DEBASING THE CURRENCY OF LANGUAGE

@hawkeye10,

hawkeye10 wrote:

A2K is still the only place real or virtual where I have ever seen folk get lathered up over language.

You should try alt.english.usage and alt.usage.english on Usenet.

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@contrex,

Quote:

Only a nut could simultaneously fulminate against "silly prescriptions" and haul out the OED as an authority.

You and Merry and a bunch of other idiots still haven't got a grasp of the difference between being descriptive and being prescriptive. This is particularly egregious on your part, C, as you make claims to actually being an English teacher.

Merry has, of course, done his fair share of misleading wrt language.

Quote:

I only said I didn't like these usages, not that people shouldn't employ them (how could I stop them?)

You don't like them because you are ignorantly hopping on a bandwagon loaded with falsehoods and making pretense that you are somehow knowledgeable of the workings of language. [You too, Merry.]

If you, a putative English teacher deigned to do even a tiny bit of research, you might actually be able to offer your students something of value.

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FROM:

Are you irrated by trolls who say only buy American?
http://able2know.org/topic/191192-2#post-4995450

I've copied this post to this thread because it so accurately describes just what huge hypocrites these prescriptive idiots are.

Of course, this is nothing new for Setanta. From my first contact with him, I found that he could contradict himself, in a major fashion, in the short space of one posting; good reason for anyone to view any of his posts with great skepticism.
==========================

@Setanta,

Quote:

So, troll has no meaning? Anybody with whom one does not agree is a troll now?

This is oh so rich, and ironic, not to mention unbelievable and telling.

Here is Setanta, whining about people misusing one of his favorite epithets, troll when 'troll' hasn't come anywhere near to acquiring the status of a new word as compared to all the words he thought he was being "highly educated" about in his goofy "DEBASING THE CURRENCY OF LANGUAGE" thread.

http://able2know.org/topic/191041-1

So here's this brand spanking new word, 'troll', and Setanta isn't bitching and moaning about how it's debasing all the other meanings for 'troll' - he's defending it.

Oh, I forgot to mention - incredibly hypocritical.

Don't you have any memory left in that blob that inhabits your cranium, Set?

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@Setanta,

Quote:

An announcer would be talking about someone's first album, describing it as "iconic." Excuse me? If you only have one of something, how can it be an icon? How can it be the representative sample of someone's art, it it's the only sample out there?

Now they pounding legendary into a meaningless pulp. A local home improvement company talks about their "legendary" service. A local furniture company talks abou their legendary furniture. Wait . . . what? I've never run across a legend about a home improvement company, nor a furniture store.

Language is like water, it fits into meet the cup or expectation set up by society or a group of people. Language changes all the time, and have always done so.

The definition of words will expand and contract, become more ambiguous or less ambiguous as needed to suit society's changing values and customs.

By your logic, the word marriage has always been in past to be any type of union between man and woman, and grouping union between partners of same sex is debasing the language. This of course is an outright etymological fallacy.

As to the matter on iconic, in what context did the person use it? Do you think he could be describing the album as the object of great attention like an idol, or some sort.

The local furniture can use the word legendary if their service are remarkable enough to be famous or very famous, or else it is false advertising. There are two definitions and I think you are confusing it with the definition that says something based on legends.

1 Reply

@Val Killmore,

No, i made no such "logical" leap. You're confusing a polemical position with a linguistic usage. However, from what i've seen of your performance elsewhere, logic is not your strong suit.

I''m comfortabe with my objection to the usages i've complained about, and nothing obliges me to justify them to you. Basically, you're here to attempt to pick a fight, because you are petty-minded, bearing a grudge because i--and at least a couple of others--have pointed out to you that your use of troll is not appropriate. You come here to attempt to create the impression of erudition on your part, and a basis to claim that my objections to your silly and meaningless use of troll are unjustified.

Have a nice day, Bubba.

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@Setanta,

Yes you did make a logical leap!

You are arguing about how words should or should not be used relative to how it was used, or it is used in the past?

Sure language has power, but does it have worth or currency as you say?

The only example of debasing the English language is barbarous jargon.

