(Or, Modern Writing Habits that Really Need to Go)
I get really ticked by some of the things I read and hear nowadays. Know what I mean; like the increased substitution of nouns for verbs as I just did in the title? Englishify? Frost? It happens all the time. Let’s “task” Joe with something; Did Tom “deconflict” the issue? The suspect “lawyered” up. He “texted” Louie. He “gamed” the system while “guesting” at the casino that “comped” him.
Maybe that specific usage is just the natural evolution of our language. After all, we have accepted many nouns acting as verbs in the past; mop the floor, for example. I fear, though, that we may soon be hearing things such as; Did you “broom” the floor?
Is my fear rational, or am I just resistant to the inevitable? Is the word “mop” diminished since it has no counterpart to “sweep?” But what about the good old Navy term to “swab” the floor (deck)? See how complicated this can be? My definitive answer is: Who knows?
There are a number of burrs under my saddle, though, that just have to do with laziness, sloppiness or ignorance. Here are a few…
“Can I get?” as in: Hey, can I get a coffee and bagel? What happened to “I would like,” or “may I have, please?” Should the response to “can I get” be “Sure, just come behind the counter and grab a cup and put what you want on the bagel”?
Spell check reliance: using this device blindly without proofreading. “Their is a lot of verb for noun substitution going on.” A recent best seller contained: “she was only interested in her quaff.” The writer was referring to her hairdo, not to a can of beer.
“You know.” This kills me, you know. It’s like, you know, so bad.
Fifty cent words when simple words will do. “Sarah eschewed the use of simple words in an effort to seem smart.” We should eschew use of words like eschew.
Turning adjectives into nouns by adding “ness” when it does not belong there. “The aliveness of the hostess was amazing.” What ever happened to words like vivacity and ebullience?
Bulky sentences containing too many prepositional phrases. “Notwithstanding his apparent aliveness, we knew that, despite his best efforts, he was depressed.”
“Do” this or that. “Let’s do lunch;” “I am going to do those stairs over there.”
Starting with “you can” instead of giving a direct command. Mom: “You can go to your room right now!” Junior: “Yeah, I guess I could, but I don’t know if I will.”
Being vague instead of using visual imagery and colorful language. “The offender provided information.” How about “The street skell (or skank) coughed up his buddy in a New York minute.”?
About the Author:
John J. Hyde, self-described “old fart,” lives at the Jersey shore with his wife and son. He has traveled to 45 countries and is now happy to write when he feels like it and otherwise go fishing.
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3 responses so far ↓
I do get your point about some people makes their own way of saying things without checking if its correct or not. I guess this is their way of expressing themselves in a simplest way possible at the same time the other person will get right away what they are trying to say, since using this, other people tend to adopt the concept and then later on use them also. later on it will be acceptable and correct to the others even thou its not.
Actually, i think it is really the natural evolution of language. Your fear is actually rational. Thing is that it is communication and i suppose the important thing is that you understand the message being relayed, right?
I think that the more words a language contains, the more accurately the intended meaning is conveyed. Same goes for grammatical rules. They’re based in logic. The logical placement of the words helps us understand what’s being said.
I fought the hyphen battle for years, but recently gave up. Today I found myself staring dejectedly at a sentence that I myself wrote: “Dina has decided not to respond to the one line query asking if I write content.” But if I used the hyphen in the appropriate spot, we would know without having to guess, that the query contains just one line. A one-line query. Not a “line query” (just one of them), but a “one-line” query.
I personally think that language is *devolving.* Same for human intelligence in general. The computers do the work for us now. Math brains and linear thinkers are a dying breed. Frightening.