As part of our effort to chronicle the ongoing death of the English language, we need to recognize a disturbing – or at least annoying – trend: forcing nouns to do awkward double duty as verbs.
My attention was drawn afresh to this phenomenon a few days ago when I saw a guy wearing a T-shirt promoting his church with the phrase “Come fellowship with us.” My first thought in response to this offer was “Nah, I’d rather Bible on my own.” Okay, actually my first response was “While we’re fellowshipping, can we ice cream?”
For the longest time I fought the valiant fight as best I could against the use of “impact” as a verb. This was particularly sticky because “impact” actually can be used as a verb. However, the verb form is much narrower than the noun form. For example, the “No, it just impacted on the surface” line toward the end of Star Wars is correct. But “The President’s speech impacted public opinion” is not.
This problem is due in part to a somewhat understandable discomfort with the distinction between “affect” and “effect” that can make the two terms hard to use. I’m less clear on why “influence” is an unacceptable substitute in most situations. But the point is moot. The misuse of “impact” has become so widespread that it’s probably not a misuse anymore (language sometimes works that way). I’ll still correct it on student writing assignments, especially if I’m in a cranky mood when I’m grading (which is most of the time). But otherwise it’s time to cede the field on this one.
On the other hand, I can think of at least one line from which no retreat may be allowed: the use of “beer” as a verb. At the moment this one appears to be limited to Neanderthals who order their beverage of choice by instructing the barkeep to “Beer me.” But if this trend spreads, it’s only a matter of time before we’ll get phrases like “Sorry, I can’t beer tonight. I have to car.”
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