The Tennessee Stud

[Lif Strand <fasterhorses@gilanet.com>]

> In reply to fasterhorses@gilanet.com having
> written:
> << Second, stud is also a term for stallion, just as the word horse
> is also  used to mean stallion. >>
>
> Heidi wrote:  Technically, no.  However, the words have been
> corrupted as slang to be interchangeable.  It is the linguistic
> equivalent of saying things like "ain't", "he seen",
> "Me and Joe went", etc.  The fact that bad grammar and
> inproper word useage are common does not make them
> right.

There's two schools of thought when it comes to what we're talking about
here.  One is that language should be used a certain way, and the
other is that language must and will change to reflect the fact that
people's thinking changes.  It's the difference between Latin - a
"dead" language, but very precise because the word meanings
cannot change - and English & other living languages, where there's
lots of imprecision but meanings are allowed to change and the language
evolves over time.  Living languages are much more imprecise - words
and meanings have lots of depth and shades of meaning.  In an
evolving language, constant use of a new meaning for a word makes it
become a"correct" useage - there is no corruption, only
evolution.  

In the general (non-technical) use of language, if a word is used and the
meaning is understood, then from the linguist's point of view that use
can't be "wrong" - it can only be wrong if the meaning is
misunderstood (there's a whole field of linguistics that studies this
area, called transformational grammar.  Very fascinating to some
weird minds.).  The technical use of language is more like using
Latin - it is more black and white and of course when you're dealing with
science you need that.  

Ah, but give me the poetic use of language any day - remember that old
folk song "The Tennessee Stud"?  Does anyone think it was
about a breeding facility?  

Now, if you want to talk about corruption in language, let's pick on the
use of emoticons & acronyms.  Yuck!  Lif

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