"Different than......".

quote:

Originally posted by Kevin-W:
Fowler's Modern English Usage, the definitive tome on these matters, says:

"The commonly expressed view that different should only be followed by from and never by to or than is not supportable in the face of past and present evidence or of logic..."

Fowler is correct. One might have a preference for a particular form but all are equally valid.

Fraser,

Language changes in order to be useful to its speakers and it can be useful in a number of different ways - as a mark of identity for example or of belonging to a certain class or social grouping. There is no vote, judgement or consensus other than practice. Those who claim to be know 'correct usage' and set up academies, curricula and other institutions to promote it are a part of the picture of course and they may or may not be successful at persuading others to adopt their point of view, but their claim to know what is right or proper is utterly baseless. The important thing is that people are able to communicate effectively in a range of circumstances and are not penalised or despised for the manner in which they do it.

It's the whole "bring with"/"take to" thing that gets me... grrr.

Jayd,

It's a matter of context. I couldn't care less if an American uses American English, indeed they should. What I object to is the introduction of such words into British English. Not everyone in the world wants to be American...

steve

Mongo,

Guilty as charged on pompous however the point is as has been made/reinforced by others. People are just showing their age and there is no correct language or grammatical structure.

I'll say it again. Read Deutscher. I challenge you to come out the other end with the same view of language.

The idea that we are subservient to something we created (eg. English) is an odd one.

The purpose of language, whether written or spoken is to facilitiate communication. In order to do so it must evolve with its users and surroundings/context to remain relevant and functional. The same can be said for any language - English, German, French, painting, sculpture, photography, motion pictures, art, music...

A static language is a dying language.

quote:

Originally posted by Paper Plane:
Jayd,

It's a matter of context. I couldn't care less if an American uses American English, indeed they should. What I object to is the introduction of such words into British English. Not everyone in the world wants to be American...

steve

Fair point, I see the distinction.

quote:

Originally posted by Paper Plane:
One of the "new uses" of words that irritates me intensely is the use of the word leverage as a verb. steve

100% agree. I delete it from documents I review; it is another that really grates. I think the writer means "takes advantage of".

Another is the use of "prior to" when the writer quite clearly means "before".

However, I would ask if these are any more irritating than the response to when you ask somebody "How are you?" and they reply "I'm good" when you didn't enquire about their behaviour, but their welfare. The correct answer is "very well, thank you" and should be given irrespective of the true state of the respondents health.

We no longer put things in alphabetical order, but alphabetise and those that do often do so with a "z" (pronounced zed) rather than using am "s" (pronounced ess).

On match of the day, pundit Lee Dixon referred to renaming an end at the Emirates stadium to the Clock End as arsenalisation. It must have worked because his team won 6-nil (and not 6-zero as one commentator remarked).

Bring back Ron Atkinson.

Ever heard of nominalisation? It's the process of verbs changing to nouns. Ever heard of metaphor? It's how we take the concrete to describe the abstract. Both are a natural part of any evolving language.

The fascinating thing if you look at us now is that whilst we might love both Dickens stories and the language used we do actually have much more to describe and much more expressive use of language to describe it with.

So, leverage, is actually a word that, using the logics of some posters here, should simply not exist. It should have been confined to being a noun that described a thing. Except that it never did that. It described a thing and became associated with the action if that thing. It's only a small and perfectly natural leap to use it as metaphor and from there for it to become also am adjective.

quote:

The correct answer is "very well, thank you" and should be given irrespective of the true state of the respondents health.

What's the point of asking, then?

And not that it bothers me in the slightest, but I cannot help thinking you're missing an apostrophe there somewhere.

quote:

However, I would ask if these are any more irritating than the response to when you ask somebody "How are you?" and they reply "I'm good" when you didn't enquire about their behaviour, but their welfare. The correct answer is "very well, thank you" and should be given irrespective of the true state of the respondents health.

One of the standard greetings around where we live and work is 'Now then.' No answer is required. Much more satisfactory, if a little unnerving to offcumdens.

It should of course be pronounced as a single word; 'nathen'. See also what Bill Bryson (who lived here for a while) christened the Malham Wave. This is a gesture of acknowledgement whereby the finger of the driving hand is momentarily twitched from the steering wheel of the owner's Land Rover as you pass by. The degree of movement is inversely proportional to the degree of friendship between the participants. Receipt of a really minimal MW is a special moment that means you've been more or less accepted into the community.

Bruce

Fit a' bunch o jumpit up loons fa keep bleeterin on a muckle load a' foostie clart in es wee neuk.

This clamjafry wud maist likely mak a fash amongst a puckle a deid haddies. A guid skelp for yon tumshies is jist fits wintit.

