Superfluous Affix Agglutination Creep

"Seriously, this one gets to me every time."

It's not that they're adding superfluous suffixes onto these words. It's that they were already there, and folks removed them. Over time this practice made it into common usage. The suffix -al properly ends these words for the same reason the suffix -ly ends the word 'seriously'.

What if you had written instead "Serious, this one gets me every time." What you meant is perfectly clear of course, but it looks strange, yes? To someone used to their correct spellings, those other words look just as ill-formed and mis-spelt.

I appreciate what you are saying. There are many instance in which what you say is absolutely correct.

I am not (at least in this post) advocating dropping all the -al, -ly, or -ality suffixes.

The situation I intend to describe is one where the root word exists in use and (at least from my perspective) then an alternate (created by adding suffix but without altered meaning) sees a surge in popularity.

I'm having difficulty finding references to verify whether the increase in use is strictly due to the sampling bias of my personal experience.

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at any rate, i think words the words I used as original examples are not improper nor odd sounding in the same way serious/seriously was in the example provided.

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Moreover I would argue that dynamical and aerodynamical are the odd sounding and improper constructions.

Who exactly is the creep you have in mind? (Or should one say creepage?)

I can be a bit of a pedant at times, but oddly some of the Americanisms that grate on me most turn out to be closer to the original English than the usage in the UK.
My current pat hate is 'repurpose' and the general trend to treating random words as verbs.
Like at the Olymics saying we are hoping to 'Medal' or 'podium' ... grrr ftzzzz hissss, no! Maybe they are hoping to meddle or to win a medal.
Del

Whatever difference of opinion one might have with G'Dub, it is certainly difficult to dispute his claim of being 'misunderestimated'.

It is certainly difficult to understand his claim of being 'misunderestimated'.

A recurring theme of his presidency was; time and again, he made himself immune to a rhetorical device commonly used for criticism; namely the hyperbole of exaggerated underestimation of competencies.

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His immunity was brought about by displaying a level of competency far below the level his detractors originally considered to be exaggerated underestimations....

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....hence: His detractors often and severely 'misunderestimated' him, as per his own repeated admission.

repurpose repurposize

*Irregardlessly - There, now it's fixed and in it's proper form. Need it in a sentence? "He threw the aluminum can in the garbage irregardlessly."

In all seriousity, I've got a short list of words (both real and unreal) that make my mates skin crawl, especially those with a high level of diction I think part of the blame stems from everyone as a society becoming lazier and lazier. Twitter restricts us to 160 characters, texting makes it a pain to form long form coherent sentences, and everyone is so "busy" that they can't just use the phone as intended and form sentences like a human.

Only 160 characters for Twitter? Depending on whom I'm writing to, I need way more than that just get past the salutation!

Don't get me started on texting. I see kids having ZERO interaction with their parents because they're too busy composing one of their 500 text messages of the day. And I don't buy that nonsense about "ooooh, she needs a smartphone so I can keep track of her". Phhhhhht. An ordinary cell phone can do that. The trick is to show the kids that it's cool to be DISconnected from all this technology and CONNECTED to their families. Steve Jobs may have been a marketing genius, but he's killing society with his products. Damn it, now I'm riled again.

Breath in, breath out ;)

Twitter restricts us to 160 characters

It's not obligatory, you know. I'm being diabolic, but half the population are born so.

Thank you, for all the excellent replies. The right mix of commiseration, correction, and comedy.

I appreciate it.

"Ruggedized"

Don't know why, but that one always makes me cringe.

In my opinion, too many people are lazy with their use of language, regardless of education. Many examples can be directly attributed to "texting", but it's been a growing problem for quite some time.

Beyond misuse and misspellings, the book, "Usage and abusage: a guide to good English", includes a section on what it calls "vogue words":

"Many words (and a few phrases) have acquired a power and an influence beyond those which they originally possessed ... Such words gain a momentum of their own, whatever the primary impulse may have been. Not all 'new' words or new senses that have come into vogue are necessarily to be castigated on that account; we need the new sense of green just as we need fax and glasnost, to name new phenomena ..."

BTW: There are some helpful online resources for word usage, such as the Tameri Guide for Writers.

I will not unthaw the pipe irregardless of my wife's pleas.

I find adding "ation" to the end of words annoying. When transport becomes transportation and document becomes documentation etc. It all seems unnecessary.

Unneccessaryation, surely?

Of causation now I'm getting confused, confation conation carnation, that's better..

What? August members of this forum mocking good usement? All of that gets under my skin stuff, that would be subjurious, right? Right?

you've completely stumped me with 'subjurious'???

subjurious, injurious, subcutaneous. Sounded like a good idea at the time...

OH, I see! I like it.

