I find it ironic that as i look for people discussing how to use ironic, nobody can quite agree on what it is. Wait – was that ironic or just coincidental? “Irony is one of the most misused words in the English language.” So say the scholars anyway. But i heard on a podcast a few days ago, and i completely agree – if the majority of the population is using a word in a certain way, isn’t that the “correct” usage, by definition? After all, language is just a construct to help facilitate communication between people, and if everyone uses a word to mean “x” (even if the dictionary says it really means “y”), who’s right – the dictionary, or the people using the word?
That’s one of the great things about the English language. It’s constantly evolving. We’d probably be hard-pressed to understand most of what someone was saying in “old english” a few hundred years ago. Many words have changed meanings, many more have gone out of day to day usage, and tons of new words have come into being. Not to mention local pop cultural references. Who can understand all those weird things in Shakespeare (unless you’re an English professor)?
Viva English … Woot!
