Date:    Thu, 25 Jun 1998 12:52:41 -0400
<br>From:    Beverly Flanigan <flanigan[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]OAK.CATS.OHIOU.EDU>
<br>Subject: Re: "incent"
<br>
<br>Comments for both Mark and Bethany:  Backformations, like incentive, n. -->
<br>incent, v. are common; witness television-->televise, option-->opt,
<br>emotion-->emote, enthusiasm-->enthuse, and my own (idiosyncratic?) usage,
<br>transition-->transish.  Since we've just been talking about this word
<br>formation process in my Intro. to Linguistics class, I've got a million of
<br>'em.  Mind you, I don't like all these forms personally, but the process is
<br>not new or irregular.
<br>
<br>Nor is 'grow' as tr. verb new.  My Sociolx students came up with a list of
<br>such usages last year--all I can remember off the top of my head are
<br>variants of "grow crops" (grow tomatoes, grow corn...), but they noted
<br>several common and traditional phrases with tr. 'grow'.  The semantic issue
<br>is another thing, of course, esp. when Alan Greenspan uses the phrase below!
<br>
<br>
<br>At 11:29 AM 6/25/98 -0400, you wrote:
<br>>The problem I have with forms like "incent" is semantic: what EXACTLY does
<br>>it mean? It seems to me that it can mean variously "provide incentive" or
<br>>"provoke" or "fail to provide disincentive," etc.
<br>>
<br>>The same thing happens with the relatively new tr verb "grow" as in "to
<br>>grow the economy" -- does it mean "improve the economy" [and, if so, by
<br>>whose standards?] or "increase the GNP" or "decrease inflation"??? Who
<br>>knows?
<br>>
<br>>Bethany
<br>>
<br>