WORDS AND THEIR MEANINGS 'When I use a word,' Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, 'it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.'
George Orwell is justifiably
renowned for his defence of the English language against a steady onslaught of mischievous
euphemism, political corruption and manipulation. It is to Orwell to whom I owe
my sensitivity to the use of language in general and the meaning of words in
particular. It’s always worth keeping an eye out for words being gradually prised
away from their meaning.
Currently the word unprecedented
is slowly being transformed to mean unexpected, unforeseen or just of
considerable scale. Thus on Friday I heard a politician declare “we have not
seen floods like this for over 250 years, they are completely unprecedented.”
This is pure nonsense, the sentence of someone who has stopped thinking when he
speaks; he cites a precedent, albeit over 250 years ago, then states that the
events described are without precedent. We know what he means, as I say, unforeseen
and of considerable scale, (though of course whilst the latter part of this
formula might be true, the former is not). He uses ‘unprecedented’ not out of
any understanding of its meaning but because he thinks it sounds more
impressive, is more likely to persuade. to silence objections.
All this may sound pedantic, but I do think it important to keep words attached to their
meaning, for every time we loose a word we loose the idea that it carries and the
language becomes consequently poorer. If, as looks increasingly likely, we loose the meaning
of unprecedented what are we going to say when we come across a phenomenon for
which there is no precedent?
A good example of this sort of process is the loss of the true meaning of the word 'critical.' It used to mean to 'intelligently appraise,' now it is reduced to meaning hostile or negative comment.
Still one thing I learnt
from Orwell, when you do highlight these subtle shifts of meaning those who have
their attention drawn cease to be tone deaf to the phenomenon.
