36. Sick, Ridiculous, Terrific: English language over time

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[00:00:01.630] - César (Guest)

Hello, and welcome back to English and Beyond, an English language learning podcast where we explore the quirks, complexities, and fascinating history of the English language and British culture, or whatever I feel like exploring in reality. Remember that you can download the transcript at www.morethanalanguage.com, as well as test yourself on the most difficult vocabulary from this and every other recent episode using the flashcards that you can find on the same website.

[00:00:34.330] - Oliver (Host)

How often do you stop to think about where the words we use every day come from? And have you ever thought about the words we don't use anymore? Language is a living thing: it grows, it changes, it adapts, and sometimes, words simply vanish. But here's the twist. Not all of them stay gone. Some words disappear for decades or even centuries before suddenly returning to our everyday conversations situations as if they had never left. Often, we don't even realise that they're as old as they are. English is a famously adaptable language. New words seem to be coined, seem to be invented every year. In every other major European language, there's often a complaint that English encroaches, it invades the space of other languages.

[00:01:22.400] - Oliver (Host)

I've heard many, many Italians complain that their compatriots, their fellow Italians, use far too much English in everyday conversations, and especially in the office. Some European countries have established institutions to regulate the use of their language, like the Royal Spanish Academy. These bodies simply don't exist for English, and the philosophy of these regulatory bodies would be very alien in the UK. For example, the Académie Française states that the primary function of the academy will be to work with all possible care and diligence to establish definitive rules for our language and to make it pure, eloquent, and capable of addressing the arts and sciences. This attitude would be unthinkable for an imagined English equivalent. Instead, the English language is very happy to steal words from all over the world and is generally not very worried about maintaining its "purity". So, bearing all this in mind today, we're going to explore the words that English has lost over time, the reason words disappear, and the surprising ways some of them make a comeback, and even some some words that might vanish in the near future. Modern languages are in constant motion, and since there's nobody to oversee changes in English, words that seem timeless to us now may one day, quite soon, be considered ancient history. So let's begin.

[00:02:46.600] - Oliver (Host)

As I have noted already, English has arguably borrowed, adapted, and abandoned more words than almost any other language and over the centuries, many words have simply faded away. Some of them are beautiful words that describe experiences we still have today, yet for some reason they didn't survive. One good example of a word that has been lost is 'eftsoons', which was once a common way of saying soon after or shortly afterwards. At some point, English speakers just stopped using it in favour of the simpler soon. Another example is 'dwealth', which used to mean error or misstep. Now, we would just say 'mistake'. Another word that meant the same fate is 'meseems', which simply meant 'it seems to me'. Instead of using this elegant the old word, English evolved towards the simpler phrase, I think. In Spanish and French, it's quite useful sometimes to have the less personal 'me parece' and 'il me semble'. I think it's a shame that we no longer use meseems, although I think most English speakers would be able to guess its meaning if you did decide to incorporate it into your conversation. Why do words like these disappear?

[00:03:52.890] - Oliver (Host)

Obviously, languages change naturally over time, and words disappear for a few key reasons. First, redundancy plays a huge role. If a word is a simpler or more commonly used alternative, people tend to stop using the older and more complex version. That's why as eftsoons was replaced with soon. It's simply easier. Another reason this complexity. If a word is too difficult to pronounce or too formal, it tends to fade away over time. For example, we had words like quotha, which once meant indeed, especially in a sarcastic context. However, perhaps it sounded awkward and overly refined, so people just stopped using it.

[00:04:36.140] - Oliver (Host)

Cultural shifts also have a huge impact. Some words fall out of use simply because society itself has evolved. We no longer use thou and thee because English has moved towards a simpler pronoun system, one that eliminated the formal versus informal distinction that still exists in languages like Spanish or French. To go on a short digression, I find these words thou, thee, thy, which are archaic, old-fashioned versions of you, subject, you, object, and your, possessive, especially interesting, because it only really now exist in some religious contexts or when people are trying to sound humorously formal.

[00:05:15.600] - Oliver (Host)

In the former context, you hear it in prayers, especially. For example, the Lord's prayer begins, "Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name". I think most English native speakers would assume from that context and others that thou and thy are the more formal versions of you and your, but it's actually quite the opposite. The thou was the English version of Spanish, French, and Italians "tu", and you was our version of vosotros, vos, and voi, all of which began life as the formal version of the second person address, even if they've now been replaced in that formal function by other words in Spanish and Italian. Over time, this informal thou was lost to most English speakers, though some people in Yorkshire do apparently still use it in everyday speech, like a mother, for example, telling her child to wash thy hands. Anyway, those are some of the ways that words die, but not all of them stay dead. Some words disappear for centuries and they make a surprising comeback in some sort of linguistic resurrection.

