If we are to believe Lewis Carroll, Humpty Dumpty employed “rather a scornful tone” when he told Alice, “When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less.”
Due respect to Mr. Dumpty, but usage, not fiat, defines words. The facts of linguistic life are that new words appear; old words fall out of fashion; definitions, pronunciations, spellings, and rules change; lexicographers struggle to stay current; and, through it all, pedants fume.
(It is an easy matter to expose the pedant in the room. Just use phenomena as a singular, pronounce GIF with a hard G, or say “octopi.”)
At the risk of laying bare my own pedantry, I fervently hope for certain words to remain ever impervious to change. There’s simply no improving on lollygagger for slowpoke (or, for that matter, slowpoke for slowpoke), bumfuzzled for confused, and squishy for things that are, well, squishy. On the flip side, some words cry out for the long overdue opportunity to mean what they sound like. It’s high time gastronomy referred to the study of noxious odors in outer space, penultimate to the best writing implement ever, ameliorate to naming your child Amelia, plethora to the gunk you cough up when you have a cold, and pulchritude to anything other than beauty.
Merriam-Webster and the Oxford English Dictionary deserve credit for their valiant efforts at keeping up-to-date. To wit, both feature entries for the recently coined portmanteau mansplain. My only regret is that they define it succinctly and without condescension. O Irony, where is thy sting?
Some newly co-opted words and expressions fail to land well among the privileged. Take, for instance, privilege. Perhaps those who bristle at its newer use still associate the word only with backstage passes, first class seats, and a place at the head table. Its more recent application—you’re shielded from crappy treatment and blissfully unaware of it because it doesn’t target you—can be harder to grasp if you’ve never been pulled over for driving while not White, never received a lower grade for schoolwork as good as a more comely classmate’s, never had your résumé passed over due to the ethnic sound of your name, or never been forced to carry an unwanted pregnancy to term.
Even the word Christian is evolving. The process may have had its start when Born Again Christians dropped “Born Again” and preempted the modifier-less Christian for their exclusive use. According to many a Christian Formerly Known as Born Again, mere espoused belief in Jesus of Nazareth is no longer sufficient for calling yourself a Christian. Nay; you must worship “the Jesus the Bible teaches,” which, oddly enough, is something that only Christians Formerly Known as Born Again manage to get right. Sorry, Protestants who get it wrong and also Catholics, Mormons, Adventists, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Mennonites, and Quakers. You are not true Christians. If it’s any comfort, you probably aren’t true Scotsmen, either.
The newly emerging definition of Christian has had no small effect on related words and phrases. The admonition to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, and treat others as you would be treated now means not to do any of those things. Peaceful protest has taken its rightful place as a synonym for armed insurrection. The politically correct term for vulgar, law-breaking, morally and intellectually bankrupt, toddler-esque septuagenarian topped by a marmalade-colored dust bunny is God’s Chosen. The new way to say “when you pray, go into your room and close the door” is “legislative bodies, teachers, and football coaches should make a show of praying and, in the case of but not limited to teachers and football coaches, force participation by any plausibly deniable means including but not limited to social pressure.” Religious freedom is defined as government-sponsored Christianity. The word for withholding basic human kindness from anyone God considers yucky, which, by sheerest coincidence, is anyone the above-referenced newfangled Christians consider yucky, is righteousness.
Not to be overlooked, we are indebted to televangelists for introducing the term prosperity gospel. This burgeoning gospel of love boasts needles bigger than camels, beats plowshares into stock shares, and plops Lazarus in torment, where he enjoys a clear view of the rich man thumbing his nose from heaven.
All the above may portend good news for Humpty Dumpty. Perhaps in a not-distant day, “couldn’t put Humpty together again” will mean “restored him to mint condition.”
If we are to believe Lewis Carroll, Humpty Dumpty employed “rather a scornful tone” when he told Alice, “When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less.” Due respect to Mr. Dumpty, but usage, not fiat, defines words. The facts of linguistic life are that new words …