This use of singular they had emerged by the 14th century, about a century after the plural they.[4][5][2] It has been commonly employed in everyday English ever since and has gained currency in official contexts. Singular they has been criticised since the mid-18th century by prescriptive commentators who consider it an error.[6] Its continued use in modern standard English has become more common and formally accepted with the move toward gender-neutral language.[7][8] Some early-21st-century style guides described it as colloquial and less appropriate in formal writing.[9][10] However, by 2020, most style guides accepted the singular they as a personal pronoun.[11][12][13][14]
I intensely dislike this recent trend of turning thrift into a verb. I think the word shop does fine instead of turning thrift into a verb-like slang. It irks me in the way the word fellowship has also been turned into a verb by the church-going populace. Other irksome trends include using home instead of the word house, people in general need to know the difference. Overuse and misuse of the words epic, iconic, legacy, legend or legendary, literally and unprecedented greatly annoy me. Making the words die and death into dirty words and using pass, pass-on and passing are also very irritating. Death and dying are facts of life, get used to it; "preceded in death" in obituaries is also annoying, the word predecease expresses the idea much better and is to the point. One could go on and on with language silliness but I will stop here and perhaps undoubtedly will find reason to comment another day.
It is an evolution in language that creates efficiency. For example, my wife and I take a small amount of a noni supplement every day (it is a tropical fruit, if you were not familiar). So, she often says to me: “Did you noni today?”
We use may such concepts. How about “I pilled the dog” meaning, I gave her the meds.
Even older, “I papered the walls today” meaning, I applied wallpaper. It could also be "I papered the town today" meaning I spread leaflets everywhere.
I could go on and on.
That reader might be peeved, but she is fighting a hopeless battle.
I didn't mean to suggest that verbing nouns is new. "I cup my hand"; "I hand you a cup." Both "cup" and "hand," which come to us from Old English, have been verbs as well as nouns since the 1400s. But I'll bet the people who heard the verbs when they were new found them strange. The point I was trying to make is that new things get our attention until they no longer strike us as unfamiliar.
I couldn't help but think about how, back in the before times, the good folks at the Xerox Corporation expressed great consternation at the fact that their company name had been verbed. They were extremely upset when people started saying that they had "Xeroxed" five copies of a report. They were worried that frequent (and improper) use of the word "Xeroxing" for making copies of documents would reduce their company's name and its products to generic status. I wonder how exactly does that genericification (points for new word?) process happen? I don't think that anyone ever said, "I 'carbon papered' five reports." Sorry, as the old joke went, "I am dating myself now because no one else will."
You mentioned the singular they.
...
This use of singular they had emerged by the 14th century, about a century after the plural they.[4][5][2] It has been commonly employed in everyday English ever since and has gained currency in official contexts. Singular they has been criticised since the mid-18th century by prescriptive commentators who consider it an error.[6] Its continued use in modern standard English has become more common and formally accepted with the move toward gender-neutral language.[7][8] Some early-21st-century style guides described it as colloquial and less appropriate in formal writing.[9][10] However, by 2020, most style guides accepted the singular they as a personal pronoun.[11][12][13][14]
I intensely dislike this recent trend of turning thrift into a verb. I think the word shop does fine instead of turning thrift into a verb-like slang. It irks me in the way the word fellowship has also been turned into a verb by the church-going populace. Other irksome trends include using home instead of the word house, people in general need to know the difference. Overuse and misuse of the words epic, iconic, legacy, legend or legendary, literally and unprecedented greatly annoy me. Making the words die and death into dirty words and using pass, pass-on and passing are also very irritating. Death and dying are facts of life, get used to it; "preceded in death" in obituaries is also annoying, the word predecease expresses the idea much better and is to the point. One could go on and on with language silliness but I will stop here and perhaps undoubtedly will find reason to comment another day.
Oh, Ms. Wallraff, this is really a non-problem.
It is an evolution in language that creates efficiency. For example, my wife and I take a small amount of a noni supplement every day (it is a tropical fruit, if you were not familiar). So, she often says to me: “Did you noni today?”
We use may such concepts. How about “I pilled the dog” meaning, I gave her the meds.
Even older, “I papered the walls today” meaning, I applied wallpaper. It could also be "I papered the town today" meaning I spread leaflets everywhere.
I could go on and on.
That reader might be peeved, but she is fighting a hopeless battle.
Jeff Kaufman
Needham
I didn't mean to suggest that verbing nouns is new. "I cup my hand"; "I hand you a cup." Both "cup" and "hand," which come to us from Old English, have been verbs as well as nouns since the 1400s. But I'll bet the people who heard the verbs when they were new found them strange. The point I was trying to make is that new things get our attention until they no longer strike us as unfamiliar.
I'm going to go look up "noni" now.
I couldn't help but think about how, back in the before times, the good folks at the Xerox Corporation expressed great consternation at the fact that their company name had been verbed. They were extremely upset when people started saying that they had "Xeroxed" five copies of a report. They were worried that frequent (and improper) use of the word "Xeroxing" for making copies of documents would reduce their company's name and its products to generic status. I wonder how exactly does that genericification (points for new word?) process happen? I don't think that anyone ever said, "I 'carbon papered' five reports." Sorry, as the old joke went, "I am dating myself now because no one else will."