[00:06:21.150] - Oliver (Host)

One great example of a word that has returned after a long hiatus, a long break, is unfriend. Believe it or not, Shakespeare actually used this word in his plays back in the 16th century. It disappeared for a very long time. But when Facebook introduced the concept of unfriending someone, the word was revived in a completely modern context. If you had asked me previously, though, I would have bet a lot on it being a newly-invented word. Then there are words where certain meanings disappeared and returned. For example, you may know that the word sick can mean cool or amazing. For example, label, Lady Gaga and Beyoncé have both used the word in this way to describe their songs as being good. Lady Gaga sang, "Let's Have Some Fun, This Beat is sick", on one of her earlier singles, and Beyoncé, in one of her best songs, Partition, sang/rapped "I sneezed on the beat and the beat got sicker". This might sound like thoroughly modern slang, but it was actually used in the 1800s in exactly the same way. It disappeared for a long time and then resurface in contemporary slang. It was used in the 1800s, sick, to describe a wild or intense experience. But it wasn't until the 1920s jazz scene that musicians began using sick as a compliment for an outstanding performance. It resurfaced in the 1950s as part of countercultural slang, meaning cool or edgy, about the Beatnik culture.

[00:07:51.070] - Oliver (Host)

And in the 1990s, it appeared again, spreading into hip hop and street culture. From then, it has become a mainstream way of saying something was incredible. But I can guarantee you that virtually every young English speaker using this word now would be shocked and maybe horrified to find out that their great grandparents may have been using this word in a similar way. Another word that is popular nowadays, though this time with absolutely everyone, is the word ridiculous. This comes from the Latin word ridere, which means 'to laugh', and made its way into middle English to describe things worthy of being laughed at. However, apparently it all but disappeared during the 17th and 18th centuries before returning to modern English in the 19th century. It's now an incredibly common word used in various different contexts, and it's hard to imagine English without it. So why did these words come back? Usually, it's because of cultural shifts, technological changes, or new trends in communication. Actually, these same tech changes are responsible for us losing some words. Some candidates for the future are fairly obvious. Floppy desk will eventually disappear simply because no one uses them anymore. The same, I imagine, goes for VCR - when was the last time you saw one of those? But another interesting example is dial, as in dial a telephone number. When I was growing up, we actually had a phone in the house that did have a real dial. It's hard to explain how they work, but since many of my listeners are actually older than me, I may not need to. But essentially, a rotary dial for a phone would be a circular dial with holes representing each number. You'd put your finger in the appropriate hole for the relevant number and rotate it round the face of the telephone to dial in that number. This was quite a long and cumbersome movement for 11 digit British phone numbers, but it was quite fun. Nowadays, smartphones don't have dials, and it's possible that younger generations will eventually stop using the word entirely. There are already alternatives to saying dial. You can say, in case of an emergency, call 999 instead of dial 999. A lot of the time, you'll hear people talking about typing in or just putting in a phone number. Something that sounds extremely American to me would be punching a phone number, but Google assures me that Americans do actually occasionally say that.

[00:10:20.640] - Oliver (Host)

Then we have new words that currently seem cutting edge, that seem new and exciting, but may well have their days numbered too. Will we still be saying selfie in 50 years? Will influencer still be a career title or will it have been replaced by something else? Language changes at an unpredictable pace and what seems permanent today might vanish tomorrow.

[00:10:44.040] - Oliver (Host)

Now, I have a question for you, listener. Are there any words that you think should make a comeback? Maybe one of the words I mentioned today, or maybe one from another language that you think English desperately needs. Or on the flip side, are there any words you think we should get rid of entirely? Words that are outdated, overused, or just plain annoying. Let me know. You can message me on Instagram @BritishEnglishandBeyond, or leave a comment on Spotify or YouTube. And of course, don't forget to subscribe to the podcast so you never miss an episode. César, are you ready to have a chat?

[00:11:22.650] - Oliver (Host)

So, César, one of the things that I asked the listener was, are there any words in your own language that you think English could benefit from? So, are there any words in Spanish, do you think, or any constructions that you think English, you know, as I say, could utilise?

[00:11:40.610] - César (Guest)

Well, I'm thinking of a word that is sobremesa, which it would be translated as "over table" or something like that. It describes the idea of going for lunch, going for dinner, and then stay(ing) at the restaurant or stay(ing) at your friend's house at the table after lunch, after dinner for hours, basically. In Spain, it happens a lot that you go for lunch around 2pm, have lunch. Lunch is done by 3:30pm, but then you stay with a coffee, then you have a drink, a gin and tonic, for example. You just stay talking for three hours. You know, many times we left the restaurant around 6: 00 PM, 7: 00 PM.

