The Is Not Defined By Dictionaries Or Professors, Or...

Definition Essay Draft Words are not defined by dictionaries or professors, or officials, but by how people use them, how they are put in to context, through the timeless evolution of meanings. Words can have many different faces, many of which can be powerful or quite weak, others can have a friendly face or a mean one. Sometimes there are words that can start out having a friendly face, but with time society can turn them into a mean face that betrays its former self, words like this exist all across modern social interaction, some can be more prominent than others and promote an ignorant atmosphere as to which we are forced to live in. The word gay is no exception, many people apply this word incorrectly to every situation and it†¦show more content†¦Gay wasn t used to replace homosexual as a noun until the twentieth century (Oxford English Dictionary). That was when politics and news corporations used the word to label the homosexual community as gay. In recent events, for example, there have been instances such as the Gay Rights Movement which has been mentioned in media, in turn creates it as a label for homosexuals. So nowadays homosexuals are officially known as gays. Although gay became a technical term in the professional field, at a local level, the word turned away from being a noun and became an adjective, just like in the beginnings of the word; but it had taken on a very different meaning from what it was originally. Gay: adj., stupid, dumb, out of favor. That seems to be how our generation defined this word, it is sad to see that society has come to this, to relate a group of people to the words dumb or stupid. People use this word in many cases that don t even have any relation to the actual meaning of the word, mostly as a derogatory term or insult. For example, if a student chooses to complain about a homework assignment or how a teacher runs their classroom, they usually will say â€Å" Man, this is so gay, I hate this† . To the student, their sta tement is exactly the same as, â€Å" Man, this is so stupid†. It is pitiful how this generation has done this to such a word that has so much other meaning behind it. It is the same story for similar words, like faggot or queer. These terms have