Going Forward

Now, I know that from time to time I like to have a bit of a moan about things, but I don't really enjoy being grouped with the usual suspects, when it comes to being a malcontent. The typical purple ink / letters to the editor / why-oh-why-oh-why type of person is usually either a lunatic or fairly conservative in their outlook, and I like to think I'm neither. Certainly not the latter, anyway.

A good example came up in a recent issue of Oxford Today, a glossy magazine which talks up the achievements and global prominence of some small percentage of graduates of the university, as if anyone needed reminding ("Oh, that Oxford University!"). I think a magazine which emphasised the pretty modest achievements and utter insignificance of the rather larger proportion of its alumni might be more instructive. Anyway, someone had written a piece in a previous issue in which he referred to "data" as a singular noun (as in, "your data is held securely") and several pedants broke loose from their chains. "Data is a plural in Latin, so should be treated as a plural in English", they fulminated.

This is utter nonsense. As another correspondent put it nicely:

[Mr. Pedant] suggests that as 'data' is plural in Latin, it must be so in English. So does he regularly refer to 'these agenda' and 'these spaghetti'? And why is Latin so often singled out for plural pedantry? Does your correspondent know the correct Japanese plural for 'tsunami'? Would he use it if he did?

This attempted U / Non U manoeuvre, which we could describe as "learned ignorance", is very annoying. It ranks with that prissy use of "you and I" where the speaker feels the combo "you and me" must always somehow be vulgar. More nonsense. If someone says to me something like, "I thought he had already given it to you and I?" I usually reply, "Well, 'e certainly didn't give it to Oi", in my best yokel accent. They rarely see the joke. Ha! I suppose anti-pedants can be annoying, too.



Then there was a section in this weekend's Guardian, discussing "neologisms, Americanisms and lazy clichés", in response to a blog piece by Michael Holroyd. Holroyd's article was actually quite balanced but, predictably, it flushed out the sort of person (I think of John Humphrys, presenter on Radio 4's Today programme) who objects to the use of new turns of phrase on the grounds that they are new, as well as redundant, annoying, and -- above all -- used by people they do not like.

Such people miss the point and pleasure of linguistic novelty. It is very rare indeed for a neologism to arise for no reason at all. Yes, there may be older, plainer words that express the same thing, but they will always lack an important mystery ingredient, whether it be exclusivity, a sense of contemporaneity and community, or an otherwise inexpressible change in sensibility.

For example, one of the Guardian contributors wrote, "I'm loving (something) and I'm liking (whatever) are the shibboleths of the 'edgy', phones-aloft-at-Glastonbury, young, urban middle class. It's a development in the language that I'm loathing". Nicely put, but missing the point. This usage has all the social benefits outlined above (exclusivity, community, contemporaneity) but mainly signals a change in sensibility: to say "I'm liking X" is not the same as saying "I like X". It declares an element of contingency, impermanence and openness to change in one's tastes; "I like X today, but realise you may not, and may have changed my own mind by next week". It's a way of introducing a new grammatical mood or tense into the language, to match a new social mood.

Interestingly, the use of the Present Continuous tense in English is fraught with difficulty for non-native speakers. How often have you heard an otherwise faultless speaker of English say something like "I am liking this book very much", or confusing the intention of the questions "What are you reading?" and "What do you read?". Language is subtle stuff, and yet all native speakers effortlessly understand such nuances without ponderous explanations. Amazing, really.

So, when Michael Holroyd writes, "I try to quell my indignation, lower my blood pressure and keep a lookout for developments of language that are precise, witty, useful and have aesthetic value. Have you noticed any lately?" I have to answer, "Yes, I'm noticing them all the time".