[00:12:27.460] - Oliver (Host)

I get quite bored after spending such a long time talking. Yes, that is true, actually. It's funny you should say that because at the moment, I'm writing an episode about British drinking culture. Maybe the reason we don't have that word is because we don't have that culture of sitting and speaking-

[00:12:47.420] - César (Guest)

Not in restaurants, at least.

[00:12:49.140] - Oliver (Host)

Yeah. But I would say in general, that one of the things that I'm talking about in that episode is how long, how basically Spanish people drag out their drinking for a very long period of time, whereas British people tend to binge. There are lots of reasons for that, which is what that episode is about. That's true, actually, that in every language, people always make this big deal, don't they? Out of the fact that some words exist in one language and there's no equivalent term in another. Although I've seen some memes of German for this, where German has a reputation for having a word for everything. Then some people who have learned German say, well, it's not that they have a word for everything, it's just that basically they'll just keep putting words together to make a really big word to express an idea. So, like, Sobremesa would be like "long-drinking-session-after-dinner" or something like that. And then they're like, "Oh, we have a word for that". I don't know how true that is or not.My German is not good enough. But I think that, of course, you'll have some words that don't exist in language because they don't have that type of-

[00:14:04.270] - César (Guest)

It is true that in this case, British people don't really need that word because there's not this habit. But things like getting up early, I'm really surprised that there is not a word to describe the idea, a verb to describe the idea of getting up early. We have "madrugar" in Spanish, and I think in other languages, you also have... Because it's something that many people do, right, so, in the same way, I'm surprised that we don't have in Spanish a verb to describe the idea of commuting, to commute. We don't have any verb to describe that action. We say going to work or the journey where you go to work, but we don't have a specific word for that. It's very tempting to make some jokes about Spanish culture.

[00:14:55.960] - César (Guest)

About going to work?

[00:14:58.950] - Oliver (Host)

But, but well, that and also the concept of getting up early maybe doesn't exist in the UK because we just all get up early.

[00:15:05.720] - César (Guest)

Maybe. That's not an exception.

[00:15:07.550] - Oliver (Host)

Yeah. But to be fair, that is absolutely not the case for you and me.

[00:15:11.400] - Oliver (Host)

What time do you wake up?

[00:15:12.570] - Oliver (Host)

Exactly. When you dragged me out of bed, you've been up for a long time. But I find it really hard to madrugar, to wake up early. And I actually googled, how do you say madrugar in English, to see.

[00:15:28.020] - César (Guest)

Do (did) you have to look it up on "Word Reference"?

[00:15:30.750] - Oliver (Host)

No, I wanted to see whether there was a... Because I feel like there's something on the tip of my tongue, I feel like there is a verb. So I googled and it literally just says, "get up early, rise early". And so, maybe you're right, and there is no word for it, which is funny. But it is also true that I often want to say, I'll be talking to someone in Spain about, you know, they'll ask about London, and I'll say, "Oh, one of the problems of London is always the long commute." And I end up having to explain the concept of what I want to say because I'll be like, the journey, the voyage to work, which obviously sounds stupid. I suppose that in general, that, again, I don't know how much these things are true or how much it's just something that people say, but theoretically, the Eskimos have loads of different words for snow. I don't know if it's actually true. Whereas in other countries which don't have snow, you'll have just one because they don't need all these different kinds of words. I suppose languages adapt to what is needed, and that can change over time as well.

[00:16:40.260] - Oliver (Host)

Obviously, what was needed in the 15th century is not what is needed now. Exactly. But then I thought that it was quite interesting about words like unfriend and ridiculous. Ridiculous in particular, because ridiculous is a word that is used so often in English that it's almost started to go the same way as words like literally where literally is almost never used literally nowadays, but instead as a synonym of just extremely. "When I got home last night, I was literally dying of hunger," would be a totally typical phrase to use. But it literally doesn't really mean anything except just drawing emphasis now.

[00:17:22.610] - César (Guest)

It's a way of emphasising something.

[00:17:25.320] - Oliver (Host)

It's not enough now to just say, I was really hungry. I'm literally dying. And ridiculous is becoming a bit like that, where everything is ridiculously good or ridiculously bad.

[00:17:39.230] - César (Guest)

I'm thinking as well of devastating.

[00:17:42.870] - Oliver (Host)

Devastating.

[00:17:42.980] - César (Guest)

Sometimes it's used like, when something is upsetting but not devastating.

[00:17:47.780] - Oliver (Host)

That might just be me, though.

[00:17:51.410] - César (Guest)

Oh really?

[00:17:52.260] - Oliver (Host)

I'm just absolutely devastated. Why do you say that? What makes you think of it?

