The Evolution

The Evolution of terminology Nash, keliann
Intro:
Silly are the goddy tawdry maudlin for they shall bow down before him: bedead old men, priest and prester, babeling a pitterpatternoster: no word is still the word, but, a loafward has become lord. What was going through your head when you listened to me speak this poem by Ronald Suffield. whats going on? what is she saying why am I listening to this complete babble? I wonder whats for dinner tonight. I wouldnt blame you if your mind wondered a bit, because the first time I read this same poemI blanked out. The truth is, is that the writer of this poem, Ronald Suffield, wrote the Tenth Beatitude for this exact reason. He wrote it at a time when the words that make this poem complete babble; Silly, loafward, christgeewhiz, actually made sense. He wrote it also to prove that words can change their meanings completely. Today, I would like to explore the world of the evolution of terminology. You see, Suffield discovered something called pejoration and Amelioration. PEJORATION: Pejoration is the process when a word has changed its meaning that means something worse than its original meaning. For instance, the word silly begins Suffield's poem and
meant in Old English times "blessed", which is why Suffield calls his poem a beatitude (Christ's beatitudes begin with "blessed are the..."). How did a word meaning "blessed" come to mean "silly"? Well, since people who are blessed are often innocent and guileless, the word gradually came to mean "innocent". And some of those who are innocent might be innocent because they haven't the brains to be anything else. The innocents must therefore be foolish, which of course is the current primary meaning of the word silly. The word goddy in the poem is a metaplasmus (artful misspelling) of gaudy. The word gaudy was derived from the Latin word gaudium, "joy", which was applied to praying (as a type of rejoicing.) The final word in Suffield's poem to undergo pejoration is paternoster. You must be thinking, how could that word of changed its meaning? Its not even a word today! it originally descended from the Latin pater noster, which represents "Our Father", the first words of the Lord's Prayer. As a result, it became the new name of the Lords Prayer. The word paternoster also came to mean any word-formula spoken as a prayer. Since the Paternoster was in Latin, and in Medieval times Latin was no longer the native language of any of the reciters, the prayer was often recited quickly and with little regard for the sense of the words. Because of this, paternoster came to mean meaningless chatter, words empty of meaning -- this sense of the word gave rise to the form patter. (The word pitter-patter, though used by Suffield in his poem, is actually etymologically unrelated to the word patter with this meaning.) Patter has the sense of meaningless words, and sharp words can become rounded and dull. But although Suffield laments that no word is still the Word [of God], some words do assume a dignity they had not before possessed.
AMELIORATION: Amelioration is the process by which a word's meaning improves or becomes elevated, coming to represent something more favorable than it originally referred to. Two words that have undergone amelioration are priest and prester. Both words are descended from the Greek word presbuteros, "older man, elder", a comparative form of the word presbus, "old man". Because churches of most religions are headed by elders and not youth, and because age is often equated with wisdom, the Greek word gradually acquired the meaning of "church leader, priest". The different forms represent borrowings made at different times, with priest being the oldest English form, followed by prester, followed by the learned borrowing of presbyter. In what for Suffield is the greatest example of amelioration, the early Old English word hlfweard, which if translated using its descendant words would be rendered loafward, meant "the keeper of the bread" and was applied to the head of a household. Although "keeper of the bread" might bear witness to the importance of that most basic of foodstuffs to early Anglo-Saxons, alternatively one might argue that it had no more literal sense than bread- does in the modern word breadwinner. The word hlfweard has been shortened over time, first to hlford and then to lord. Over time, the word has been used of not just any head of household but of princes and nobility; this sense was extended to include the Prince of Light, God. For Suffield, this extension of lord makes a fitting appellation for Christ, given that Christ was the keeper of the bread of communion. By ending the poem with the word lord, Suffield offers a hope for redemption for all words.
Clearly the poet Suffield believes that man has taken the meaning out of God's words, reducing pater noster to patter and God's son's name to a curse. Yet if he is extreme in his view of pejoration as an example of man's trivialization of God and rejection of divine meaning, the process of semantic change is almost universally condemned by teachers, scholars and other concerned language speakers. In fact, semantic drift is as natural as continental drift and almost as inexorable. The meanings of words change, sometimes for the worse, but sometimes providing useful distinctions. Some words, like lord, are even inspired. So now that we understand what Suffield was saying in the beginning of this speech, you can now listen to it without your mind wondering. In todays English, it would say something like this: Blessed are the joyful, for they will bow down before him, Old men and the elders of the church make a great noise, and an unnecessary chatter, but no word is still a word, for the keeper of the bread, has become Lord. Thank you!

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