Discussion Groups / ESL Teaching / October 2003

Here you have hit the crux of the problem: what does it take to
claim that the word is a recognized English (capital "E", please;
"english" is not a recognized English word). If all the students,
faculty, and administrators at the high school in question recognize
"to consequence" as a meaningful English verb, then it must be one
--- for them, at least. And I would suggest that however barbaric it
may seem to you and me to verb that particular noun, English
speakers are always verbing their nouns. The meaning of this
apparent verb in this context is clear to me: "Any student who does
not display an ID will {suffer the consequences / be punished
according to the rules}".

For most of us, I suspect, it is not really a word, but who are we when
compared with the many who create these logomachic monstrosities? They
are vastly in the majority.

In alt.english.usage on Sun, 27 Jul 2003 08:15:44 GMT "Intrigued"
<forumonly@nospam.spm> posted:

If they correct that word, won't there still be more in the future.?

I think instead you have to convey to your son, in a way that may make
him grow up a little stronger than he would if he went to a high
school where they used good English, and yet in a way that won't bring
out the snotty teenager in him, that the challenge he would face in
life anyhow is starting a little earlier.  I'm not a father.  I don't
know if this can be done in every case, in many cases.

I don't remember bad English, but there were a small number of other
things when I was in school.  My eighth grade shop and electric
teacher made a mistake in grading a test.  He asked us why birds
didn't get electrocuted when they sat on power lines.  I replied that
they were not grounded.  He said that was wrong, it was because the
wires were insulated.  For other reasons, I usually defer to others
until I'm sure, even when I'm already pretty sure.  In fact many wires
are not insulated, but the birds don't get killed because they are not
grounded.  It took me more than 10 years to be sure he had made a
mistake.  I think that is too long. OTOH, I think one day would be too
short, no matter how stupid his answer had been and how sure I was
that I was right.

The problem is that you know something about English and I knew
something about electricity (I had a model train and I read books, or
something.). That's why you thought to check here and those other
places you looked. What about the areas your kid will know little
about and will be depending on the teacher, and the book?

You can talk at dinner about what he learned that day.  And he should
learn to be on the lookout for things that don't seem reasonable.  Of
course a lot of things are neither reasonable or not.   They're just
facts, or mistakes.

In a way he should know that one cannot fully trust almost anything
that anyone tells you, unless he cites his sources, and one has
verified them.  OTOH, I don't want his 9th or 10th year to be harder
than necessary.  Maybe your warnings are best limited to English
usage, if you decide that has gone downhill faster than other things
that are taught.

More anecdotes:
In 10th grade American history, 1962, long before much feminism, Mr.
Cloncs told us that the sewing machine was invented by Mrs. Howe, not
Elias Howe.  A) It was good of him to mention that if it was true. B)
I haven't heard this since (I also haven't tried to check). He might
have been joking. C) If it was true, it deserved more attention than
he gave it, just a passing comment.  Because it might be reflective of
a bias in history. (There are lots of other possible reasons having
nothing to do with sex.)  And the existence of one bias is a reminder
of how many different biases are possible.  Maybe he thought we
weren't ready for stuff like this (even though I lived in I think the
richest high school district in Indiana (which trust me isn't really
saying much.  We were all middle class, with a few people that were
poor and a few that were rich.  I don't know who the rich ones were,
with maybe one exception.   Off topic: Even though I went to school
from 1960 to 64, the only one to say a single word about the Civil
Rights movement was my Freshman Latin teacher, who pointed out that
engagement and wedding announcments for Negroes in the Indianapolis
Star, until recently I think, or still, at that time, appeared not on
the announcement page, but on the obituary page.  Of course that one
pithy remark was worth hours of talking about it, at least to me.
Maybe that is what Mr. Cloncs thought about Elias and Mrs. Howe.

My geometry teacher had several problems, all related.