It is more than the debasement of the language, it is the familiarization of the culture. Children talk to their parents as though they were talking with their school mates. There is a lack of respect for those we do not know by immediately treating them as long time family friends instead of with the courtesy of distance until both sides are willing to change the relationship.

I know where you are coming from.

Edwin Newman fought the good fight over misuse of the English Language. We do, however, appear to be in a state of decline: nouns are used as verbs, "then" and "than" are used interchangeably, and editing seems to be a thing of the past.

But also remember that language, especially English, is living and constantly evolving.

Shakespeare invented words as he saw fit and enriched our language tremendously.

However, there is a difference between adding to the language and misusing it.

And your examples, well it is hard to say if whether the people are misusing the words, because the context of the situation is not given.

1 Reply

@Setanta,

hey, jesus may be full of **** but... wait. what was the question?

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@dlowan,

dlowan wrote:

Oh balderdash.....I and my friends do a great line in small talk.....not Victorian small talk, but small nonetheless.

I think the key to small talk is not to be intrusive into another's private affairs.

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@Thomas,

Thomas wrote:

David, the state of Prussia used to be the 800-pound gorilla within the federalist nation of Germany. Imagine a Texas that covers all the US West of the Mississippi, and you get the right idea. The Allied Forces disbanded Prussia some 65 years ago, but we South Germans still it make a point not to like them.

Is there a correlation to Lutheranism? Is Bavaria doing the Austrian thing and saying they were a victim of the other group during WWII?

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@Setanta,

Didn't Prussia get decimated in the Thirty Years War, to the point that there were reports of cannabilism in order to survive? Whose army was so ruthless?

1 Reply

@Setanta,

Quote:

However, from what i've seen of your performance elsewhere, logic is not your strong suit.

After just this thread, Setanta, you are hardly in any position to be telling others that their logic is wanting.

Quote:

I''m comfortabe with my objection to the usages i've complained about, and nothing obliges me to justify them to you.

Hidden as your are in your little bubble, of course you are "comfortabe", pathfinder. But the facts have shown you to be an idiot, someone who knows little of how language works.

Quote:

because i--and at least a couple of others--have pointed out to you that your use of troll is not appropriate.

Did you do it in as convincing a fashion as you have in this thread?

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@Val Killmore,

Quote:

The only example of debasing the English language is barbarous jargon.

No, that's not an example either, Val.

Quote:

Edwin Newman fought the good fight over misuse of the English Language. We do, however, appear to be in a state of decline: nouns are used as verbs, "then" and "than" are used interchangeably, and editing seems to be a thing of the past.

Who is Edwin Newman?

There is no state of decline. Did you not read the short excerpt from The Decline of Grammar?

Quote:

And your examples, well it is hard to say if whether the people are misusing the words, because the context of the situation is not given.

That's true, but Setanta has a long history of misdescribing language.

1 Reply

@JTT,

I was thinking about internet jargon.

Well I guess it's all relative to how one sees a circumstance.

So do you think far from debasing the language, the rapid expansion of English on the web may be enriching the mother tongue?

While the root of Latin took centuries to grow its linguistic branches, modern non-standard English is evolving at a fast rate. The language of the internet itself, the cyberisms that were once the preserve of a few web boffins, has simultaneously expanded into a new argot of words and idioms: for example, Ancient or Classic Geek has given way to Modern Geek.

So maybe thanks to the internet, we are witnessing the second great age of the a fantastic outpouring of words and phrases to describe new ideas or reshape old ideas in novel forms of language.

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@Foofie,

There was no Prussia (as a nation at least) in the 17th century. Foof strikes (out) again.

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@Thomas,

Thomas wrote:

David, the state of Prussia used to be the 800-pound gorilla within the federalist nation of Germany. Imagine a Texas that covers all the US West of the Mississippi, and you get the right idea. The Allied Forces disbanded Prussia some 65 years ago, but we South Germans still it make a point not to like them.

U said that the Prussians r not "real Germans".
I 'd never question the Americanism of Texans.
I remember when Texas was the biggest State in America.
Texans were vocally proud of that.

I remember a Texan lad named Keith expressing his hope
that Alaska 'd not become a State because Texas 'd not be the biggest State any more.

David

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DEBASING THE CURRENCY OF LANGUAGE

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