[Chyld]

'Meh' makes Collins English Dictionary
Whatever

The interjection "meh" has beaten "frenemy", "huggles" and "jargonaut" for inclusion in the 30th anniversary edition of the Collins English Dictionary following an invitation to the unwashed masses to submit neologisms reflecting the current state of play with our beloved mother lingo.

According to the Times, meh was chosen by a panel of judges in the "Word of Mouth" campaign "because of its frequent use today". It was suggested by Erin Whyte of Nottingham, who described it as “an exp​ression of utter boredom or an indication of how little you care for an idea”.The dictionary will define the word as "an interjection to suggest indifference or boredom - or as an adjective to say something is mediocre or a person is unimpressed".

Cormac McKeown, Collins Dictionaries head of content, said: “This is a new interjection from the US that seems to have inveigled its way into common speech over here. It was actually spelt out in The Simpsons, when Homer is trying to prise the kids away from the TV with a suggestion for a day trip. They both just reply ‘meh’ and keep watching TV; he asks again and Lisa says, ‘We said MEH! - MEH, meh!’"

The rise of meh is apparently a sign of how email and the interwebs are "creating language". McKeown explained: “Internet and email are playing a big part in formalising the spellings of vocal interjections like these. Other examples would be hmm and heh, which are both now ubiquitous online and in emails. People are increasingly writing in a register somewhere in between spoken and written English.”

Regular readers will recall that "pod slurping" was crowned Oz word of the year 2007, while "wiki" last year poked its ugly face into the online edition of the Oxford English Dictionary. Whatever. ®


http://www.theregist...2008/11/17/meh/

Like, thanks to the Doctor or something.

Well, of course it was going to get in there. Look what it had to go up against! "Frenemy", "huggles" and "jargonaut"! I only recognise one of those words, and its a cuddly word girls use! Damn.

[Spoon Poetic]

What the hell is a jargonaut??

I find this all really strange. Obviously "meh" is not a real word. I find that it does not belong in the dictionary. Same with "ain't" and all the other slang and made up words that are ending up in there. Maybe I'm a grammar snob, but I think these words deserve like, their own section in the dictionary, so that it's clear that the words cannot be used in a term paper, for Scrabble, or in any way when you're trying to make yourself sound intelligent. They're conversational terms at best, hick language at worst, but their inclusion into the dictionary is making them "okay" to use. (I saw the word "okay" in a peer's term paper the other day. Ugh!)
Did you know that "stupider" and "stupidest" are in the dictionary now, too? With no indication whatsoever that it is technically incorrect, and at best a colloquial saying?

People argue that the rules of language are ever changing, else we'd still be speaking in the tongue of Beowulf or whatever, but I mean ya gotta draw the line somewhere. Yeah I use all kinds of crazy words when I'm just having an informal conversation or typing on the internet, but some of these words just reek of ignorance and lack of education and they just do not belong on my Scrabble board, dammit!!!

[Chyld]

Did you know that "stupider" and "stupidest" are in the dictionary now, too? With no indication whatsoever that it is technically incorrect, and at best a colloquial saying?

Technically, they're... what are those words for comparing things called? So if those sort of words are allowed, those two should be.

IE, I am the stupidest person in my house, but the people in the FR forums are stupider. Not colloquialism, comparison. Man, I wish I could have done an etymology degree, that would have been fun.

[Spoon Poetic]

They are superlatives, but incorrect ones. The correct phrasing would be, Bob is more stupid than Frank, but Bubba is the most stupid of all of them.

You know, like you don't say heinous-est. It's the most heinous thing I've ever seen. You also don't say, Hilary Duff is beautiful-er than Paris Hilton, but Lindsay Lohan is the beautiful-est. You say more beautiful, most beautiful. There are rules, and the word "stupid" is falls into the "more and most" category instead of the "-er and -est" category.

[TheOrator]

To be fair, however, words with two syllables have no rules and are a case by case basis.

I don't know if they are supposed to be stupider or more stupid.

