Evolution is imminent

And so today I was walking around the mall while waiting for my sister to come.. when I spotted an advertisement fixed on one of the pillars which went

"We are evolving to serve you better"

Oh my god. Is that scary or what? I mean, the first meaning that the word evolve triggers in me is that of the biological sense. Or something like transform. ><

Evolve has many senses, but a number of them are rarely used or even obsolete now. The senses listed below are some of the more common usages.


evolve, v.
5. trans. Chiefly Chem. To give off or emit (gas, heat, etc.) as a product of chemical, physiological, or other internal action; to liberate or disengage from a state of chemical combination. Also intr.
6. trans.
a. To extract (something implicit or potential); to derive or deduce (a conclusion, law, or principle); to develop (an idea, theory, or system). Also intr.
b. To create or imagine independently, or by a priori reasoning. Freq. in to evolve from one's inner consciousness.
7. a. trans. To generate, develop, or modify by natural processes or gradual alteration, esp. from a comparatively rudimentary to a more highly organized condition; esp. to originate (species of living organism) by gradual modification from earlier forms, to produce or modify by evolution. Chiefly in pass. without reference to an agent.
b. intr. To be transformed from one form into another by a process of gradual modification, esp. from a more rudimentary to a more highly organized condition; esp. (of a species of living organism) to be generated or transformed by evolution.
8. trans. To produce or give rise to (a condition, circumstance, process, etc.) as a natural consequence. Also intr.: to arise.


The poster above is trying to communicate the message that the staff are constantly changing and adapting their service in order to provide better service to the customers each time. However, the use of the word evolve strikes me as odd because it generates weird images of the 'change' process.

I think there could be two possibilities as to why evolve is being used here:
1. Evolve sounds like a more sophisticated word for change
2. They are really evolving, like in 7b, just in a figurative way?

I vote for 1.

Please do not remove unborrowed books from the library

This is a pretty common sign found at most libraries. You could probably see a sign like this at the National Library or even our dear Central Library. In fact, this should look familiar since it was taken at the Central Library in NUS. Snapped a quick picture of this before the librarian thought I was weird or up to something.


At a glance, it does seem to make sense. After all, the prefix -un is commonly used to convey the meaning of something which is opposite of X, where X is a particular verb. Words such as uncommon, untruthful, unflattering or unclear are examples.

The interesting thing about the word, unborrowed, though, is that it is not as commonly used as we might think it is. In fact, after checking with a number of dictionaries such as the Merriam Webster, Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary, Longman Web Dictionary, First U.S. Learner's Dictionary etc, this word couldn't be found. There was no entry for this word. Well, Merriam Webster has it in the unabridged version though, which I have no access to.

BUT I managed to find an entry in the OED! :D

unborrowed, ppl. a.
Not borrowed or taken on loan; esp. fig., not adopted from another, native, inherent, original. (Common from c 1700.)

1638 G. DANIEL Eclog i. 256 Oh doe not thinke but She may be as faire In nature's bounties, with vnborrwed haire.

1697 DRYDEN Virg. Past. IV. 52 The luxurious father of the fold, With native purple and unborrowed gold, Beneath his pompous fleece shall proudly sweat. 1704 Moderat. Displ. ix, Bathillo, in his own unborrow'd Strains, Young Sacharissa's Angel Form profanes. 1742 RICHARDSON Pamela III. 325 For your Arguments are always new and unborrow'd. 1793 W. ROBERTS Looker-on No. 43 (1794) II. 144 His taste was unborrowed, as well as the principles on which he supported it. 1828 LD. GRENVILLE Sinking Fund 55 Every portion of unborrowed wealth which this fund has ever received. 1871 FRASER Life Berkeley ix. 351 His unborrowed, evidently self-elaborated thought.


Looking at the quotations for the word unborrowed, the examples are all rather old. The latest is 1871 and that is quite long ago. In addition, the use of the word seems to be in contexts which are significantly different.

Therefore, using unborrowed to refer to books which have not been loaned or checked out from the library yet would be a rather unusual use of the word. Unborrowed doesn't even seem to be in use today, or maybe rarely. Entering the word on Google UK and filtering only UK sites produced only 2000+ search results which is somewhat of an indication of how seldom this word is used.

I really wonder then, how did such a word become such a commonly used word in the local context, especially in libraries? I suspect there was some assumption about the usage of the prefix -un and its productivity. People probably thought it attaching it to borrow would produce the meaning of something which has not been borrowed. What they did not realise is that the result unborrowed is a little different, since unborrowed looks like a really natural construction with a straightforward meaning.

Sale! Everything must clear!

Yes, everyone has seen a sign or two like this somewhere haven't you?


According to my observations, during clearance sales, the phrases 'everything must clear' or 'everything must go' are often used. Once again, I ran a search with the phrase 'everything must clear' and this was the first page which came out.


