Joining the "conversate" conversation

My fellow Atlantic blogger Ta-Nehisi Coates posted a couple of days ago about "conversate": is it a word or not? He interviewed Jesse Sheidlower, of the Oxford English Dictionary, and they had a good conversation, well worth reading. Jesse is a smart guy and a first-rate lexicographer. But one thing no lexicographer is likely to tell you is that we don't need dictionaries anymore to tell us what counts as a word. We can decide for ourselves.

As Jesse said, what lexicographers do is search out words that people use, see how they use them, and write them up. Adding a new word to the dictionary doesn't amount to giving it a stamp of approval; it just means that the lexicographers found the word in wide enough use over a long enough time that they decided dictionary users might want to know about it. 

Well, owing to the Internet, anyone today can figure out how widely used a given word is. Just google it. "Conversate" is all over the Web. If, however, you want to find out whether it's in standard use -- which is often what people mean when they wonder if something is a "word" -- archives of edited media, such as Google News, are a better place to look. According to a  search I did just now, "conversate" has turned up in the newspapers and press releases, etc., that Google News tracks exactly five times in the past month. That's very few. Two of the five come from Ta-Nehisi himself; two are from AllHipHop.com, and one was published in an actual newspaper, in a quote from a basketball player. Isn't this already starting to be a good basis for drawing your own conclusions about "conversate"?

Comments

Yesssss! I was so hoping you'd respond to TNC on this. Cleverly researched.

Posted by clacla | January 9, 2009 3:08 PM

The author, Richard Price, in his novel 'lush life' published 2008, uses the word "conversating" at page 385, penultimate line.

Posted by Taylor | January 9, 2009 3:40 PM

I respectfully decline to commentate.

Posted by pannonica | January 9, 2009 8:33 PM

But one thing no lexicographer is likely to tell you is that we don't need dictionaries anymore to tell us what counts as a word. We can decide for ourselves.

Actually, Barbara, this is something I tell people all the time. One of the great things about the availability of so many full-text databases is precisely that it allows people to do research for themselves that they would never have been able to do in the past. I think it's good for everyone: it's good for the dictionaries (especially the OED), as people can now keep us on our toes, and it's good for people who want to be able to find out everything they can when such questions come up.

The very point of the OED is that we are not some official arbiter of proper usage, telling people what is OK and what is not; we try to give people the tools they need to make that decision for themselves. And sometimes we are criticized for this, by people who would prefer us to take a more active role in this process.

What you did by searching Google News for conversate is exactly what I'd recommend to anyone who has an interest in a word like this. The acceptability of the word in various contexts is, after all, what my conversation with Ta-Nehisi was about, and though I alluded to context I was not able to elaborate on it as much as I might have preferred.

The one thing I would observe is that many of the commentators still seemed to miss this. They liked conversate because they found it expressive or natural, or felt that they shouldn't be hold how to talk; or they didn't like it because they'd never get hired in an office if they spoke like that. But that's exactly the point: Not everyone wants to speak like they're on a job interview. It's great to note that conversate only shows up in blogs, hip-hop websites, and in the mouths of basketball players. But that doesn't make it bad. As you write, it gives the reader "a good basis for drawing your own conclusions."

Posted by Jesse Sheidlower | January 11, 2009 9:40 PM

The prescriptivist in Wallraff comes out to play!

Posted by Vivera | January 12, 2009 3:07 AM

Linguists and lexicographers have taken Mr. Sheidlower's position for at least a century, and few laymen today ever seriously consider the idea of official word-dom.

Posted by Paul | January 12, 2009 3:16 AM

"The one thing I would observe is that many of the commentators still seemed to miss this."

Gosh, Jesse, I would have used the word "commenters"! (Little joke at the outset of a busy day. Thanks for weighing in, and more from me later.)

Posted by BARBARA WALLRAFF | January 12, 2009 9:39 AM

Ha! Yes, you're exactly right, commenter was the correct word. Thanks, Barbara.

Posted by Jesse Sheidlower | January 12, 2009 9:46 AM

This belongs to an unneeded category of neologisms. They are words for which an alternative has already provided good service, as opposed to those that fill a need or otherwise provide a new outlook. My term for this type of neologisms is ignorisms.

Posted by Herb Luckert | January 27, 2009 3:49 PM

Conversate or converse? Why wouldn't basketball players use conversate? They all know that Converse is a basketball shoe.

Posted by Joe Yee | January 27, 2009 4:17 PM

I live in Ireland and the Jan/Feb 09 issue arrived yesterday. "In A Word" is always my first read. I would like to save your sentence,"Everything we think about is less important than something else we could be thinking about." in my quote collection to use in the future, and I do attribute quotes when used. Is this original with you?:

I love it. It reminds me of one of my favorite greeting cards bought in an art gallery in MPLS:
(at top)"It is simple" ...(then, below) "we are where we should be, doing what we should be doing, otherwise..." (inside) "we would be somewhere else, doing something else."

As to "Word Fugitives," how about "Green Loom" for pre-worn garments at rest, awaiting their call to once again appear in Carolyn's daily drama?

Re your blog comments on use of the apostrophe -- the Irish use the most varied in their signs, newspapers, posters, etc., and explain all the errors by saying, "Everyone knows what we mean." As for England's decision, it's just another example of dumbing down to the lowest level. Sad.

Posted by Jeanette Huber | February 5, 2009 3:11 PM