"Stupider," even more technically, would be the comparative, and "stupidest" would be the superlative.

[Spoon Poetic]

Right. Comparative. Forgot that bit. (I'm great at remembering the practice of the rules, not so much with the names of them.)

And it's not that two-syllable words have no rules. Yes it's a case-by-case basis, but those ARE the rules. That's why we get taught this stuff in school. It's the rule that you don't use -er and -est with the word stupid, you use more and most.

[civilian_number_two]

Spoon would prefer the (alleged) classical "more stupid" and "most stupid." Not all comparatives and superlatives (there's the terms for you Chyld) accept the suffixes. However, why she's bent up about this one I don't know; many words have evolved to allow the suffix that did not in the past.

Well, I should qualify that. In the days of OLD English (Beowulf), the adverbs "more" and "most" had no equivalent. Every word demanding a comparative or a superlative took a suffix. So the old Enlish equivalents of "realer," "righter," "wronger" and so forth are out there. Some time in the 13th century, in the days of MIDDLE English, the adverbs moved in, and were used either alone or together with the suffixes. "Most good" might appear instead of "better," and you might even see a thing like "more better." NOW we have some standards, but finding a rule would be insane. Some have tried mnemonics such as one-syllabe words take suffixes while multisyllabics take adverbs, but there are so many exceptions that it would take a pretty long rhyme to work them all in. I believe currently ALL three-plus-syllable words take the adverbs. For a while, common usage evolved rules regarding which words would allow the suffix and which required the adverbs, and these alliances have shifted over the years. The colloquial tendency these days seems to favour the suffixes, so maybe that's why we have "stupider" and "stupidest" now. But the latter of those is so natural to hear that it must have been around for some time. Spoon, what era are you hearkening back to? Because "That's the stupidest thing I have ever heard" sounds more natural to me than "That is the most stupid thing I have ever heard." I don't think in my lifetime I have ever heard that second sentence out loud. I know I am older than you are, so I imagine we'd need a print source for your allegation.

Anyway, without the evolution of language we wouldn't have the adverbs at all. So Spoon, you HAVE to accept the evolution of your language (How do you spell "colour? centre?"). But at the same time you needn't worry. The dictionary's goal is to formalise (how do you spell that?) the spelling and definition of words, as a reference for readers and speakers unfamiliar with them. The inclusion of a word in the dictionary doesn't indicate that it will suddenly appear in Harper's magazine. You shouldn't worry about seeing "meh" in your formal writing, like, ever, mkay?

(Too bad about your Scrabble game though)

This post has been edited by civilian_number_two: 21 November 2008 - 07:02 PM
Reason for edit:: reread it, corrected an error

[TheOrator]

Man, I actually agree with Civ.


Like, to a scary extent. His example in support of 'stupidest' was in fact the example I would have used had the issue been pressed. Down to the same sentence.

High five, Civ!

[Spoon Poetic]

I know, and I said, people are going to argue that language has to evolve, etc. I just think that some of this evolution is crap. I have reason to believe I WILL start seeing "meh" in formal writing, since it's not acceptable to use the word "okay," etc. I like language to sound educated.

I'm not too big on the whole stupidest-stupider thing, it's just an example of something that used to be wrong but is now perfectly okay. I think I even tend to use stupidest from time to time.

(I do spell "colour" and "behaviour" etc., though - all the books I read as a kid drilled some old and/or British spelling into me that I've never been able to get out, mostly extra U's.)

Evolution of language, fine. But I don't want words like "ain't" and "meh" and "dunno" creeping into formal writing, like, ever.

[civilian_number_two]

I remember, and this is old guy talk now, when "Aint" got into the dictionary. It was like 30 years ago or so. We used to have this joke "Aint aint a word cause it aint in the dictionary," and we were bummed out because now it was. 30 years later, it's still not a part of formal writing, and in fact you don't hear it much outside the South. "Meh" will have limited longevity, trust me. It doesn't read well, and you don't hear it spoken that much neither.

