Argh!

[djpsyche]

OK, I think the use of the word "action" as a verb has replaced "we were sat down" as my number one grammatical bugbear. Expecially when bloody suffixes are added, as in "actioned".

ACTION IS A NOUN!! ACT IS THE VERB!

Whatever happened to "has this been done?"

Comments

[bluekieran.livejournal.com]

Acted upon?

[oletheros.livejournal.com]

you? pedantic? say it ain't so!

[bluekieran.livejournal.com]

Great icon.

[oletheros.livejournal.com]

thanks. i have a collection.

[pastor-saturn.livejournal.com]

Har, har! Mine is the use of "impact" as a verb. As in, "I will impact your skull with a mallet if you don't stop abusing the English language." :)

[mark13.livejournal.com]

Yeah 'action' is a pretty loathsome usage, although there are things in the darker depths of the lexicon which make me cringe far more, such as public speakers appending "-ise" to a poor unsuspecting noun whenever they can't think of the right verb.

Oh, and the next person I hear using the word 'imagineer' gets poked in the eye.

"Verbing weirds language" - Calvin, Calvin & Hobbes

[djpsyche.livejournal.com]

I haven't heard that one yet. Maybe I should stay away from the law firms after all ;)

Re: "Verbing weirds language" - Calvin, Calvin & Hobbes

[mark13.livejournal.com]

'Imagineer' is more of a film industry term. I think it was coined by someone like Spielberg to describe a process already perfectly well served by the word 'create'.

And in a similar vein - 'reimagining', which seems to mean 'a remake of a perfectly good film, in which all the elements that made the original so popular are removed and replaced with a nu-metal soundtrack, a bland hero and a novelty cameo from a pop star'.

Re: "Verbing weirds language" - Calvin, Calvin & Hobbes

[minusbat.livejournal.com]

Disney coined it. It might even be a trademark of theirs actually.

Re: "Verbing weirds language" - Calvin, Calvin & Hobbes

[mark13.livejournal.com]

Ah, knew it was someone along those lines.

I believe Disney have also trademarked the word 'flogging' inasmuch as it applied to deceased equines, and have a licence to charge a fee for supplying quantities of superannuated rope.

Re: "Verbing weirds language" - Calvin, Calvin & Hobbes

[minusbat.livejournal.com]

http://answers.google.com/answers/threadview?id=58918

[darkvervain.livejournal.com]

Can you provide an example? :P
Who the hell says "we were sat down"!?! I've never heard of that before!
One of my biggest pet peeves is the oft-used southern phrase: "fixin' to".

[darkvervain.livejournal.com]

Southern American, I mean. (to be more explicit)

[djpsyche.livejournal.com]

Who the hell says "we were sat down"!?! I've never heard of that before!

English people! Who should know better! And they'll *swear* it's actually correct! *Sigh*

One of my biggest pet peeves is the oft-used southern phrase: "fixin' to".

My least favourite Southernism is "ax you a question".

[http://users.livejournal.com/_blackjack_/]

[pedant]The OED has action in use as a verb as early as 1733, in the sense of "to institute a legal action against".[/pedant]

[djpsyche.livejournal.com]

Ok, so when they mean "have you filed this lawsuit yet", then they are allowed to say it. But not when they mean "have you filed this letter"!

[http://users.livejournal.com/_blackjack_/]

The OED also has "2. To take action on (a request, etc.), to process; to put into effect. Used esp. in business jargon." in use from 1962, which is relatively recent, but old enough that we're probably stuck with it.

irritating

[xpi.livejournal.com]

It would be great if we could just move forward on this.

[jasontheknight.livejournal.com]

Unfortunately, English is defined by its usage (as with any language), so it won't be too long before it's been slipped into every dictionary in Christendom.

[spangle-kitten.livejournal.com]

I hate the phrase 'signage' (and generally puting '-age' on the end of a word to make it a plural) Having working in retail it crops up quite often. We got told to 'position the signage' which make no gramatical sense whatsoever! It's SIGNS for goodness sake!

I highly reccommend you read George Calin's "When will Jesus bring the Pork Chops?" it's fantastic :)

[mr-targ.livejournal.com]

I think it's an attempted inflexion of the noun, misclassifying it as a finite verb, in a haphazard attempt to form a verbal noun.

It is vulgar and unnecessary.