After going through the first 5 pages of the search results, I noticed something. The search results included the phrase 'everything must go' as well. Interestingly, though, the sites which used the phrase 'everything must go' were mostly by foreign sites like those from the UK. In contrast, the phrase 'everything must clear' generally came from local sites.


So would it be safe to conclude that 'everything must clear' is a kind of a local phrase? The meaning is pretty easy to get; it simply means everything has to be cleared from the store. But the usage of the word clear differs. Not that the sense of the word doesn't exist in standard English.

clear
1 surface/place
[transitive] to make somewhere emptier or tidier by removing things from it


But it might be generally considered weird by other speakers of English for clear to be used in this situation. I guess this is the image Singaporeans have in mind when they wish to indicate that the store needs to be emptied.. literally?

Revert

I was looking through my old emails earlier, and stumbled upon something which read:

Dear all
We are looking for Japanese speaker for following event.

Please revert to me about your availability.

Date : XX Jan Tuesday

Time : 18:00-22:00

Venue : Fourseasons Hotel

Job detail : reception staff for event hosted by Japanese company

Fee : S$70.00 up to 4 hours and additional S$15.00 / hour after 4 hours.

Changed some details. =D

Running a search through google as well with the word revert, a number of results (from the Singapore pages) displayed usage of the word in the same way as the email above. Now.. It does seem that the word revert here is used to mean reply. However, taking a look at the dictionary, there doesn't seem to be this sense of the word existing.

revert verb
1. revert to sb/sth (law) (of property, rights, etc.) to return to the original owner again—see also reversion

2. revert to sth (formal)
1 to return to a former state; to start doing sth again that you used to do in the past
2 to return to an earlier topic or subject

I think the sense of the word revert as we used it is closer to the 1st sense given in the dictionary entry. In the sense that the email is being sent back to the first person who sent out the mail.


In fact, I found this from the Speak Good English movement website
1. http://www.goodenglish.org.sg/improve/ask-about-english/please-revert-soonest-possible/
2. http://www.goodenglish.org.sg/improve/lessons-tips/tips-work/misusing-the-word-revert-2/


Hmm okay so it isn't standard English, but I wonder why and how did we derive such a meaning from the word revert? Personally, I have not used this word to mean reply before. In fact, I rarely use this word so I am not really sure how it came about.

Should we simply take it as an attempt by people to make themselves more sophisticated by using another word in replacement of the good old reply hence leading to a misconception about the meaning of the word? Or is there something more to it?

What does everyone think?

Confessions of a mugger

Hello all. This is my first official post!


You know how Singaporean students are known for 'studying too hard'? I think we probably do. To the extent that we require a unique verb/noun to describe our actions and ourselves. I'm talking about the word mug. In fact from the verb mug, there is even a noun to go along with that, the noun mugger.

So what does this mug/mugger thing mean in the Singaporean context at least? Well, firstly when a fellow student calls you a mugger, you are actually being despised so don't even start acting like you're flattered. Or don't start thinking you've committed a crime of some sort. The term mugger carries a slight negative connotation, referring to those hard-core geeks/nerds who study 25 hours a day and furiously do their homework like there's no tomorrow.

In short, those who study way too much and most of the time more than what is actually required. The verb mug then refers to their actions, or the act of studying too much. In fact, you could even talk of closet muggers (people who are secretly muggers yet try to cover it up but in actual fact study real hard when they get home, then ace the exams leaving everyone dumbfounded and feeling cheated), which is an interesting usage of the adjective closet normally used to describe homosexuals who don't admit they are.

Some proof. I was checking my facebook account when I came across one of my friend's status which read..

Of course, for privacy purposes I had to blank out my friend's name.

Checking this meaning of mugging against the one which is used in standard English, we find that the meanings differ greatly. Here's what the Longman Dictionary says:

mug means..

• to attack someone and rob them in a public place
• to make silly expressions with your face or behave in a silly way, especially for a photograph or in a play (American English informal)

Then I saw this:

mug up phrasal verb

informalSE to try to learn something in a short time, especially for an examination

OH. So the verb mug when we Singaporeans wish to scorn each other for studying too hard, actually came from the phrasal verb 'mug up'! Okay.. I guess this is juz another typical scenario where we luv to shorten words 2 make reading and typing ezier for u and i. No complains here. I'm guilty of using the word 'mug' for studying too! Don't tell me you've never used it before! However, the usage of the verb mug up still differs a little from the way we use it. Because we don't just use it when we're trying to learn something within constraints of time, but also generally to refer to the act of studying.

All these usages of the word mug could make our youth muggers today be easily misunderstood as a dangerous and violent group of people mostly gathered in libraries and MacDonald outlets. This reminds me of one of my sister's favourite lines 'You don't want to get on the wrong side of angry muggers'. Either way you have it.

And time to start mugging now.. =p