I am still curious to know when "Stupidest" was ever incorrect. I honestly think you may be mistaken on that one.

I like intentionally wrong writing, when it has its place. Alice's "curiouser and curiouser" charmed me as a kid. After I read The Adventures of Tom Sawyer (abridged; I was 9), I tried to write a story in that style, with lots of "dunno"s and "gonna"s in it. My teacher circled them all in red and told me they were wrong. I adamantly used Tom Sawyer as my defence, and she told me in no uncertain terms that I was flat-out wrong, Tom Sawyer be damned. I spoke to the sixth grade teacher about it, and she smiled and told me all about the First Person narrative, and reliability of narrators, writing in the vernacular, and a number of other things I was too young and ADHD to really be learning at that age. I suspect my soft attitude about language fidelity, my love of Mark Twain, and possibly my preference for brunettes all stem from that one experience.

PS: High five, Orator. Won't leave you hanging.

[David-kyo]

Very well summarized, Civ #2, respect.

[smartarse]Anyway, Spoon, there are no incorrect forms in linguistics, only ungrammatical ones.[/smartarse]
No matter what a literature teacher tells you, language doesn't decay with time; it's not getting worse and worse because of people being exposed to the internet. There are changes, of course. Prescriptivists tend to argue that there is a pristine form of language which we should return to, but that's a load of bollocks. Just look at, say, the difference between one's language and that of their grandparents. What's considered an appropriate exp​ression today might have been considered awkward, or out of place back then (and vica versa, for instance, the word "nigger" used to be a completely non-offensive and acceptable way of referring to black people yonks ago). The point I'm trying to get to is that there is no "good" form; prescriptivists would always find problems with their language regardless of the period they live in. And yes, I'm fully aware of the fact that there are fucked-up exp​ressions that are painful to hear, but they still aren't supposed to be considered "wrong". Yes, even "fucked-up" is a more accurate description.

IE, I am the stupidest person in my house, but the people in the FR forums are stupider.

We love you, too.

[Mirithorn]

I'm alright with the change of colloquialisms to a certain extent, but it really irks me to see language moving so far from its roots. There's a difference between a language evolving a bit over time and being just plain stupid about it. No matter what, I will NEVER accept "If you think that, you've got another thing coming". It makes no sense as a colloquialism. Same with "It's a doggy dog world." Language needs to make sense, and it makes more sense if you can tell where things came from and (at least for reading the works of others) what it was intended to mean.

Nevertheless, I do agree that the word "meh" ought not be in any dictionary. It is a sound effect and nobody needs a definition. My Latin-English dictionary translates any sort of uncomfortably anatomical word into different Latin rather than English . Perhaps we should do the same thing in English dictionaries, just so that if you're the sort of person who bothers to look up the word "meh" you at least learn some Latin at the same time.

[TheOrator]

What's the matter with "You've got another thing coming"?

Who says "It's a doggy dog world"?

Meh is not an onamatapoeia, it's just a sound.

And if we're getting technical about grammar, it ought not to be in the dictionary.

[civilian_number_two]

Believe it or not Orator, some folks mishear Dog Eat Dog and say that thing, which of course is meaningless.

As for "another thing coming," it doesn't work in this context. The original exp​ression was "If you think that, you've got another think coming." It was a play on "another thing coming," almost certainly, but specific to this context and deliberately ungrammatical. Correcting it, as Mirithorn says, just isn't funny and makes saying all those words uneconomical at best.

If one were to say it with "thing," it'd be better simply to say "think again."

[Mirithorn]

In fact, although "you've got another think coming" is used less frequently, it is the original phrase. It is a waste of words to use the phrase "you've got another thing coming" instead of "you're wrong", given that it's not witty and doesn't really have any added force, and it would have been so just as much when the phrase originated.

And if we're going to get picky about meaning, I shouldn't have preceded a point in keeping with all above it with "nevertheless" either. I was a bit tired.