WORDS are wonderful things. The right word at the right time can turn an essay into a masterpiece or a business letter into a deal-clinching success.
English is a complicated language and pity the poor foreign student or second language English speakers who must master not only the basics but also the puzzling pronunciation of certain words which look similar but are said differently.
Then there are the subtle nuances that English speakers take for granted but the student fails to understand.
English is also a living language so meanings change with time but the purists find it difficult to go with the flow.
Take the word prestigious. We take it to mean something of high value. The Oxford dictionary defines it as inspiring respect and admiration, but its original meaning referred to pomposity and delusion; negative connotations.
There are those who insist that the word be used in its original context, but for what purpose when most of the English speaking world understands its “new” meaning?
One of the words which has the proof reader in this office scratching her head is chairman. The understanding, drummed in by a fastidious editor decades ago, is that chairman is not a sexist word. A chairman is the manager of the chair and so it shall remain. Yet journalists and others continue to write chairwoman, chairlady or, even worse, chairperson. Chairperson, in my humble opinion, is one of the concoctions which came from the British loony left and feminism taken to the extremes of ridiculousness. Our government adopted this word when the ANC came in to power to give a nod to their non-sexist leanings, little realising that actions speak louder than words. Other word changes in the name of transformation was learner and educator in place of pupil and teacher, and look what’s happened to education since.
Puzzled by the continuous use of chairperson it was decided to research this word. Oh Google is a wonderful thing! The editor of old was sort of right, but not quite.
According to friend Google, the word chairman comes from Medieval times, times when chairs were not in general use. Most people sat on benches or on the floor. So the only chair, or the highest chair in a room, would be given to the most important person in the room. And so the word chairman was born. How fascinating. It is presumed that there may have been times when a queen was the most important person in the room, but the word remained chairman. Also of interest was the piece on where the title chairman of the board came from. According to Google, in the same Medieval times, tables as we know them were not common. Tables were generally made from trestles which supported a board, hence chairman of the board .
Mark Twain, best known for his books The Adventures of Tom Sawyer and The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, was also a journalist. It is reported that, in irritation, he once wrote: “God made idiots. That was for practice. Then he made proof-readers.” So at the risk of proving Twain’s words true in the eyes of our readers, chairman is the word we use, no matter the sex of the person in the highest chair.