...and to think originalicaly, I completenessably beyondfurtheroverlooked the ultramostsheerest excelificent magtupendiarity of your commenticated idealalitiness.

"That's simplode a three-four you to say."

This whole thread has a radicalness of fanaticalness that I find has a incredulously ridiculousness undertonage that needs further investigativeness on our parts.

Just sayin'

The ones that annoy me even more are misused/misspelled words such as: cite/sight/site; reign/rain/rein; bear/bare. Or the people who destroy the aspect ratio of photos by using the left/right side or top/bottom handles. They should use the corner handles or otherwise make sure the aspect ratio is preserved.

You have to read (maybe reed!) everything, because spell checkers will not catch a wrongly used word such as it when you intended in.

How about 'its' and 'it's'?

Yep, those too. There (they're) are (our) lots of them, such as "to" and "too" and "two."

Or when you loose the word lose on an unsuspecting reader...

...or did you lose the word loose?

... or is that "unloosed"?

That's what I tell them I use a torque wrench for - to "unloosen" a bolt to the proper "torquage". -- JHF

No, I couldn't ask for another (that's right)
Your groove I do deeply dig
No walls only the bridge
My supper dish
My succotash wish (sing it baby)
I couldn't ask for another (uh-huh, uh-huh)
(I-I-I-I) No, I couldn't ask for another

Groove is in the hea-a-a-art
Groove is in the hea-a-a-art
Groove is in the hea-a-a-art (astronomical)
Groove is in the hea-a-a-art (hit me!)

DJ Soul? Is that you?....

Bootsie? ....Where are you guys? ....

I haven't seen you in forever!

!

Nice. New to me.

Oddly, reminds me of this

(...and come to think of is, a little of this).

My bit of commiseration:

I have a well educated co-worker who consistantly uses the word 'idealistically' in place of the word 'ideally'. One of these days I'm going to explain the difference to him. As engineers few of us are idealistic. Ideally an engineer is practical.

I know some people find it inappropriate, but I can't help but snicker as some word misuse.

Some times it is just so funny, especially when someone does it trying to sound impressive or authoritative. No one ever warns me.

No one ever lets me know in advance by saying, ''....hey, during the upcoming serious part of this discussion, I'm going to throw in a completely absurd construction....just wanted to give you a heads-up, since it would be totally inappropriate to laugh.....'' I could work with that, but no one ever does, so it catches me totally off guard and makes me sputter or snicker without time to suppress.

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Actually sometimes even when I know it is coming, I still can't help but laugh. I use to attend one of my clients monthly all-employee meetings with one particular women who when recognized to speak would inevitably begin her statement with "...Well personably, I feel that.....' only to follow suite additional freestyle grammar. Even once I realized this was to be a repeating event, I still had trouble looking at her with a straight face while she preformed spoke.

To make it worse a friend of mine who worked and in whom I had confided my difficulty in maintaining serious composure took delight trying to make me loose it. Among other tactics, he would be very insistent about being recognized to speak immediately following this particular woman and once recognized he would say with a completely straight face and begin his commentary with something like, '. I understand where you are coming from, but Hispanically speaking.....' generally bringing up things that needed to be discussed and often asking my opinion on specifics. I'm not sure exactly how many other people were aware of what was going on, but the ones who didn't might have thought I was smoking weed or something prior to those meetings.

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On a slightly different note, I find it interesting how often I hear otherwise very well spoken people use the word 'nuther'. Often in the construction, '...a whole nuther.....'

My typically response it to inquire about the availability of partial nuthers....1/2 nuthers, indivisible ownership nuthers, etc.

Well, I hope at least 4 wrong words in your thesis are intentional! Like so: one women, preformed, loose, & it. They are real words, so the spell check wouldn't complain.

small men use big words

Small women just use lots of them.

'...small men use big words...'

That is quite subjective. After all,

to a small mind most words are big.

My favorite is "MSDS sheets". When the guys ask where the "MSDS sheets" are I tell them they are in the "Material Safety Data Sheet sheet" book. By the way, next year we will be changing from Material Safety Data Sheet sheets to Safety Data Sheet sheets.

I also liked the governmentese for the change over deadline. It is NOT Dec 31, 2013... it is Dec 31, 2012 with a one year grace period! Sure glad I get the difference. -- JHF

oooh yeah! That is yet another species of thought-free vernacular.

I often hear people say they are going to the 'ATM Machine'.

snicker nicker snicker.

...where they punch in their PIN number...

Interesting. This thread has been running several days now and English Rose, CR4's resident pedant petal, is nowhere to be seen. Hmmmmmmmm........

The one that has me grinding my teeth is "myself"

A policeman, "He brought the evidence to myself."

"Three friends and myself went to the ballgame."

Aaaaaarrgh.