For maximum clarity, especially when reading etymologies, is that there are two words “turtle”, that happen to have the same spelling and pronunciation. It’s the separate etymologies that lets us known it’s two words, and not one word that happened to end up with two different meanings.
What, nobody has posted the Pratchett quote yet?
Another interesting one is “manufactured”. Originally, it meant “hand-made”.
The process is termed “folk etymology,” where an unfamiliar word new to the language changes to a more familiar form. The French “tortue” evolved to match the English “turtle” (turtle dove now).
The old meaning of “want” is still used in the courts, where a case can be dismissed for want of prosecution (in a civil case, it refers to the plaintiff) or dismissed for want of jurisdiction.
There’s a chain of marijuana dispensaries in suburban Chicago named Okay, which sounds fairly self-deprecating unless there’s some slang or trade usage of the word that I miss as a non-user.
“Masterpiece” these days means something that is at the pinnacle of an art or craft.
However, it used to mean the project somebody in a medieval guild worked on to qualify for a Master rank in the guild. Which is close to the opposite in meaning, it didn’t mean “one of the best works ever”, it meant “meets the bare qualifications for being an expert job”.
Democracy
Until the early-mid 20th century, it meant, “Rule by popular vote.”
As best I’ve been able to determine, Woodrow Wilson and the National Education Association (among other) populist/left leaning organizations started to push the new, alternate definition that democracy means, “A country with a popularly elected president”, specifically undercutting the roles of Congress and the Electoral College.
Under this new definition, Mexico and the Philippines are Democracies. The US is a nation that is still on its way to being a proper democracy.
https://constitution.congress.gov/browse/essay/artIV-S4-1/ALDE_00013635/?hl=en-US
I don’t see anything in that link nor in Wiktionary about that definition of democracy and I’ve never heard anyone emphasize an elected president. I more often hear the term republic used for that, as opposed to having a monarch as a head of state in an otherwise elected democracy.
Now, what I have heard is that the Vietnamese consider themselves to be democratic but not because they have valid elections but because in their language “democracy” has a connotation of good governance that is responsive to peoples needs. I don’t know if that’s true or not, but I have heard the confused statement that Vietnam is “democratic” from otherwise liberal people (as opposed to leftist tankies).
The lighter form (generally short for “Democratic Republic”) is still a corrupt replacement.
The original form of the US government was that land owning white men could vote, and those votes were then skewed according to different forms of population count.
While the representatives were expected to focus on the welfare of the people (per the first sentence of the Constitution), that was more of a job description than something that came from the popular vote.
The modern equivalent might be like saying that college educated people who have a retirement account with your yearly income multiplied by 2 * ((age -20) / 10) in it are the only people allowed to vote. E.g. you’re a stable, reliable, educated individual then we trust you to discern and elect a person who would serve according to the job description.
Woke
Originally an adjective to describe awareness of racial discrimination (with the implied exhortation to always vote), it now seems to be used by MAGAs mostly to end discussions.
Fake News
I first heard it from Norm McDonald in the introduction to SNL’s “Weekend Update”. It’s become a chant MAGAs respond with to anything they hear and don’t like.
Entitlement
Originally referred to government benefit programs which people had paid into and therefore were entitled to (Social Security, Medicare, etc.) Now generally accepted as referring to programs which people feel entitled to, with the implication that they’re actually not entitled.
I first heard it from snopes circa 2016, who used it to refer to websites that were designed to look like legitimate news sites, but published completely fabricated stories designed to get lots of shares on social media, thus driving lots of traffic to their site so the owner can make a quick buck from ad revenue. Often they accomplished this through stories designed to provoke outrage or that appeared to confirm some conspiracy theory, like the one that the Democrats were going to rig the election. If called on their fake stories the owners of these sites would usually claim they were “satire”, but there nothing satirical about them in the traditional sense.
My bold. Made me look it up because I’ve been wrong on this sort of thing before - tortoise is terrestrial, turtles are aquatic.
More of those irregular plurals need to die.
Cute meant "shrewd,” “keen,” or “clever.”
One of the most interesting words is inflammable which has completely reversed meaning in my lifetime. When I was growing up it meant capable of being inflamed and the opposite was non-inflammable. Now the neologism flammable has taken over the original meaning and inflammable has come to mean non-inflammable. Very confusing and even potentially dangerous.
The word “inflammable” should never be used, because it’s confusing, in a context where confusion could be life-threatening. Instead, use “flammable” and “nonflammable”.
Intercourse. It used to mean general communication, interaction. Now the meaning has narrowed down to sexual intercourse.
Intercourse - Etymology, Origin & Meaning
You’re right. I got it backwards when I wrote that post.
Terrific: which usually has good vibes now but used to be more of a bad descriptor like a ‘terrific explosion’ for instance.
I’m surprised no one has brought up the can of worms that is “literally.” Personally, I have no problem with the current usage as an intensifier, as it has been used that way for hundreds of years, but some get all twisted by that one.