Retro

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Manalto
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Retro

Post by Manalto »

I could easily have my own column, "Grammar Gripes" where I vent my endless list of complaints about the way people slaughter the language, and it could run until I collapse from exhaustion and rancor. One that jumped out at me today while shopping for a vintage fridge (yes, I still am :wtf: ) is misuse of the word "retro" for authentically vintage items. The dictionary defines the word (an abbreviation of "retrograde") as: "imitative of a style, fashion, or design from the recent past." In other words, new - made to look old, like those Crosley radios.

I would say, however, that if you have a kitchen, for example, of vintage appliances that the kitchen could be called retro; that is, imitative of the design of kitchens from the past.

"Fail" as a noun is another one that gets under my skin. Is it really too much of an effort to summon the energy to add "ure"? OK, I'll go back to my corner now.

Olson185
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Re: Retro

Post by Olson185 »

Manalto wrote:I could easily have my own column, "Grammar Gripes" where I vent my endless list of complaints about the way people slaughter the language, and it could run until I collapse from exhaustion and rancor. One that jumped out at me today while shopping for a vintage fridge (yes, I still am :wtf: ) is misuse of the word "retro" for authentically vintage items. The dictionary defines the word (an abbreviation of "retrograde") as: "imitative of a style, fashion, or design from the recent past." In other words, new - made to look old, like those Crosley radios.

I would say, however, that if you have a kitchen, for example, of vintage appliances that the kitchen could be called retro; that is, imitative of the design of kitchens from the past.

"Fail" as a noun is another one that gets under my skin. Is it really too much of an effort to summon the energy to add "ure"? OK, I'll go back to my corner now.


I have a theory for why this is.

The internet has made it possible for people to express themselves directly to a wide audience, unlike (ie.) having to write a letter to the editor of a newspaper to be heard. This means one does not have to be a writer or take above average care concerning spelling and grammar to be approved by a proofreader or editor that checks one's material.

There's a generation of internet users who don't think much of spelling and grammar and, therefore, don't know as much as the pre-internet generation who had to meet stricter editorial requirements.

This internet generation has elevated spelling and grammar ignorance to the status of "social media convention" in which it's not only "proper" but to question or correct it is seen as rude and the person doing the correcting is labelled as a politically incorrect "grammar troll" or "grammar nazi" (never mind that labeling a person is, itself, considered politically incorrect).

I find it a bit ironic that the internet has become more of a vehicle to disseminate misinformation than a vehicle for disseminating information. Case in point, the vast majority of the content on houzz.com.

BTW, my pet peeves include "utilize" instead of "use". "Utilize" used to mean to use something for a[n unintended/secondary] purpose while "use" means using something for the purpose in which it was intended. For example, "I utilized the screwdriver to dig a hole" vs "I used the screwdriver to screw in the screw."
~James

Fourth generation in a family of artists, engineers, architects, woodworkers, and metalworkers. Mine is a family of Viking craftsmen. What we can't create, we pillage, and there's nothing we can't create. But, sometimes, we pillage anyway.

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Lily left the valley
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Re: Retro

Post by Lily left the valley »

Gaming made me lazy because of text chatting. If I spent any time double checking to make sure I didn't make at least glaring errors, the conversation was three topics off where I was commenting. Raids before I had a headset were a nightmare. You could get dropped for failing to respond fast enough. I am a touch typist, so if I go off my home keys at all, that's a big mess if I'm not watching what I'm typing as well. This happens more than I like to admit because I don't sit properly while on the computer much anymore, and sometimes have a pushy cat in my lap too. Still, I persist because I decided I'd rather be part of the conversation than be less of a part just to write well all the time. Yes, that's terrible of me. Horridly lazy, even. If I'm RPing, and something comes out horridly wrong, sometimes I will emote coughing or something and correct myself. Sometimes.

That eventually drifted to forums. When I'm tired, it gets worse. Usually because I ramble write more when I'm tired, and then I've already spent time trying to shorten what I wrote because it's a wall. So a third round for editing often makes me think I should be doing something else with my time. I've even whole scale deleted some writings that just looked like a hot mess rather than post them because I couldn't spare the time to fix them, but they were that bad.

