Verbification, Verbing Nouns: Using Nouns as Verbs
English language lovers and purists tend to be very prescriptive when it comes to grammar. They shouldn’t always be because our language is in constant evolution as it devises more efficient structures. Many native English speakers convert nouns and proper nouns into verbs (by changing the position of the noun in a sentence) and like the fact English gives them the freedom to ‘verb’ nouns and ‘noun’ verbs and feel it allows them to communicate more efficiently. According to Steven Pinker, verbing nouns makes our language more sophisticated.
There are hundreds of nouns and acronyms covering a wide variety of professions, hobbies and sports that have become verbs: access, ambulance, arrow, author, bed, beverage, breakfast, blunt-object, bunt, chip, club, fly, garage, gift, ground, gun, impact, input, knife, lance, parent, polymerase chain reaction (PCR), rat, ring, spear, tree, torch, torpedo,
- I don’t want to consens (give consensus to ) on something the boss won’t agree to.
- She went Paris Hilton shopping and Paris Hiltoned an astronomical amount of merchandise.
- He was ambulanced (take by ambulance) to the emergency room.
- Thieves accessed (gain access) the bank accounts.
- The neighbor’s dog treed (chase so it climbs a tree) our kitten.
- Hugh Heffner has bedded (have sex with) hundreds of women.
- Would you garage (put in the garage) the car before it rains?
- He has a milk allergy and doesn’t want the pizza cheesed. (put cheese on)
- How many were impacted ( affect) by the blackout?
- The women who were incested (a victim of incest) were given new identities.
- They’ll NFA (no further action) the proposal if you send it.
- Couples who parent (become parents) too many children should pay more tax.
- The victims were funeralized (funeral) on the weekend.
- Her husband broomed (sweep with a broom) the steps.
- She weirded /weirdoed (act weird, act like a weirdo) herself past the authorities.
- This Friday will be bookended (to come before and after, or at both sides of ) by two oil spill reports from British Petroleum.
- Ron Paul felt that certain behavior could not be legitimated (legitimate for legitimize).
- They’re shoeing (put shoes on) their son.
- An arrow may be flighted (fletch) with feathers.
- Sects incentivize (insensitive) their followers to mainstream society.
- The author was AKAing (also known as) (as) David Wolfe.