Jim

quote:

"new uses" of words that irritates me intensely is the use of the word leverage as a verb.

This is from another sub-world of business speak.
If you can't visualise this you need to realign your bandwidth issues.
Going forward at the end of the day and to give you a heads up on this, unless you effect a radical paradigm shift you are toast.

quote:

This is from another sub-world of business speak.

Or bollox as it is also known.

lev·er·age   /ˈlɛvərɪdʒ, ˈlivər-/ Show Spelled [lev-er-ij, lee-ver-] Show IPA noun, verb, -aged, -ag·ing.
–noun
1. the action of a lever.
2. the mechanical advantage or power gained by using a lever.
3. power or ability to act or to influence people, events, decisions, etc.; sway: Being the only industry in town gave the company considerable leverage in its union negotiations.
4. the use of a small initial investment, credit, or borrowed funds to gain a very high return in relation to one's investment, to control a much larger investment, or to reduce one's own liability for any loss.

I use leverage routinely in contexts similar to 3) above.

It might be bollox to some but it's worth a lot to me.

Jim

PS. BTW, my previous post was submiited in reasonable NE Scotland Doric. Those that can translate it will clearly understand my position on this thread.

Whilst agreeing languages have to remain alive, why do people invent new words for something when a perectly good one exists already? The example that comes immediately to mind is "ongoing". What's wrong with the existing word "continuing"?

steve

Jim,

The thing that irritates me about leverage as a verb is that 'lever' is a verb already and would get the job done. At least it's an area of language that tends to change pretty quickly, so it might not be around to annoy me much longer.

quote:

Originally posted by rodwsmith:

quote:

The correct answer is "very well, thank you" and should be given irrespective of the true state of the respondents health.

What's the point of asking, then?

And not that it bothers me in the slightest, but I cannot help thinking you're missing an apostrophe there somewhere.

Excellent spot, you're of course right.

The correct answer is "very well, thank you" and should be given irrespective of the true state of the respondents' health.

I hold my head in shame for its omission

quote:

Originally posted by ROTF:
The correct answer is "very well, thank you" and should be given irrespective of the true state of the respondents' health.

Wrong again, I'm afraid, in the context of the original post:

If replying to a single respondent: "...respondent's health."
If replying to more than one respondent: "...respondents' health."

I'll get me coat.

Fraser

quote:

Originally posted by King Size:
The purpose of language, whether written or spoken is to facilitiate communication.

Communication is surely a secondary function of language. The original 'purpose' - 'application' is maybe a better term - of language must, I propose, have been to facilitate evolution of thought. Thoughts have to be formulated before they can be communicated. The egg does, in fact, come before the chicken.

Fraser

I agree with Steve.
“Different from” did the job very well for a long time then some time after I left school “different to” crept in and I now see and hear it more often than “different from”. Now “different than” is hovering about. Three expressions where one used to work very well. How is this a good thing? This is not evolution, it's more like dilution and comes from laziness and unwillingness to think just a little bit about what's being written or said.

It looks to me as though some people would have us just make things up as we go along which, to me, is linguistic anarchy and is bound to reduce the level of precision of a language.

quote:

Communication is surely a secondary function of language. The original 'purpose' - 'application' is maybe a better term - of language must, I propose, have been to facilitate evolution of thought.

Fraser,

I understand - and even admire - your reasoning, but as language is not a single player game, I don't think it would be possible to say anything more fundamentally incorrect.

TomK

quote:

To imagine a language is to imagine a form of life.

Wittgenstein

Language has always been made up and discarded as we go along. In social circumstances which demand precision and specialisation, operating theatres and courts of law for example, precise and specialised forms of language will arise.

David,
I agree to some extent that context is important. If I'm having a drunken conversation in the pub with the lads, or exchanging emails with my cousin in NY, relaxed English is definitely acceptable, sometimes even preferable. But you don't need to work in an operating theatre or court for precision to matter. I work in a technical environment and precision is very important. Perhaps one of the reasons I'm so uppity about this is that many times I've had to sort out the mess caused by people being sloppy about what they asked for. Spelling mistakes, grammatical errors and all that other anal bullshit really make a difference, often the difference between something being fully understood or not.

quote:

Originally posted by Fraser Hadden:

quote:

Originally posted by King Size:
The purpose of language, whether written or spoken is to facilitiate communication.

Communication is surely a secondary function of language. The original 'purpose' - 'application' is maybe a better term - of language must, I propose, have been to facilitate evolution of thought. Thoughts have to be formulated before they can be communicated. The egg does, in fact, come before the chicken.

Fraser

The existence of language is not a pre-requisite for the evolution of thought. The ability to communicate that thought however, does require a common language.