In law school (I'm sure she was proud of herself that she got into law
school) a young woman used an adverb where a predicate adjective
should have gone.  Why I corrected her I don't know. (Maybe I was used
to the college I went to, where learning was more important than
egos.)  Her first answer was that I was wrong, and her second was that
she majored in English (so that proved I was wrong.)

I've gradually gotten tired of correcting people, except in this
newsgroup, of course.

s/ meirman    If you are emailing me please  
say if you are posting the same response.

Born west of Pittsburgh Pa. 10 years
            Indianapolis,   7 years
            Chicago,        6 years
            Brooklyn NY    12 years
            Baltimore      17 years

It's yet another abomination.  Where do these things start?  More and more I
am convinced that there are people out there whose sole mission is to
introduce these sorts of things into the English language.

Steve Howarth

On Sun, 27 Jul 2003 08:15:44 GMT, Intrigued wrote

It's sure an ugly little bugger, but it's undeniably a word.  (You've
seen it and quoted it, so there ya' go......it's real, but that doesn't
make it pretty.....)

English has such a long tradition of verbing nouns, that fighting one
on the basis of "correctness" is bound to be a losing battle -- no
matter how infelicitous the resulting word may be.  For what it's
worth, I'd tend to ridicule the person who used such a clunky form,
rather than trying to nail them on the basis of correct or recognised
words.

It has probably become a word that means something specific within that
institution. Your son will have to wait until he fails to display his ID
before he finds out whether being "consequenced" means being reprimanded, or
being nailed to the school flagpole by his earflaps.

Owain

I've read some other responses, and I share the general view that
(1) there is nothing wrong per se with verbing nouns but (2) this
one is really ugly.  But you might want to imagine the reaction if
you accost someone high up in the chain of authority at the school
about this usage.  Here are some possible reactions:

1.  We've used it that way around here for years.

2.  Everyone knows what we mean.  Didn't you?

3.  I learned it in Ed School.  Were my professors wrong, too?

4.  (Assuming some degree of sophistication) What's wrong with
verbing nouns?

5.  I'm the educator here, not you.

6.  Don't you have better things to do with your time?

7.  By George, you're right. I'll fix that right away.

What are the odds on that last one?

Most of us who have nursed our kids through secondary school have
taught them to be indulgent of their teachers' frequent displays of
ignorance.  Even teachers are human.  Tell them what they want to
hear even if you know better.  If Mrs. Thistlebottom thinks it is
correct to write "He is one of the students who is always late to
class," she doesn't want to hear that "are" is preferred, if not
required, in that sentence.  Feed her a diet of "is"s.  Your grades
will be better, and the poor dear will be happy.

"Consequence" the verb sucks.  But there's more to life than who can
write the most elegant sentences.  Help your child learn wisdom from
this episode, not just English.

Thank you for all of the detailed replies.

After reading Bob Lieblich's reply, I've decided that I will politely send
an anonymous note to the school asking that they consider modifying the
signs so that the word "consequenced" is not used.   Maybe I am being
unrealistically optimistic, but I suspect that they will actually reply "By
George, you're right. I'll fix that right away."

And, after reading several other replies, I will agree that English speakers
are often [improperly] "verbing" their nouns.  In fact, I just came across
an advertisement on a web site that states: "Features a king sized bed,
fireplaced sitting area. Bath with shower and two-person whirlpool tub.
Private sundeck accessed through French door."

Until now, I didn't know that "fireplace" had a verb form.  Searching
google, though, the word "fireplaced" appears to be widely used in real
estate advertisements.

Time to start writing to those real estate agents . . .

At least of the responders to my post used the phrase "verbing nouns".
Searching google for that phrase, I found this humourous poem.

http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/~haroldfs/family/verbing.html

It is NOT a proper word. Please draw the line and remind the (mis)educators
at that school that to cqall them morons would be an insult to morons,
because even a moron should know "consequenced" is not a word.

Also please post the school name and address so we can correct the imbecile
or imbeciles who wrote that sentence.