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English seems to be losing nuance quickly, as we smash words into synonymity through ignorance or, relatedly, allowing figurative, sarcastic, or hyperbolic uses
by shantly 7y ago
English seems to be losing nuance quickly, as we smash words into synonymity through ignorance or, relatedly, allowing figurative, sarcastic, or hyperbolic uses to overtake and replace original meanings. I know languages and word meanings change, but my sense is that this is happening very fast, and largely in the direction of creating redundant perfect synonyms than adding new meanings or nuance to replace what's been lost. I don't really see new vitality of this sort coming into English to replace what's leaving.
If this effect is real and not something I'm imagining, my best guess is that it's a result of much wider exposure to language (consider: how many fewer words, spoken and written, did the average person in 1850 hear or read in an average day, than you do?) with the bulk of it coming from writers and speakers far less well-educated, on average, than the people who had access to, say, publishing in the 19th century or perhaps early radio, and so more likely to mis-use words or phrases. Mistakes have always become common usage if they live long enough, but if the rate of mistakes become very high and the ability of those mistakes to gain a wide audience grow, that must surely have some effect on language, and any notion that it must necessarily be neutral or even beneficial strikes me as wishful thinking—I believe it's at least possible that changes of this sort would harm the practical expressive potential of language (as when we here judge that this useful word's distinct meaning is dead, to no purpose, and without ready replacement).
- asveikau 7y ago> English seems to be losing nuance quickly, as we smash words into synonymity through ignorance Languages lose complexity all the time. Ask Italy, Spain, Portugal, France why they don't have a full Latin case system with various suffices to distinguish them. It's not because their ancestors suddenly became stupid. It's just that languages change and a very common outcome is that complexities get lost in time. I can tell you with certainty that this has been happening in Indo-European languages for thousands of years and yet civilization has thrived in the same period. You're overthinking it in a very judgemental way.
- shantly 7y agoI think I’m allowed to judge loss of expressiveness with no apparent benefit as bad. It’s fine to judge things.
- asveikau 7y agoYou are perfectly welcome to get stressed out over completely natural processes that happen repeatably in the course of human history, but I would just like you to be aware of this aspect before thinking it improper. Happy new year.
- shantly 7y agoI just don’t think that such things are bound to always be fine, is all. I’m aware of the evolution of language and not upset that folks don’t like it when I put a circumflex in “rôle” these days. I would like to know where new expressive vocabulary is coming in to replace what we’re losing—I don’t see it. Yes slang and such, as always, but those are mostly more close or exact synonyms for existing words and aren’t entering Standard Written English at the same rate we’re losing words, as far as I can tell.