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#74625
06/30/2002 1:26 AM
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Joined: Jun 2002
Posts: 7
stranger
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stranger
Joined: Jun 2002
Posts: 7 |
I am unfamiliar with the word "vetting," and my Microsoft Bookshelf only gives it noun meanings. I gather in the caption below the author means as in "protection" or "surveillance," but it appears to me to be a use of a noun as a verb. What does anyone think?
GwynneF
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> From today's New York Times headlines email:
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> >>Textbook Publishers Learn to Avoid Messing With Texas
> Textbook battles are legendary in Texas, and the latest
> round has involved a coalition of nine conservative
> organizations vetting more than 150 books.
> http://www.nytimes.com/2002/06/29/arts/29TEXT.html?todaysheadlines <<
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#74626
06/30/2002 3:23 AM
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Joined: Jun 2002
Posts: 7,210
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jun 2002
Posts: 7,210 |
Hi GwynneF,
from Merriam-Webster:
Main Entry: 2 vet
Function: transitive verb
Date: 1891
Inflected Form(s): vet.ted; vet.ting
1 a : to provide veterinary care for (an animal) or medical care for (a person) b : to subject (a person or animal) to a physical examination or checkup
2 : to subject to expert appraisal or correction : EVALUATE
- vet.ter noun
so it looks like definition 2 is what you're looking for. a relatively recent word, and usage, seems like.
formerly known as etaoin...
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#74627
06/30/2002 10:45 AM
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Joined: Jun 2002
Posts: 1,624
Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Jun 2002
Posts: 1,624 |
Interestingly I can't find any provenance for the word. It's defined everywhere but its etymology is unexplained anywhere that I have access to.
And I can't even think of a likely derivation. This is terrible!
- Pfranz
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#74628
06/30/2002 1:01 PM
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Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858 |
A veterinarian checks your animals for disease. In his spare time he "vets" books for
for suitability of contents.
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#74629
06/30/2002 1:17 PM
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Joined: Jun 2001
Posts: 2,636
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jun 2001
Posts: 2,636 |
Well, at least in Texas, anyway. 
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#74630
06/30/2002 8:10 PM
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Joined: Jun 2002
Posts: 1,624
Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Jun 2002
Posts: 1,624 |
What wwh says is perfectly true. But I'm sure that the etymology of the word is different in each case. Has anyone got access to the grown-up version of the OED?
- Pfranz
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#74631
06/30/2002 9:10 PM
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Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858 |
vet
n.
short for VETERINARIAN
vt.
vetted, vetting [Colloq.]
1 to examine or treat as a veterinarian does
2 to examine, investigate, or evaluate in a thorough or expert way
vi.
[Colloq.] to work as a veterinarian
>vet2 7vet8
n.
short for VETERAN
vet
abbrev.
1 veteran
2 veterinarian
3 veterinary
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#74632
06/30/2002 10:52 PM
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Joined: Jun 2002
Posts: 7,210
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Jun 2002
Posts: 7,210 |
this, from the WordDetective: http://www.word-detective.com/041798.html(way down toward the bottom) "Perhaps the most surprising thing about "vet" is its origin, because it seems almost too simple. "Vet," the verb, like "vet" the noun, is a contraction of "veterinarian," and to "vet" originally meant to have your animal thoroughly examined by a vet. "Veterinarian," in turn, comes from the Latin "veterinae," or cattle, which constituted the bulk of early veterinarians' patients."
formerly known as etaoin...
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#74633
07/01/2002 10:44 AM
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Joined: Apr 2002
Posts: 475
addict
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addict
Joined: Apr 2002
Posts: 475 |
everyone online has access to the oed
http://www.oed.com/ ;)
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#74634
07/02/2002 6:13 PM
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Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 10,542
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 10,542 |
>everyone online has access to the oed
yes, this is absolutely true... for a mere $550 dollar-bucks (US) per annum for an individual subscriber. a slightly better deal can be had through gratis use of a proxy server via a publicly funded network subscriber, such as your local library.
meanwhile (while everyone rushes to sign up), here's some history on 'to vet' culled from the virtual pages of OED2:
vet first shows up as a verb ca. 1891 and very soon gets applied in a general way (to a person) in 1898. but it was Kipling, in 1904, who gets credit for moving on from medical examination to investigation of a person's suitability:
These are our crowd.... They've been vetted, an' we're putting 'em through their paces.
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