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you're not the only one here, so please excuse me - this isn't a personal attack - but what does "poignant" mean in american english these days? as an english
by andrewcooke 13y ago
you're not the only one here, so please excuse me - this isn't a personal attack - but what does "poignant" mean in american english these days?
as an english english speaker, it's associated with regret, sadness, etc. yet i've seen it used here multiple times to mean something completely different. what?
- zensavona 13y ago"strong in mental appeal" a subject of poignant interest.
- nsmartt 13y agoThis isn't snark. I legitimately tried explaining in my own words. I wasn't satisfied, so: http://www.thefreedictionary.com/poignant http://www.thefreedictionary.com/poignant
- andrewcooke 13y agohmm. http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/poignant?q=poignant http://oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/poignant?q=... (also my dead-tree concise oxford, with a longer entry, doesn't have anything that's not emotionally affected, one way or another). i suspect it's a cultural variation.
- nsmartt 13y agoAs mentioned by one of the other replies, it comes from "to prick" in Old French, so the usage you're seeing—Profoundly moving; touching—seems to align with that fairly well, at a glance.
- ekianjo 13y agoIt comes from French in the first place - it's something that involves you deeply/stimulates you on an emotional/intellectual level. You can't use this for people but you use this for things or works of art usually.