
It read,
"Evagation
\Ev`a*ga"tion\, n. [L. evagatio, fr. evagari to wander forth: cf. F. ['e]vagation. See Vagary.] A wandering about; excursion; a roving. [R.] --Ray"
So, I am wondering if hereafter I should put an abrupt end to all my avagations and instead cultivate some other evagations..
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Whats the comment?? Mail, if you can.. I won't smack you, though.
Hi,
I had a similar doubt and I finally figured it must be avocation rather than avagation. Evagation doesnot seem right to me.
Good one though!
I have always wondered about the same thing. I have never encountered the word avagations anywhere,only my father used to say that. Now I think it is avocation and not avagation. Although evagation may potentially be what it is supposed to be.
dude. this is scary.Even my dad uses avagation. And when i searched for it, ur blog's the first to show on google. Cleared lots of doubts. But still wondering., how come so many people use that word,in the same context, and all being telugus?!!!!
nice read
i enjoyed reading it. i too have heard the word avagation till i dropped dead but never understood it. when my husband (from Vizag) use this word, i just put it on google and got ur blog. finally, i have an answer to my avagations!!!!!
I always hear the word "avagation" from many people and had aruguements earlier that the word doesn't exist.
Thanks to this explanation!
It's Avocation, not avagation! Commonly misspelled and misused word.
Thanks for your blog , I hail from Ramagundam ,where teachers and mentors frequently use this particular word "Avagation" to mean others interests or distractions ,hence its imbibed in my speech too,and I realized at later stage its misspelled word when I uttered in front of my northern Indian friend.
Very well articulated..
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