When did 'gift' become a verb and what happened to 'give' and 'gave'?

The more literal French phrase “pas de problème” is also not uncommon. “No problemo,” however, is not Spanish.

I was at Chick-Fil-A this afternoon and noticed that all 3 of the employees I dealt with replied “my pleasure” to my “thank you”. I assume that’s part of their training. I wish others would follow suit.

And did you also counter “You’re welcome” with, “Gee, why would you imply that doing this thing for me might not be welcome”?

Currently, there are a ton of words being repurposed in our language. Our language constantly evolves. It’s common to reading adulting, for example. Things are so extra. I can’t even (can’t even what? Never mind.)

Some of these changes will stick around, others won’t. No one says they feel gay anymore when they mean they feel lighthearted and carefree. But gay is still a word in common usage.

My personal most-hated word is the misuse of impact, which has sadly now become accepted. I have vivid memories of working a banquet for a born-again religious group. They had a big banner displayed which said “Church of xxxxxx, Impacting the World!” That still bothers me, 30 years on, and I still wonder if they were the first to do that.

At least the phrase “my bad” seems to have fallen out of favor.

Ha ha, I like “my bad”!

In the movie Freedom Writers, Hillary Swank’s character (teacher) tries to relate to her students by saying “Oh, my badness.” The students are amused, not annoyed. I thought that was a cute scene.

One of my pet peeves is, “Let me be clear…” Just say what you mean!

Well, I’ll be one of the first to confess that I say "no problem"sometimes in response to a thank you. What I mean to convey is that it’s my pleasure. I had no idea it was an irritant to some. I’ll work on updating my wording. This also has led me to realize I sometimes respond “no worries” which also, in a literal sense, isn’t what I mean to convey. Of course I don’t believe the person is or could be worried. OK, this casual Californian will work on being more clear in her communication!

Likewise, I had never given the word ‘gifting’ much thought although I believe I really only think of it being used in connection with a gift of money. On the other hand, some basic grammatical errors are like nails on a chalkboard to me.

Funny, I agree about “Let me be clear…” (post #46)

One I’ve heard the last 10-15 years, and must admit that I kind of like depending who says it, is “effort.” As in, I efforted to get that term paper done.

^^^Wow, I’ve never heard anyone say that.

^^ I hear it often by TV newscasters. “We’re efforting to get more information on this as soon as possible”. It drives me nuts when I hear it.

I’d be efforting to find the remote to change the channel to one where the newscasters speak proper English. :smiley:

@skieurope, they all do it, unfortunately. It seems to be contagious.

My theory is a lot of these re-purposed words are context signals that escape into the wild. As noted early in the thread, “gifting” is a legal term, meant to be used in financial planning. “What are our key asks” is something one would hear in a business planning meeting.
It can be annoying to hear them in a different than expected context. Such as a waiter asking you for your “key asks” perhaps.
I have never heard “efforting” though, sounds awful. Hope they don’t pull a muscle. (Might be an offshoot of “effecting”, which is another awful corporatese word)

Having a mother tongue where there is a plethora of long compound words, we learned early on not to use a long word when a short one will do. That said, just because a word is commonly used in a corporate war room (another term I dislike) does not make it right. “Ask” is not a noun; “requirements” or “demands” is the correct word. :smiley:

“Ask” is very common parlance in the development/fundraising world. Demands or requirements don’t really fit. They seem a bit bold for the circumstances. :slight_smile:

Effecting has its place as a verb, corporate or not.

Here’s an example of “efforting” by CBS News, of all people!
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/pro-gun-group-efforting-recall-of-colo-state-senate-president/

and in this article - https://www.cbsnews.com/news/government-shutdown-continues-no-agreement-in-sight/

@doschicos Do you have a better solve? :wink: