Degradation of language, part 2

[DownRound]

Man you gotta up ur game cuz the world finna leave u behind

I'm okay with it, feel like Rip Van Winkle most of the time anyway.

I've thought that for a while and in fact just finished a book that mentioned the story, a history of the changes in the U.S. in the 1800s.
It had been so long since I read the story. Washington Irving meant it allegorically, a reaction to his alarm at the changes during the time of the American Revolution.

The big lesson of history, people are crazy in similar ways in every age.
The book:
Invalid Link Removed

 

[Ralph Manak]

Let's all break out our copies of The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, or earlier works if you have them.

Language rules are merely conventions, which ebb and flow based on actual usage. The spoken, usually the cutting edge, eventually shows up in the written. Haven't we all witnessed grunts and moans being sufficient for communicating in some households?

 

[cheddar]

I can't find part one of this, so forgive me if I am missing the point or repeating an earlier one. Mostly, they have to do with the loss of precision. I am fine and even encourage new vocabulary or usage as long as it makes communication more effective and economical.

House and home have become synonymous. Used to be that a house was a structure and a home was where you lived.
Cheap and inexpensive have become synonymous. Used to be that cheap meant poorly made and inexpensive meant low cost.
Impacted used to refer to a problematic tooth, now it can mean that or something important, consequential.
The adverb/adjective creative is also now used as a noun, and people are called creatives. I struggle with this one but I'm not sure why.
Different from is correct, different than is wrong. It just is
Based off rather than based on.
Super as an adjective is way over used. I am super excited, etc.
Unique is often qualified, but shouldn't be. If it is unique it is unlike anything else so no adverb us needed.
Further is often used instead of farther, even when referring to physical distance.
Optionality rather than options. (yes, I've heard this in my line of work)

One change I am in favor of: Invitation is rarely used anymore as it has mostly been replaced by invite. Though invite can be a verb, with proper context invite works as a noun, so I am good with it (more economical)

Many more, but probably already overdid it!

 

[Lo-E]

I used to let this stuff bother me a lot more but I have limits on what I can stress over.

A former colleague of mine (a math major) used to joke with me that I (an engineering major) had secretly been an English major and just didn’t know it.

That said, get me around either of my parents and my Brooklyn accent, replete with all of its colloquialisms, comes out of nowhere. Spoken language is definitely fluid. After several years of professional travel, I actually became very interested in and fond of local dialects and idioms.

As long as you don’t use the word ’ask’ as a noun around me, I remain pretty tolerant about usage these days.

 

[dougjwray]

I think the evolution of language is wonderful as long as it's additive. What I don't like is the blurring of meanings, because it means that tools for communicating are disappearing.
As my mother used to say, "When you write clearly, it shows that you think clearly."

 

[Low Down Brown]

Jest droppin dis awf...

 

[dougjwray]

I can't find part one of this, so forgive me if I am missing the point or repeating an earlier one. Mostly, they have to do with the loss of precision. I am fine and even encourage new vocabulary or usage as long as it makes communication more effective and economical.

House and home have become synonymous. Used to be that a house was a structure and a home was where you lived.
Cheap and inexpensive have become synonymous. Used to be that cheap meant poorly made and inexpensive meant low cost.
Impacted used to refer to a problematic tooth, now it can mean that or something important, consequential.
The adverb/adjective creative is also now used as a noun, and people are called creatives. I struggle with this one but I'm not sure why.
Different from is correct, different than is wrong. It just is
Based off rather than based on.
Super as an adjective is way over used. I am super excited, etc.
Unique is often qualified, but shouldn't be. If it is unique it is unlike anything else so no adverb us needed.
Further is often used instead of farther, even when referring to physical distance.
Optionality rather than options. (yes, I've heard this in my line of work)

One change I am in favor of: Invitation is rarely used anymore as it has mostly been replaced by invite. Though invite can be a verb, with proper context invite works as a noun, so I am good with it (more economical)

Many more, but probably already overdid it!

