Verbing Family Members

Verbing Family Members Verbing Family Members Verbing Family Members By Maeve Maddox The other day when I saw the words to an unfamiliar modern hymn displayed on a screen, I stumbled over the word Father used as a verb. My momentary confusion was not because a noun was being used as a verb, but because the verbed noun was capitalized. Note: Even though the fathering mentioned in the hymn was being done by God the Father, the verb did not require a capital. I started thinking about the verbing of other nouns for family members. One often sees father and mother used as verbs. The earliest OED citation of father in the sense of â€Å"to beget† is dated 1483. The earliest use in the sense of â€Å"to look after like a father† is dated 1577. Shakespeare uses father in both senses in Cymbeline (1611). Belarius, reflecting on the nobility of his foster sons compared to the lack of it in others, says, â€Å"Cowards father Cowards,† Later in the play, when the Roman general Lucius invites Fidele to be his page, he says he will father him rather than master him. Note: The character Fidele is a disguised woman, Imogen. As Lucius believes her to be a boy, I’ve used the masculine pronoun. The earliest OED citation for mother in the sense of â€Å"to give birth† is dated 1548. The earliest citation for mother in the sense of â€Å"to take care of like a mother† is much later: 1863. Unlike father, which can still mean beget, mother is no longer used in the sense â€Å"to give birth to.† Procreating men â€Å"father children,† but women â€Å"have babies.† I’ve often used a line from Shakespeare’s King Richard the Second to illustrate the fact that nouns can be used as verbs: â€Å"Grace me no grace, nor uncle me no uncle† (Act 2, Scene 3). However, the Duke of York is not using uncle to describe a manner of behavior, in the way we use father and mother, but as a term of address. He’s telling his outlawed nephew not to look for favors from him by calling him uncle. York’s use of the word uncle is an example of anthimeria. Anthimeria (aka antimeria): a rhetorical term for the creation of a neologism by using one part of speech (or word class) in place of another. Other terms for anthimeria are â€Å"conversion† and â€Å"functional shifting.† Advertisers do this kind of thing. An annoying example that comes to mind is the Nutella slogan, â€Å"Spread the happy,† in which the adjective happy is used as a noun. I looked in vain for uses of other family relationships that are commonly verbed. A woman can mother someone, but not aunt or grandmother anyone. A man can father someone, but not uncle or grandfather him in the sense of behaving as an uncle or as a grandfather. The noun grandfather can be used as a verb. The verbal use derives from the legal term â€Å"grandfather clause.† A  Ã¢â‚¬Å"grandfather  clause† is a provision in which an old rule continues to apply to some existing situations while a new rule  will  apply to all future cases.  For example, the US Army plans to establish a new tattoo policy that forbids new recruits to have tattoos below their elbows and knees or above their neckline. According to an article in Stars and Stripes Magazine, â€Å"Current soldiers will be grandfathered in as long as the tattoos are not racist, sexist, or extremist.† Although not itself used as a verb, the noun cousin may be the source of the verb cozen. cozen verb: to deceive by artful wheedling or tricky dishonesty. Note: Both cousin and cozen are pronounced the same: /KUH-zin/ Some dictionaries cite an Italian source for cozen, but another possible origin is the French verb cousiner: to cheat on pretext of being a cousin. This possibility brings us back to York’s use of uncle in the scene in which Bolingbroke attempts to use a title of kinship to further his own ends. Want to improve your English in five minutes a day? Get a subscription and start receiving our writing tips and exercises daily! Keep learning! Browse the Spelling category, check our popular posts, or choose a related post below:7 Types of Narrative ConflictHow to Pronounce MobileComma After Introductory Phrases

