Following are some some observations about the nature of our language and how it is changing. Here is a sentence containing several examples of language evolution.
"If u Google" laser "and its that with with the trendbalized results we already have we can nuke the veggies :)"
The above sentence contains several ways our language is changing: a new spelling (u), a noun converted to a verb (google), a compound (interface), one abbreviation (def), an adjective that has been turned into a verb tangibalized), an abbreviation that has become a word (nuke), slang (veggies), and a new punctuation mark - :).
But then, our language has been changed from the first grunt. Try this:
"She was a worthy woman al hir lyve, housbondes at chirche-dore she hadde fyve, wuthouten other companye in youthe, but there nedeth nat to speke as nouthe."
Chaucer wrote this verse, but that is about how Christopher Columbus spoke and wrote a few years after Chaucer 's death in 1400.
How about "Got milk?" Or "I axed her." Neither Chaucer nor Columbus would have understood. The first is a grammatical mistake, and the second is a mispronunciation of "asked," which is now creeping into the written language as " axed. "Whether these current use examples become permanent has not been been decided, but then, who ever thought" 9/11 "would come to mean anything other than than September 11, and a toilet plunger would ever be called a" hydro blast force cup "(US Army).
Here are some ways the language is changing, and some of them will become become permanent, if they have not already.
1. The Use of Pompous or Ambiguous Jargon.
AT & T used the lofty "customer input / output access facility" to describe
They complaint windows. The White House called the Granada invasion a "pre-dawn vertical insertion." We like to pick up on the Pentagon because they are so creative. When they say "neutralize the adversary in an expedient fashion" they mean shoot first, dude. The Pentagon refer to to combat as "violence processing," and "permanent pre-hostilities" means peace, brother. "Collateral damage" means killing our allies by accident.
Shell Oil called his gas station special attendants "and there are any any more because they are all called" Maintenance Engineers (and their is not an engineering degree among the lot) Most companies do not have mail rooms, they have Document Distribution Centers. Sales men and women are the oh-so correct "associates," which avoids gender identification, but it sounds like they own part of the business. Maybe that & s the point.
2. The Compression of Words into Acronyms and Abbreviation.
Does anyone remember what scuba means? We do not bother to capitalize it, but
It means Self-Contain. Underwater Breathing Apparatus. It's Means Light Amplification through Stimulated Emission of Radiation. The ZIP in zip code means Zoned Improvement Program, and POSH mean "port out, starboard back," which are the best staterooms on a ship.
"To access GPNU 2, @ ADD the source file TEXDIS * TEMPLATES.GPNU 2 while in PARSD." Excuse me? And from Northrop Aviation we find this procedure: "The program was loaded onto the CMS and compiled with Fortran Compliers rs (FORTUS), GICFTG, and H Extended (FHX).
3. The Epidemic of Slang
Slang is so prevalent that people do not realize they are using it. "Reoccurance" is
I have heard people in high-class business meetings say "guestimate" with a straight face, and "evergreen" to mean up-to-date or continuously improved.
"Everyday language, we hear other slang words such as" bummer, "" framistant, "" diddlysquat, "cockamayme," "disambiguate," and of course "veggies", which is what "vegans" eat. "Meaning" What & # 39; s up? "LOL has now hit the verbal language.
4. Compounding Words into New Words
Compounding starts when two words are used so frequently
"Down time" became "down-time" and now it & # 39; s "downtime." There are endless combinations: "they are hyphenated. greenmail, "" meltdown, "" airhead, "" proactive, "and" ripoff "to name a very few.
We like put "mega" in front of almost any word: "megabucks," "megatrend," "megastar," "megabyte", and "megamillionaire." We also put "ultra" in front of words: "ultralite, "ultrafine," or "ultraswede," and we stick "anti" anywhere at all: "antiterrorist," "antidiscrimination," "antiwar," "antimarriage, etc.
Lastly, we like to stick "out" on the end of many self-respecting words: "far out," make out, "" veg out, "" pig out, "" freak out, "" burned out, "" cop out, zoned out, grossed out, and chill out to name a few.
5. New Definitions for Old Words, and New Foreign Words
It all depends on how you say it. "Bad" if you mean bad, and "baaad" if you mean
"Meat market" "wired" mean to house or elsewhere, "heavy" used to mean it weighs a lot, and "trash" mean something you put out on the curve. "a stoned" was a medieval form of execution still practiced today in some third-world countries, and "crunch" was what Rice Krispies did. "Cool" mean a temperature.
We are ingesting foreign words at a record pace. Anything on the menu at a new word, "glitch" is a German word, and "skoosh" is a Japanese word. Globalization, over the next 1,000 years, will have us all speaking the same language.
6. The Conversation of Nouns and Adjectives into Verbs
"We will status the drawings tomorrow" (Bectel).
"He inferfaces well with clients" (IBM).
"During phase 2 we will reorientate the program (Boeing Aircraft).
"The power line was built secludedly to please landowners" (US Forest Service).
All of these sentences were drawn from actual documents used in writing
from work on the side of a truck, "This report will definitize an answer" from Martin Marrieta, and "Routinization has begun" from ARCO Oil. "Ruggedized" means heavy duty reinforcement at the BLM, and from Cameron Iron Works: "That whole program should be absoluted." Brilliant.
7. Regionalism
If you are "living under the bridge" you live south of the Mackinaw River
A "woopie" in the northeast, a "hoagie" in Philadelphia, a "submarine" in New York, a "po boy" in Louisiana, a "hero" in the southwest, and a "blimpie" in San Francisco. If you are "makin" in Louisiana you have gone to the store, and depending on on you are always killed for calling Someone a "coon ass," or you will be congratulated for recognizing a really nice guy. Getting a soft drink can be challenging, depending on where you are. In some parts of the county, "coke" means anything cold, after which you must design which cold drink you want, and then there is "fiz," "soda," "pop," and "soda pop."
8. The Invention of Idioms
"It blew my mind that you were chewing the fat and shooting the bull with that
hacker. But lay it on me, because if you want to be off the wall and spend an arm and a leg on getting buffed out let me water the horse and I 'll join you.
In the trucking industry if someone says their coffee has been "saucered and blowed" it means it & # 39; s ready to drink. In the government they talk about "revenue enhancement" which means they are going to raise our taxes.
In 1942 Eric Partridge in his book "Usage and Abusage" said, "The field of language is strewn with the dry bones of adventurous words which once started out with a paternal blessing to make them fortune, but which have met with an untimely end and serve only, when collected, to fill the shelves of a lexicographic museum.
Some thing is not written in some verbal language, if it sticks around long enough and is used used in the written language. Dictionaries evolve, just as the language evolves. The wary keep a 1932 copy of the Encyclopedia Britannica on their shelves because it has scholarly articles instead of definitions like modern encyclopedias, which are expanded dictionaries with plenty of color pictures, and toss out last year & # 39; s dictionary with last year & # 39; s phone book.
The misuse of word can lead from ridicule in associates, and distract attention from a good education and excellent talents .
