Beg High The Roof Beam

In advertising, it’s important to have a grasp of how and why language is used, so that we can use it appropriately and effectively with whichever audience we are having a conversation. To that end, it’s important to monitor the ever changing meanings of various words and phrases. Here’s an example I’ve noticed lately that may prove instructive.

More and more often we are hearing people use the phrase, “begs the question.”
The rise of the use of this phrase coincides with the frequency with which it is “misused.” To beg the question means, or used to mean, “to assume that which your argument is trying to prove.” This phrase has been commonly used in philosophical discourse and other contexts of scholarly argument.

Today “beg the question” has come to mean, “raise the question.”

Why? What is gained by replacing the phrase, ”raises the question” with the phrase “begs the question”? They denote precisely the same thing. Nothing is gained, in terms of communication effectiveness, by saying “begs the question” rather than “raises the question.”

Yet, more and more, this substitution is being made, led largely by the news media. This development, and countless other similar developments in our constantly changing language, are almost universally mourned, if not reviled, by the self-appointed defenders of the English language, who I call “language zealots.”

This raises the question, “Why?”

The meanings of words and phrases are regularly modified by people using them to mean other than what they had previously meant, even if it doesn’t seem to add to our ability to communicate, and often, in fact, diminishes that ability. Often this change is motivated, ironically, by a person’s desire to sound smart or sophisticated or learned or whatever. I think that is motivation provides a partial explanation for why “raise the question” is becoming “beg the question.”

What I think the zealots are missing is that, at least as regards modern American English, there is another, more fundamental and universal need or motivation. Many American English speakers have need or desire for novelty. We have a strong tendency to evolve, modify, distort, vary bits of language, simply for the sake of novelty.
Why there exists this irrepressible need for novelty, at least in our culture, is a question for someone else to answer. My guess is that there is some kind of cultural ADD behind it. Whatever the reason, judging by the manner and rate at which English evolves, the need is clearly there.

Is this need less “important” than the need for clarity, stability, richness in language? I would say the people have spoken and the answer is no.

BegRecognizing and understanding this need for novelty in language is a useful insight because it provides us with one more lever, one more way to please, entertain, engage our audience. If we use this tool intentionally, rather than unconsciously, we can use it more effectively.