I realize there are dimwitted morons who believe that they can make up words any time they want. But as a court reporter, who has to transcribe what I hear no matter HOW wrong it is, and in response to what I’ve been forced to listen to recently, I have but one thing to say:
TO INCENT is not a verb!!!
One does not “incent” someone! Learn to use the fucking language properly! We HAVE words for this! Just because they have more syllables that you are too damn ignorant to wrap your lazy-ass, pompous tongue around doesn’t mean that you can rewrite the language as you speak! Stop it! You’re driving me CRAZY!
There are two schools of thought: prescriptivism and descriptivism.
They’re both wrong.
The “proper rules of English” are how it is used by native speakers (and fluent E2L folks) in the normal course of events – in books, articles, letters, conversation, cheers at sports events, etc. If “irregardless” fills a need and is used by people, it’s an English word, regardless of its solecistic qualities when examined etymologically.
On the other hand, there are standards and customs that are obeyed by users of English at a given level of discourse, and to pretend that they don’t exist in search of an elusive objective, descriptive wordlist is equal folly. “If I was you” is correct only in lower-class slang usage or in the case of someone talking to himself in the mirror; we have retained the subjunctive for a limited number of uses, and one of them is the condition-contrary-to-fact that “If I were you” supposes.
The O.E.D. and G. & C. Merriam seem to have no problems in composing a work that adequately describes “English as she is spoke” and yet clarifies what is proper usage at what level of discourse. I find it hard to believe that AHD cannot grasp this concept.
In Merriam-Webster’s online dictionary, the terms ‘dap’ and ‘dapping’ (as in skipping a stone) do not appear at all. In their own Thesaurus, the term dap appears as a synonym for ‘skip.’
If modern dictionary editors are this incapable, permission to use bastardizations like ‘incent’ are a predictable consequence. It is similar to the noun -> verb mutilations that are so prevalent these days.
“Whizbang Stationers, the way to office.”
The above advertising comes to mind and, in fact, incentses me.
To pretend that they never change is folly as well. Someone’s gotta be the vanguard.
And using “was” instead of “were” isn’t slang. Not every feature of a nonstandard dialect is slang. For someone who purports to care about language so much, it’s surprising you don’t know that. That’s pretty basic stuff.
Polycarp, when the AHD folks include usage notes, or even their Grand Our Living Language notes, they do a fine job of it, just like a dictionary’s supposed to. That being said, they include “non-standard” usages, without any warning at all, with an alarming frequency.
For example, “itch” is a synonym for “scratch” in AHD-land. No “using this word in this context will make you sound like a boob” caveat. Nothing. It gives me hives.
I’m with you, Mama Tiger, but don’t tell anybody, okay? I posted a rant a year or two ago about news readers and announcers setting a poor example and every “living language” advocate on the net smelled blood and was at my throat calling me a word Nazi. It’s a battle you can’t win. Believe me, it’s not worth it.
I’d never heard this travesty before, so i went to my copy of Bryan Garner’s A Dictionary of Modern American Usage, and sure enough, there it was. At least Garner deals with the term appropriately:
To me it sounds a little like “cop-speak.” You know, the deliberate overuse of official sounding pseudo-intellectual words. “The victim was vehicularized in a forcefully impacted manner resulting in the demisedness of same”, rather than “She was hit by a car.”
Well, to further elucidate, the word was used – at least four times; I quit counting at a certain point – in testimony about the healthcare system given to a federal agency which deals with antitrust issues by a former Speaker of the House who shall remain nameless but who, shall we say, gives all harmless amphibians a bad name. (Slight self-hijack: His sole purpose for being there, as far as I could tell, was to sell copies of his latest book. So much for public service.)
But he’s not the only one I’ve heard use it.
And yes, DesertGeezer, he was using in the sense of “to incentivize.”
Zenster, you hit upon another regular language abortion I run across all too frequently, “to office.”
What really tortures me about all this is that I CAN’T CHANGE WHAT PEOPLE SAY! I HAVE TO WRITE IT DOWN EXACTLY THE WAY THEY SAID IT!
Certain words get under my skin, too – but I recognize it as a personal failing.
Yes, Polycarp, there is a certain subset of the language used by the cognoscenti: I call it bourgeoinics. It may not include “ain’t,” but it does include “incent,” apparently. T’ain’t a pretty dialect, if you ask me.
A descriptivist dictionary should include a category for “bourgeoinics,” words that can be used by Speakers of the House without other hoitytoityists blinking an eye but that cannot be used by members of the local English department. It’s a shame that AHD doesn’t recognize this category of words.
DanielWithrow - it might not be a personal failing. Some words just don’t work. This is why some words are all over the place for a few years, and then go away so we can all be happy again.
Wittgenstein has several good discussions about why the heck it is that nothing on this earth can make impactfulness a useful word. In the wonderful world of usability, it quickly become clear that even people who use words like “incent” read more slowly and with less interest and comprehension when a text contains that kind of B.S. (Not that this makes and difference to the people who make the final decisions about what you see on your AOL homepage…)
If you want to see a fun battle between the corporate word-manglers and a defender of correct usage, you should check out the current Harper’s magazine (July 2003, p. 24), where they have reprinted an excellent email exchange between a former English teacher and the Coca-Cola Company over the slogan used for the company’s bottled water, Dasani.
I put a few of the key terms into Google, and managed to find a copy of the exchange on the web. Go to this blog and scroll about half-way down until you see the title Making an Impact. It’s worth the effort.