75 Synonyms for Angry

75 Synonyms for Angry 75 Synonyms for â€Å"Angry† 75 Synonyms for â€Å"Angry† By Mark Nichol Are you angry? At the risk of infuriating you, or making you apoplectic or exasperated, here are dozens of words to use to describe your choleric condition more precisely: 1. Acrid: extremely harsh (also refers to an unpleasant taste or smell) 2. Acrimonious: harshly unpleasant 3. Aggravated: angrily agitated 4. Angered: made angry 5. Annoyed: angry about being disturbed or harassed 6. Antagonistic: angrily opposed 7. Antipathetic: expressing antipathy, or aggression or aversion 8. Apoplectic: violently angry, from the adjectival form of apoplexy, the former word for stroke 9. Ballistic: explosively angry, from the adjective describing projectile flight 10. Bellicose: aggressively angry, from the synonym for warlike 11. Belligerent: see bellicose 12. Bitter: harshly upset due to resentment 13. Blue in the face: see frustrated, from the idea of facial discoloration caused by extreme emotion 14. Boiling: extremely angry, with the figurative sense of being agitated like heated water 15. Bristling: defensively angry, suggestive of an animal’s hair bristling as it responds to a threat 16. Burning: extremely angry, from the notion of the body overheating because of the intensity of feeling 17. Caustic: cruelly angry, or sarcastic 18. Cheesed off: see frustrated (can also mean â€Å"bored† or â€Å"disgusted†) 19. Choleric: easily angered 20. Churlish: disrespectfully angry 21. Cold: angry in an emotionally remote manner 22. Contrary: uncooperatively angry 23. Cool: angry but with emotions are held in check 24. Embittered: made upset 25. Enraged: violently angry 26. Exasperated: see frustrated 27. Fired up: see hot 28. Fit to be tied: extremely angry, suggesting that the person angered should be restrained 29. Foaming: so angry as to suggest insanity caused by hydrophobia (rabies), from the idea that foaming at the mouth is symptomatic of the disease 30. Frustrated: angry or upset because of obstacles or challenges 31. Fuming: extremely angry, from the association of the person with a volcano or other heated natural phenomenon 32. Furious: intensely angry 33. Going crook: losing one’s temper 34. Hopping: so angry as to suggest that the person might jump up and down to express or assuage anger 35. Hopping mad: see hopping 36. Horn-mad: extremely angry 37. Hostile: actively intimidating, unfriendly, or resistant 38. Hot: angry, with the sense of physical discomfort caused by emotion 39. Hot under the collar: see hot 40. Icy: see cold 41. Incensed: see indignant 42. Indignant: angry because of a real or perceived slight or unjust attack 43. Inflamed: see hot 44. Infuriated: see furious 45. Irate: see furious 46. Ireful: see irate 47. Livid: intensely angry to the point of being unable to control oneself (livid, however, can also mean â€Å"bruised,† â€Å"pale,† or â€Å"colorful,† with the second sense associated with pain, shock, or fear) 48. Mad: angry; this term has so many other senses and is so easily replaced by any of its many synonyms that it is all but useless except in a statement starting with â€Å"I’m so mad I could . . .† 49. Outraged: angry about an offense 50: Perturbed: upset (also means â€Å"confused†) 51. Pissed off: angry 52. Rabid: see foaming 53: Raging: see furious 54. Rancorous: malevolently angry 55. Rankled: angry or resentful 56. Ranting: irrationally angry 57. Raving: see ranting 58. Riled: upset 59. Roiled: see riled 60: Seeing red: so angry that one’s vision is blurred, or one is stimulated as a bull in a bullfight 61. Seething: repressing violent anger 62. Shirty: angry 63. Smoldering: see seething 64. Sore: see indignant 65. Soreheaded: see indignant 66. Steamed: see hot 67. Steaming: see hot 68: Storming: having a temper or an anger suggestive of stormy weather 69. Stormy: see storming 70. Ticked: angry; also â€Å"ticked off† 71. Vitriolic: see caustic 72. Worked up: upset 73. Wrathful: see furious 74. Wroth: see furious 75. Wrought up: see â€Å"worked up† (This list deliberately omits annoyed and its synonyms, which are numerous enough to merit their own list.) Want to improve your English in five minutes a day? Get a subscription and start receiving our writing tips and exercises daily! Keep learning! Browse the Vocabulary category, check our popular posts, or choose a related post below:20 Great Opening Lines to Inspire the Start of Your StoryHyper and HypoEducational vs. Educative