Chauvinism in Boston Town
The Boston Globe’s language columnist, Jan Freeman, wrote this Sunday about the changing meaning of the word chauvinism. I enjoy her column a lot, and I was surprised and pleased to see that she cited my blog post about chauvinism as the starting point for her column. It discusses chauvinism and two other words and phrases whose meanings changed: “cut bait” and “scan.” She also talks about how language changes:
People who object to such language changes sometimes say, “Just because everyone does it, that doesn’t make it right.” But what’s true about speeding or tax fiddling does not apply to language change; if everyone does it, that does, eventually, make it right. Often, we don’t even notice that a meaning is changing; older speakers use a word one way, younger ones a different way, but not so different that it sets off alarms.
John McIntyre talked about this over at You Don’t Say yesterday (That’s how I was alerted to the Globe column, which I missed this week):
Language becomes what its users collectively make of it. That is how Anglo-Saxon was transformed into English, mainly by a rabble of illiterate peasants, and no one should be sorry about that.
UPDATE: Since it has sparked a few mentions in the comments, here’s Jan Freeman’s further discussion of “cut bait” on her blog.
Posted on June 17, 2009 12:54 pm, in Uncategorized. Bookmark the permalink. 4 Comments.
Very cool to have inspired an article. I would have been even better if she’d been polite and actually linked your post.
Ah well.
Nathan, the MSM is still getting the hang of this Blogging and Netiquette thing.
Actually, the cut bait thing is interesting, because it has several meanings in fishing, and I think that the vagueness of the term caused the shift.
Nowadays, people rarely sit on the boat and cut up fish or chicken livers for bait any more (you either buy it pre-cut or use live or artificial bait). When I hear the term it’s used in a difficult decision. When I fish (usually with whole fish as bait – shiners), the saying means to me that my line is caught on some rocks or weeds, and I’ve got to decide to either cut the line (along with my bait) or untangle it and continue fishing.
Nathan,
I work at a newspaper, and knowing how things work in these places, the reporters and columnists have nothing to do with getting their stories up on the Web site, much less inserting hyperlinks in stories they are writing for the print newspaper.
At some point someone should probably have thought of sticking a link in there, but these places are so understaffed nowadays (and the Globe is especially in trouble) that I am happy just to have the mention. About a dozen people Googled the site on Sunday and Monday, so that was good.
My reference to fish or cut bait is when I fished with my father about 50 years ago. Cutting bait was giving up. It was when you took the worm off the hook, threw it in the water, and put down your pole. I equate it to throwing in the towel.