Headline: Frenemy, locavore among new words in Webster's

Russell Contreras, AP writer circa July 10 cites also vlog, webisode, flash mob, shawarma, waterboarding, green collar, stayction

For what it's worth I endorse coinings. Too often instead we attach new meanings to old words, diluting them, sometimes in an illogical fashion. Example: "drive" for semiconductor memory, "venue" for causation, "mad" for very

"Venue" for causation? Citation please?

Fal, my bad. "causation" isn't quite the right word, while "cause" has too many other meanings. I'm thinking of the usage where someone might say, "His sniffle arises from a bacterial venue." But I'll keep myself peeled for an actual example or two then report back

Either I'm getting old or this one hasn't made it down under yet, both of which are perfectly plausible explanations.

my boys use this all the time: "he has mad skills". it's an intensifier.

but that "venue" thing is just weird.

"he has mad skills".

Mad in this sense generally means 'awesome', or 'a lot'.

right. like "very".

:¬ )

right. like "very".

True that! I'm thinking the origins were a reference to 'mad' as in 'wild' or 'out there' maybe nah, but that is the sense I get.

As in "he has very skills."

perzactly.

Yer mad right.

Well then, who's mad left?

I don't get mad.

I get odd.

get?




;¬ )

Computer science types call this "overloading." Probably we plagiarized the use from somewhere else. The exact meaning of an operator or function depends on the context - the object(s) to which the operator is applied.

If we did steal the word from elsewhere, then it is self-descriptive, because its own meaning is overloaded.

My point exactly. Mad as "very good" / "awesome" I am familiar with, but mad as "very" is either mad new or a mad misunderstanding.

Not a big leap for slang though.

OTOH, "is mad awesome" gets 162,000 ghits.

he is very skilled.
he has mad skillz.

So:

is = has

..and skilled = skillz?

As in 's: For example, he's a reader or he's read everything.

I believed Buffalo Shrdlu was offering a paraphrase of he has mad skillz, not an interlinear translation.

I have seen mad used as an intensifier, very much like very. For example, mad confused (link).

yeah, what he says.



I LIKE this!!!

Onliest thing, he was using it as an example of mad used for very.

you turning into some sort of prescrip, Faldage?

Buffalo Shrdlu.
Bob Marley had a hit with this one.

Y'all people're great!

You describe the language you have, not the language you wish you had.

you got me there.

I heard it used today. One of our younger nurses reported that a patient had a reaction to one of the meds and the resulting rash was "mad itchy."

We hashed all this out in another thread, tho I don't think there was any "final answer" agreement, just as now. The real reason is that it continues to evolve. I have used it as "very", "extremely", "a lot", "a lot of", "many", "tons" etc. And when one student might correct my uso blanco, another will approve, so there's not even consensus amongst the originating users. I've noticed that most teenagers, regardless of all the PC categories, use, or at least understand, "mad skills/z", and even adults throw it in now and then... :0)

Rather like the Orwellian "double plus," an all purpose intensifier for any grammatical situation.

I mad liked the Orwellian "extra double-plus supergood"

But who would say "double plus"? That's a whole extra syllable! It's "plus plus" for me.... ;0)






and that's mad plussy (please leave in the "l"...)

This is all mad confusing???