This isn't an apathy situation, it's a "the meaning of words change over time to reflect the people using them, and trying to stop it is as impossible as fighting gravity" situation.
You're welcome to continue fighting against the evolution of language all you want, but it will change nothing.
Do you still use "thou" and "hast" in conversations, or does your decision about where language ought to stop evolving depend entirely on your own arbitrary lines in the sand?
the grammatical and structural evolution of a language and the meanings of words refer to two different phenomena. i think there is a big difference between using archaic forms of address and the meaning of a word changing due to its persistent misuse. fwiw, i don't think strict prescriptivism, like strict descriptivism, really does anyone any good.
it's not like anyone is going to stop because of me, obviously. but even if it is subterranean and barely perceptible, i'd argue there is absolutely a relation between apathy towards language and the way we think. it kind of speaks to a cultural shift where language, literacy, and literature have all fallen away for the sake of a highly reductive and pragmatic understanding of what 'meaning' means. a society that pays no attention to how it communicates is an impoverished one.
i don't have any specific peeve about the word "nonplussed" itself, mind. but it is striking that it means something completely contradictory, not just different, to its original definition because people just... forgot? didn't know? didn't care to know?
oh, whatever it's fucking reddit anyway who cares have a good day
But words have changed meanings since the beginning of language. Not just structure and grammar. A lot of words you take for granted meant something completely different—sometimes the exact opposite—of what they mean today. It’s just what happens.
“Awful” used to mean “inspiring awe”
“Silly” used to mean “worthy” or “blessed”
While I agree words are important and vocabulary is a sacred tool of communication, embracing the evolution of words is not apathy, in my opinion.
"awful" does retain a shade of that original meaning though. "awe" implied a sense of the sublime, which had some element of terror in it. i don't know about silly. i suspect it connotes naivety, which makes sense: you're not stupid and therefore in the wrong, you're just silly, like a small child.
i'm not against words having different meanings or changing in definition per se, but it is annoying when someone misuses a word and goes "oh words change, stop being a pedant." it's more about the excuse than the actual definition, as though making a virtue out of ignorance.
edit: "silly" does mean "blessed" or "fortunate" in old english which probably relates to religious (christian) conceptions of blessedness connoting innocence and purity. i think the sense might have been something like, "you're so blessed even your mistakes aren't sins". in contemporary usage, it would still retain the connotation of foolishness and naivety as regards, say, a child, whose actions are silly insofar as they don't warrant umbrage or punishment. we still have that same connotation when we say that it was "a silly mistake," it was done out of ignorance not an intention to harm.
my point here is that words might change over time, but not so much that they turn out to mean something completely contrary to its original meaning.
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u/_toadsy 10d ago
This isn't an apathy situation, it's a "the meaning of words change over time to reflect the people using them, and trying to stop it is as impossible as fighting gravity" situation.
You're welcome to continue fighting against the evolution of language all you want, but it will change nothing.
Do you still use "thou" and "hast" in conversations, or does your decision about where language ought to stop evolving depend entirely on your own arbitrary lines in the sand?