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I am immensely puzzled by the (recent, I think?) usage of “humbled.” The word means, according to my dictionary, “lowered in dignity or importance.” But people use it to mean the •opposite• of humbled, e.g. “I am humbled to receive this prize.”
I don’t think that means the prize is so awful that receiving it is degrading?? Instead, the word appears to mean “honored, but with a magic incantation that makes me not arrogant.” Is that all that’s going on here? Is there semantic nuance I’m missing?
People seem to mean it graciously, but there’s a vague air of double-speak about it that really rubs me the wrong way.
[Insert “old man yells at cloud” gif here]
At heart I am a language descriptivist, and understand that language changes. But that won’t stop me from mourning the losses along the way.
I’m still surly about “literally” no longer reliably meaning “non-figuratively.” That was a super useful word.
@inthehands it's funny, this usage change you note and the "literally" shift don't really bug me, but every time I hear "beg the question" used to mean "raise the question" I die a little inside.
@esnyder
Same. Almost as bad as “foo dot com backslash bar.”
