Words don't 'alf define a Society: useful words for the 2020s -- Clare Wiener (Mari Howard)

Another from (soft) science writing?

Liminality: I stared at this word, wondering whether I’d seen it before, and what it meant. Was it actually a mistake, for something I could imagine: ‘luminality’? Luminality made sense of a kind: the writer probably meant whatever possessed this quality in spades — it illumined, or lit, things, rooms, extremely well.

I then returned to my normal self and understood: liminality was the name of an Easter art exhibition which I’d recently contributed to, about the ‘liminal’ or in-between time between, for example, career or job changes, between taking exams and receiving your degree results, and in this particular case — this Easter exhibition — the Saturday between Good Friday, the Crucifixion, and Easter Sunday, the Resurrection… ‘Liminal’ — a somewhat poetic word — has entered popular use rather recently (it was 11 times more frequent in 2019 than in 1980). What I was reading used its ‘ality’ noun ‘liminality’ (10 times more frequent in 2019 than in 1980).

There’s quite a lot of this adjective-to-noun stuff about in 21st century writing: transformation from adjective to ‘ality’ (or just ‘ity’) noun has become a popular trend.  Once ‘spirituality’ seemed to stand alone (in my vocabulary anyway), and wasn’t used that often . Now it’s six times more common than it was in 1980, and we’re all using physicality, musicality, sexuality, positivity, etc. The popularity of adjective-to-noun seems, most likely, to be that it’s a quick description, it saves words, which is especially important for journalists — hence it spreads rapidly through newspapers, magazines, and of course, the on-line versions of these.

And language is a living thing: if we need to bring in a new descriptive word, if we want to emphasise something new or in a new way, we’ll find a word or a way (journalists again, they’re good at activating language and making it swing): think of ‘visceral’, meaning ‘affecting the viscera as the seat of emotion’. This word, appearing in novel writing alongside ‘use all five senses in your descriptions…’ has leapt into popular use — at least among writers, alongside physicality, as writers seek to push the boundaries of evoking feelings and emotions. Visceral’s use has increased threefold in popularity from actually being ‘revived’ from obsolescence in 1949, while ‘viscerality’ is now 33 times more popular.

Using the same scale, ‘physicality’ rose to the amazing level of 40 times as frequent in 2019 compared to 1960, earning its place in our everyday language as hardly a new word/usage… ‘Sexuality’ became ten times more frequent in 2014 than it had been in 1960, probably owing to the emergence of the new meaning ‘sexual identity’.

Another once-obscure word, ‘iteration’ is on the move… Formerly the related forms reiteration and reiterate were familiar, but suddenly, (it seemed to me) that this word had taken off its hat and coat to settle into the vocabulary of ordinary everyday talk. When, how, did it do this? In 1940, ‘iteration’ (not in its negative form) was scoring 0.00002% usage in the overall Google count based on books written in English: by the 21st century its usage reached 0.0005: 25 times commoner. Possibly sneaking its way into more popular use, iteration may’ve used the route of a mathematical iterating, or in reference to computer apps being improved/altered. But now it’s arrived almost as another, more formal, way to describe what we do when we speak or write…particularly if we repeatedly speak or write the same argument…

Now I’ve given you all those figures, you may not, as I have just said to my partner (who is working in another room), that I am ‘having fun’ with this piece — but there’s another two to go… Partner: ‘A person who is linked by marriage to another, a spouse; a member of a couple who live together or are habitual companions; a lover. Now increasingly used in legal and contractual contexts to refer to a member of a couple in a long-standing relationship of any kind, so as to give equal recognition to marriage, cohabitation, same-sex relationships, etc.’ Partner — in all senses, including who you’re in a relationship with — rose from 0.0015% in 1960 to .004% in 2007 (2.4 times).

‘Excited’ is a word which practically died out between about 1820 and 1900, but has leapt happily back, and into adult usage in the 2000s, as it’s apparently  become respectable to say one is ‘so excited!’ by, for example, a ‘cover reveal’ of one’s book, the thought of the planned ‘book launch’ in Waterstones, or the forthcoming holiday in the Himalayas. Or whatever floats your boat. It could just be the imminent arrival of a grandchild, since now all ages use ‘excited!’  Contrast 20th century teachers and parents admonishing children ‘don’t get over-excited…’ as if it was a crime… ‘Excited’ was up at 0.005 in 1827 when its meaning was rather different, sank to 0.0008 in 1940, but has now climbed from 0.001% in 2000 to 0.0024% in 2018 (2.4 times as frequent).

Enough: fun, as in 'I’m having so much fun’ — see above, used in similar context to excited, though not as teacher/parental disapproval. Fun, within bounds, was allowed!

Oh, I do so hope you’ve had fun reading this, but are not too over-excited by the development and slipperiness of language!