Thank you! That was excellent.

 

[WRM]

"Try and..." (vs. "try to...") is one that bothers me.

 

[Topkat13]

The biggest word some people know is huge.

 

[Spectrum]

I think we'd all live in a better world if everyone would just watch Tombstone and learn to speak like Val Kilmer's Doc Holiday. And maybe throw in a bit of Sam Elliott, too.

 

[WRM]

The biggest word some people know is huge.

What are the two smallest letters?...

MT

 

[DownRound]

Let's all break out our copies of The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, or earlier works if you have them.

Language rules are merely conventions, which ebb and flow based on actual usage. The spoken, usually the cutting edge, eventually shows up in the written. Haven't we all witnessed grunts and moans being sufficient for communicating in some households?

Slightly digressive tangent.
I just want to put in a word of recommendation for the Michael Winterbottom-helmed film based on Tristram Shandy featuring Steve Coogan.
A novel previously considered to be unfilmable.

 

[bass12]

The use of "invite" instead of "invitation" bugs me, as does the use of "gift" as a verb.

 

[dougjwray]

Now do “more” vs “greater”. “There are greater jazz fans in Iceland” hardly seems defensible. And if “more” can be clearly understood to mean “greater”, then surely you can learn that “less” is regularly and successfully used to convey the same meaning as your usage of “fewer”.

Not quite. The problem is that "greater" can mean either "larger" ("Africa is greater than Europe") or "better" ("Mozart was a greater artist than Salieri").

 

[gln1955]

I've spent a good part of my woking life communicating with people for whom English is a second (or third or fourth) language. As long as I can understand what they are trying to say, it's good. Same for my American friends. Life is too short to get bent up about grammar or choice of words.

 

[Dust2Dust]

Them: "He was a GOOD man! . . I can't imagine what made him snap!"

Me: "Someone said 'that' instead of 'who"

 

[Michedelic]

View attachment 7306729

Why are you using your big booklearnin words? Just use normal people words

Is it that bad in Canada?

 

[Turnaround]

1) "Less" applies to a substance. "Fewer" applies to things which could be counted.
"There is less water in this glass."
"There are fewer water molecules in this glass."
It drives me nuts when people say something like "There are less jazz fans in Iceland." It should be "There are FEWER jazz fans in Iceland."

2) Use "who", not "that", when you're referring to humans.
It's not "They are the people that run the country", it's "They are the people WHO run the country."

Some people get twisted when there's a 1/32" gap between the pickguard and control plate on a Jazz Bass.
I get twisted when people are tonedeaf about language.

Thank you for your time. Goodbye for now.

You prolly are real educated, so just turn down your hearing aid and - walla!

 

[Richard Lindsey]

House and home have become synonymous. Used to be that a house was a structure and a home was where you lived.
Cheap and inexpensive have become synonymous. Used to be that cheap meant poorly made and inexpensive meant low cost.

For house and home, not really (or perhaps only in the lingo of Realtors). It's generally realized that an apartment or a condo or even a yurt might be a home, but it's not a house. There's overlap, but they're not synonymous.

As for cheap/inexpensive, also not really. Cheap meant inexpensive for centuries before "inexpensive" even was attested in written English. It's always had both senses, and it hasn't lost the sense of "shoddy" either. As in many cases, the shade of meaning is context-dependent. There's been no loss of meaning.

Different from is correct, different than is wrong. It just is

If you're British, "different to" is perfectly correct.

 

[DirtDog]

Both my parents were English majors, so I grew up getting corrected when I spoke vernacular English.

But languages change, and vernacular usage becomes proper over time.

My mom still can't accept that I can be "done" with a task, even though that's been accepted for non-baking usage for ages.

It's ok; English has been a rapidly evolving bastard tongue all along. Less and fewer, finished and done, who and that are all commonly used synonymously, no matter how much it pains old pendants like us.

You mean “pedants”, right? ;-)