3 ms·
If everyone else is using the word in a new way then who is wrong? The small minority or the masses who are evolving a language?
by wil421 7y ago
If everyone else is using the word in a new way then who is wrong? The small minority or the masses who are evolving a language?
- umvi 7y agoWell, "history is written by the victors", I suppose, but that doesn't make the masses who are "evolving" the language "right". Unless you think it's "right" for the ignorant to redefine words like "literally" and "nonplussed" to mean the exact opposite of their original meanings or to make "could of" a valid grammatical construct.
- grepthisab 7y agoI really used to think like this. I thought there was a "proper" way to use words and evolution of language by the "uneducated masses" was a bad thing and they were "ignorant" for not sticking with dictionary definitions. I was insufferable.
- umvi 7y agoSo is there any value in studying or preserving English grammar and vocabulary at all if it is ultimately meaningless and can easily be redefined by people who have not studied English?
- apocolyps6 7y agoThe idea that people who speak differently than you smacks of old-timey classism, right up there with phrenology. Shakespere was as "vulgar" as it got in his day, and to call what he did art what others are doing something else is just bias. Language is nothing but a set of conventions which necessarily evolves with its userbase.