Words on the Move: Why English Won't - and Can't - Sit Still (Like, Literally)
John McWhorteramazon.com
Words on the Move: Why English Won't - and Can't - Sit Still (Like, Literally)
fuzziness of speech to the clarity of print. Speech and print are not the same, and a slavish presentation of recorded speech may not be as representative of a speaker as dialogue that has been trimmed and straightened.
John McPhee • Draft No. 4
We no longer speak the language of the common man. We begin to favor larger words that affirm that we are, indeed, more learned than those around us. Having begun to live more in our heads than in the heart zone, we begin to think out our sentences, one fancy word at a time.
GERRY SPENCE • HOW TO ARGUE AND WIN EVERY TIME
Often, words and phrases shift their meanings so much that they bear only the most tenuous relation to what they originally signified. The evolution of words and meanings can be a fascinating, beautiful thing. I
Dr. Frank Luntz • Words That Work: It's Not What You Say, It's What People Hear
Languages are living things. They age and change and grow and shrink. Sometimes we use a word incorrectly on a personal level for years (see me and immergance vs. emergance , gah) and sometimes a whole bunch of people begin “misusing” a word with such frequency that the word acquires that new, misused meaning. See: literally , which was “mis”-used ... See more