What does make me crazy is when I do try to write well, and then even after my "last draft" preview, I see something glaring in the post. It doesn't matter what the error is, I just feel annoyed with myself.

I was one of those folks who used to correct people as politely as I could. Still, I upset a lot of folks back then.

Now, my eyes sometimes still stop out of habit (I used to actually get paid to edit other writers' works, but I have lost much of what I once knew. I also question my spelling at words I know I know how to spell, but my brain isn't sure.)

Craig's List is a source of amusement more often than not. Here's a few I noticed recently:

- Rot Iron Chair (and all the other misspellings)
- Cast Iron Patio Set (that is made of rebar and other welded metal bits--but any "cast iron" claim that isn't, really)
- Moving Sail (no boats involved, nor even kites)
- any outright wrong label calling something what it is painfully obvious that it is not even close
- any botched spellings of a brand name, especially when the image(s) clearly show the actual name

My :twocents-twocents:
--Proud member of the Industrious Cheapskate Club
--Currently pondering ways to encourage thoughtful restovation and discourage mindless renovation.

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Willa
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Re: Retro

Post by Willa »

Lily left the valley wrote:- Rot Iron Chair (and all the other misspellings)


"Rod Iron" also gets me unless the item is actually made from iron rods.

Don't get me started on my loathing of the current use of the word epic to mean something other than what it means.

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Manalto
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Re: Retro

Post by Manalto »

Olson185 wrote:I have a theory for why this is.


Your theory has good reasoning behind it. I bet you're right.


Olson185 wrote: ..."utilize" instead of "use"....


Or "methodology" instead of "method" - or, even easier, "way."
Or "myself" instead of "me." (This one just drips with self-importance.)

It's open season on sounding pretentious. It doesn't matter if it's done incorrectly because if anyone dares to point out the error, they'll be thrown to the piranhas.

The first time I heard "at the end of the day" I thought the person speaking meant "around 6 p.m." Since then, it has infected everyday speech along with (cringe) "having said that" and its variants.

I could go on, but I'd rather get paid to complain. Wouldn't that be nice?

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Willa
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Re: Retro

Post by Willa »

Manalto wrote:
I could go on, but I'd rather get paid to complain. Wouldn't that be nice?


Did you ever read the Weekly World News, while it was really hot in the 1980's (Bat Boy, Elvis spottings and other lurid fake news)? You could be the new Ed Anger of grammar !

vvzz
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Re: Retro

Post by vvzz »

I don't think anyone owns the language though. Just because some bigwigs at Oxford say words should be spelled certain way or have a certain meaning, doesn't make it so. Language is a living thing that is constantly evolving.
Of course that doesn't apply to examples of dyslexia or stupidity :)

I'm personally a big fan of double negatives(I recently realized that's because in my native Russian it's the correct way), but the grammar nazis love to shun that.

I also refuse to say 'Cacti', 'Formulae' and the like. It's cactuses and formulas. We are not speaking latin and it just sounds pretentious.

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Manalto
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Re: Retro

Post by Manalto »

I'm not talking about splitting grammatical hairs here. I'm talking about sloppy use of words used as identifiers that distorts or confuses their meaning (I did go off on a tangent; please forgive me for finding it hard to resist that impulse). To get back to the original topic, I don't begrudge anyone his right to call a 60 year-old refrigerator "retro" - but understand that that is not how the word is generally understood. A person who understands the meaning of the word retro and who is looking for a refrigerator from the 1950s (I happen to know one!) is likely to pass that ad by - except for the fact that this shopper realizes that the word gets misused so often that now it might be used to mean vintage, and since old refrigerators are far more common than genuinely retro ones, it probably does - but you can't be sure until you check it out. Can you see how that's less clear and more work than just getting it right in the first place?

"Retro" will likely evolve from its current useful meaning to include authentically old items and designs; it's already well on its way. That will be a dilution of its definition, rendering it in effect useless, since we have an abundance of words that mean "old" and don't need another one that carries in its derivation a misdirection.

As a final note, I lament the loss of "appendices and indices." Sigh.

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Neighmond
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Re: Retro

Post by Neighmond »

While we are at it, let us all give the word "rare" a decent funeral and send it off to glory.

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Manalto
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Re: Retro

Post by Manalto »

OK, if you feel that strongly. I'm putting away the grill.

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