Pedants' Paradise

[Nick Armstrong]

As in "Does my ask look big in this?"

[Flosshilde]

I think that's a logical consequence, once the phrase passes into popular speech. It look as if it might have started out as a negative: 'no small ask', 'not a small ask' (= 'a big ask').

If a big ask goes wrong, will it end up as the biggest ask disaster in the world?

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

If a big ask goes wrong, will it end up as the biggest ask disaster in the world?

WooHooo!

[Panjandrum]

You're on fire tonight Dental Floss.

[Flosshilde]

I was rather pleased with it, in a modest sort of way

[Pabmusic]

This was on the BBC News website this morning:

"confidence in Mr Obama and approval of his international policies has trended downward during the course of his presidency".

So I looked around the web for something on 'nouns as verbs', because I know there's an honourable tradition of it, and Shakespeare even manages to use 'uncle' as a verb. I found several mentions af 'verbing' nouns.

[Beef Oven]

This was on the BBC News website this morning:

"confidence in Mr Obama and approval of his international policies has trended downward during the course of his presidency".

So I looked around the web for something on 'nouns as verbs', because I know there's an honourable tradition of it, and Shakespeare even manages to use 'uncle' as a verb. I found several mentions af 'verbing' nouns.

trended? it's just - no! Yuck!

[jean]

...Shakespeare even manages to use 'uncle' as a verb...

Shakespeare doesn't just manage it - he does it all the time, and with the greatest of ease.

...Julius Caesar, who at Philippi the good Brutus ghosted...

...Destruction straight shall dog them at the heels...

And it's not just nouns, either:

...but me no buts...

I can never understand what all the fuss is about. You lose your inflections, you have a new resource for enriching the language. What's not to like?

[Pabmusic]

I can never understand what all the fuss is about.

You have a good point. There are two sorts of verbal nouns - no, three. There are 'poetic' ones (the Shakespeare examples might fall into this category). There's ones that most people use without realising they ever were nouns first ('contact' is a good example), and there are modern ones. Most of the modern ones will die away, but some will remain, and in 80 years, no-one will be any the wiser (as is the case with 'contact').

That said, it's all a bit trendy (noun as adjective?), and often they are coined (I'm sure that's one!) unnecessarily. "Confidence in Mr Obama has gone downhill", or "has declined", says the same without a new word.

[french frank]

Shakespeare doesn't just manage it - he does it all the time, and with the greatest of ease.

...Julius Caesar, who at Philippi the good Brutus ghosted...

...Destruction straight shall dog them at the heels...

And it's not just nouns, either:

...but me no buts...

I can never understand what all the fuss is about. You lose your inflections, you have a new resource for enriching the language. What's not to like?

One of the characteristics of English is its flexibility. The prime purpose of language is to communicate and the fact that these coinages are understandable is the evidence of that flexibility.

(Adverbs can be be nuns [I mean 'nouns' of course - n'exagérons pas!] too: as in 'ups and downs'. And you can 'up' the price of something.)

[jean]

"Confidence in Mr Obama has gone downhill", or "has declined", says the same without a new word.

Your rewritings don't say quite the same though, do they? The writer wants to make sure you understand that the dip he notes is part of a trend, not an isolated example.

[Pabmusic]

Your rewritings don't say quite the same though, do they? The writer wants to make sure you understand that the dip he notes is part of a trend, not an isolated example.

I don't agree - 'decline' implies such a gradual slope (I think 'gone downhill' does as well - if the hill's not gradual in any degree, it's a cliff!). And in any case, I'm not being paid for composing copy!

[Flosshilde]

This was on the BBC News website this morning:

"confidence in Mr Obama and approval of his international policies has trended downward during the course of his presidency".

So I looked around the web for something on 'nouns as verbs', because I know there's an honourable tradition of it, and Shakespeare even manages to use 'uncle' as a verb. I found several mentions af 'verbing' nouns.

As I said up-thread () I recently found 'trended' in Haggard's King Solomon's Mines (pub. c. 1895) - "the road trended to the left".

[Pabmusic]

As I said up-thread () I recently found 'trended' in Haggard's King Solomon's Mines (pub. c. 1895) - "the road trended to the left".

I missed that, Floss. It only goes to show. I've been banana-skinned! (I bet that's not in Rider Haggard ).

[vinteuil]

As I said up-thread () I recently found 'trended' in Haggard's King Solomon's Mines (pub. c. 1895) - "the road trended to the left".

The verb 'to trend' has a long history.

My old OED has quotes back to 1000 AD - "Se æppel næfre thæs feorr ne trendeth, he cyth, hwanon he com", and many subsequent references from the 14th, 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries.

The OED quotations for "trend" as a noun are much more recent - 17th, 18th, 19th cent.