You've gotta keep 'em separated

[venta]

So. Deprecation. Do you know what it is ?

I don't mean self-deprecation, or coughing deprecatingly, or similar. I also didn't try to write "depreciation" and miss. I mean the word as used in the following sentence:

I'm afraid that method of doing it has been deprecated.

[Poll #1472070]

I'm just curious. When I started work in '99, I assumed the company I worked for had just made that usage of "deprecated" up. I was most surprised to find out it was a proper word.

Edit: For people who said they guessed, you can check whether you were correct :)

Comments

[beckyc.livejournal.com]

I know people who pronounce it depreciate, and it grates.

[venta.livejournal.com]

Ooh. Nasty.

I wonder sometimes why people persist in pronouncing something wrongly when people round them are saying the same word differently (unless they're doing it on purpose of course). Do they find it really grating that (from their perspective) you're constantly missing that third syllable out ?

Obviously I'm willing to accept different pronunciation if it's a regional thing, but I don't think that excuse will wash in this case :)

[hoiho.livejournal.com]

I have wondered the same thing, often, when I had a client who always called the simulator the stimulator, and what it did was stimulation. And he wasn't the kind of person to indulge in malapropisms for comedic effect. I worked there for about nine months, and he never varied. And we used the word many times, every day, as it affected a major part of what we were working on.

[undyingking.livejournal.com]

Some people just seem to have a blind ear for that sort of thing. And will be quite amazed when one attempts to point it out to them.

[hughe.livejournal.com]

I used to when I first came across it. But then I'm dyslexic and though people were pronouncing depreciated incorrectly, before I saw how it was spelt.

[venta.livejournal.com]

Yup, that's what I meant above. If two people pronounce a word differently, how do they establish which one of them is wrong :)

I have a long history of mispronouncing words I'd read, but not heard, so I tend just to ask people if they think I'm saying something wrongly.

[exspelunca.livejournal.com]

I suppose it has a vague origin in the accepted (in the real world) meaning of deprecate, i.e. to disapprove of. On pronunciation, if Paxman says "meetreeology" once more on Univ Challenge .... and for those who say "deteriate" and miss a syllable there are the fires of hell.

[rabbit1080.livejournal.com]

I didn't recognise the word until I read your example sentence.

[shrydar.livejournal.com]

Familiar now, but I suspect that I, too, first came across it in the late 90s. I wasn't convinced it was a proper word then either.