[00:17:56.780] - César (Guest)

Because I think on the news, on the news. People using that word to describe things that had happened that were not good, but devastating for me, it sounds like something very, very tragic.

[00:18:12.930] - Oliver (Host)

Oh, yes. Okay, fine.

[00:18:14.820] - César (Guest)

It's like, "Oh, Beyoncé has cancelled the tour. This is devastating."

[00:18:20.160] - Oliver (Host)

Yeah. People for things that are not really... Okay, yes, that's true. Well, actually, you get lots of good examples of that where things have lost their meaning over time because a word like devastating, for example, is from the Latin, "de", or "de", "vastare" has the same root as "waste" in English. Basically, it's like to totally destroy or totally to lay waste to something. As you say, it's actually a really literal strong meaning. And it's the same - do you know the verb to decimate?

[00:18:55.170] - César (Guest)

No, it doesn't ring any bell(s).

[00:18:57.280] - Oliver (Host)

You could say, you could use it about something like an army, like the army has been completely decimated. So if you look it up online, then you will get things, its meaning means "to kill or destroy, remove a large proportion of" and you can get examples that are not about death and destruction, as in "an industry decimated by recession". But decimate itself actually literally means to remove or to kill one in every 10. Because I think that there's a Roman story where the punishment was to decimate an army or decimate a city where they just brought people out and killed one in 10 people. But 10%, if you used decimate for an army or decimate for an industry, as I used in that example, and it lost only 10%, that would rarely be a strong enough example now to use decimate. Decimate implies to most people total destruction. I don't know whether I probably should know this, having chosen this for the topic of the episode, but it feels like words have a general pattern of losing their true intensity as it goes through, as the language progresses and language evolves. Words like horrible or awful, to be full of awe, or horrible would be something that causes you horror.

[00:20:27.140] - Oliver (Host)

But horrible doesn't really mean nothing anymore. You could say, "Oh, that performance was a bit horrible" from a singer. It doesn't mean that the performance was so bad that it struck you down with horror, that you were left your mouth open, tears streaming down your face, crying with fear because Rosalia sang out of tune.

[00:20:45.830] - César (Guest)

Talking about these words, I thought about the word 'terrific'.

[00:20:50.170] - Oliver (Host)

Oh, yeah.

[00:20:50.450] - César (Guest)

Which when I first heard that word in the UK, I thought it was something negative. Oh, this is horrific.

[00:20:57.570] - Oliver (Host)

I imagine it was originally negative.

[00:21:00.650] - César (Guest)

Okay. Well, because I immediately thought of the word "terrorifico" in Spanish, which is something horrible.

[00:21:08.470] - Oliver (Host)

Yeah. Well, that's interesting that in Spanish, it has maintained its negativity, and in English, it's lost it and become, I think, exclusively positive now. I've never heard of anyone say something was terrific in terms of actually causing terror.

[00:21:22.750] - César (Guest)

A bit like sick, that you mentioned on your monologue.

[00:21:26.260] - Oliver (Host)

Yeah. Although sick has maintained its double meaning, which is interesting. But maybe in 50 years time, using sick to mean unwell will sound incredibly old-fashioned. People will watch films from the 2020s, and someone will say, Oh, she's terribly sick. And they'll be like, "What does that mean?"

[00:21:51.550] - César (Guest)

Another thing, you mentioned an expression, I think it was a word that Americans use more often than British people. That's another thing. With languages like English, Spanish, you also have the complication of having so many countries speaking that language, and sometimes having misunderstood about -

[00:22:14.640] - Oliver (Host)

Misunderstandings.

[00:22:15.540] - César (Guest)

Misunderstandings, sorry, about how the words are used. Yesterday, someone from Uruguay told me that she didn't want to wear any tank tops, but she used the word musculosas, which means in Spanish from Spain, muscly. Someone who's muscly.

[00:22:35.980] - Oliver (Host)

Muscular woman.

[00:22:36.810] - César (Guest)

Muscular woman. So I thought she was telling me that she didn't want to become muscular. So we had a misunderstanding, a misunderstanding for like a minute until I had to clarify, what do you mean by not wanting to become masculine, muscular? And she was (like), "No, I'm talking about not wanting to put on tank tops."

[00:22:58.010] - Oliver (Host)

Yeah, yeah, yeah. We will end the episode there, César. So thank you very much for chatting to me about this today.

[00:23:04.610] - Oliver (Host)

Thank you, Oliver. Thank you.

[00:23:07.640] - Oliver (Host)

Listener, as always, please do subscribe to the podcast because it helps us get discovered by more people who are learning English.

[00:23:15.030] - César (Guest)

Recommend to other students.

[00:23:17.750] - Oliver (Host)

Exactly. Yeah. Thank you very much for listening. And until next time.