A vocabulary question.

[Redwolf]

Reminds me of an ongoing argument my daughter has with school friends who claim that "funner" is not a "word." It may not be "formal," but even Webster's recognizes it as a legitimate construction.

Redwolf

[PhilO]

He just kept getting happier and happier, but one day nothing delightful happened, so he got a little unhappier, till the next day when he got happier, still.

Adam was unhappy because his dog died. Bertram was unhappy because his cat had diarrhea. Both Adam and Betram were unhappy. But Bertram was unhappier than Adam because his wife ran off with a Canadian.

I think unhappier will be avoided by careful writers. It is the negation of "happier" not the comparative of "unhappy," which would be "more unhappy." That form is exceedly ugly, and the best thing is to scratch the sentence and to start over. Avoiding "happy" altogether will improve the sentence and the thought, imho.

No fair entering your own writing contest, Bloomfield; this better not win....

Philo

[Walden]

Reminds me of an ongoing argument my daughter has with school friends who claim that "funner" is not a "word." It may not be "formal," but even Webster's recognizes it as a legitimate construction.

Redwolf

But is it an unfunner construction than unhappier?

[mvhplank]

One of the earlier posts in this thread reminded me of something a friend said. A little background is necessary.

I have an autoimmune type of arthritis and was being treated for a while with a sulfa drug. Besides giving me headaches and an upset stomach, plus making me photosensitive, it resulted in my becoming severely anemic. The doctor (a board-certified jerk) took me off the sulfa drug but didn't suggest an alternative for controlling the disease. So I was moving around cautiously because I was in pretty constant low-grade pain, and in this sorry state when I attended a wonderful wedding of two good friends. In the meet-and-greet that happens at these things, my friend Lisa summed up (quite accurately) my whole feelings about the sequence of events with:

"She's under-happy."

M

PS--You know those annoying commercials for Enbrel? It's approved for psoriatic arthritis too. I have to give myself a shot twice a week but I'm symptom-free--thank God and anybody/anything who should also get credit.

[Bloomfield]

I think the PC version of that is misunhappy or maybe misunderhappiated. Dishappy? Malhappy? Happyless?

It's "special happiness." Albert had just lost his job. His car had been stolen. His doctor had told him that he had cancer. The bank was foreclosing on his house. And he was fresh out of beer. Albert was a special-happiness person.

In this day and age, Albert would be "happiness challenged"- no?

Tom

In the nineties, Albert would have been happiness challenged. It sounds too judgmental and hide-bound for the new millenium. We should all remember that special-happiness persons like Albert may be valuable members of society and that they have their own unique voice. In the case of Albert this is true at least until he gets his hands on some beer, at which point he will become a special-soberness person.

[fearfaoin]

Unhappier is a perfectly cromulent word.


---------

"A noble spirit <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kwyjibo">embiggens</a> the smallest man"

[tommyk]

Is unhappier a proper word?

As one resident linguist, a word is "proper" only depending on whom you subscribe to as the authority on the subject. Those seeking a "standard" for what is proper typically seek out a dictionary of some sort. That only holds true if one subscribes to the "Golden Rule of Dialects" (the one with the gold - money - gets to say which dialect is "correct").

Most linguists these days are "descriptive" (observe how people actually use language) instead of the old English grammar teachers who are "prescriptive" (determine how people "should" speak based upon some not always agreed upon or helpful standard).

In short, if someone uses a word and that word is understood by a listener, that utterance is communicative and, therefore, viable.

[Roger O'Keeffe]

I recently used what I assumed was a perfectly standard English word, "disimproved", in the company of a British colleague, who seemed to be really amused by it and commented "what a charmingly Irish expression".

Do things disimprove in North America too, or can they, like the British Labour Party, only get better?

[satyricon234]

Instead of using a negative such as "non-" my motto is to always use a positive of opposite meaning. So I'd say sadder. Unless the subject wasn't sad at all but merely less happy then yesterday.

Would someone say "unsadder?"

Ooops. Time's up. I have to go to work.

[chas]

In school at various points, I was taught that the suffix -er shouldn't be added to words of over two syllables. This is standard written (American, presumably) English.

I'm with tommyk, any word you can use that's understood by your companion is fair game in spoken English or in other informal settings.

I must admit that this East-Coaster has never used or heard unhappier in conversation. But I will try today.

[amar]

but what about gunther? is he imposterer?

[glauber]

Ding Ding Dong!

[Flyingcursor]

In school at various points, I was taught that the suffix -er shouldn't be added to words of over two syllables. This is standard written (American, presumably) English.

I'm with tommyk, any word you can use that's understood by your companion is fair game in spoken English or in other informal settings.

I must admit that this East-Coaster has never used or heard unhappier in conversation. But I will try today.

Does that mean that "funner" is OK?
I kind of like the idea of using negatives.

In nonsame words, I don't dislike the idea of not distaining nonpositives.

[Bloomfield]

but what about gunther? is he imposterer?

He's just shy. Likes his picture taken, though. Go figure.

[Bloomfield]

Is unhappier a proper word?

As one resident linguist, a word is "proper" only depending on whom you subscribe to as the authority on the subject. Those seeking a "standard" for what is proper typically seek out a dictionary of some sort. That only holds true if one subscribes to the "Golden Rule of Dialects" (the one with the gold - money - gets to say which dialect is "correct").

Most linguists these days are "descriptive" (observe how people actually use language) instead of the old English grammar teachers who are "prescriptive" (determine how people "should" speak based upon some not always agreed upon or helpful standard).

In short, if someone uses a word and that word is understood by a listener, that utterance is communicative and, therefore, viable.

Ok, I promised myself not to get into this. But I'm weak. So just for the benefit for the cognoscenti: Two things always amuse me about the descriptivists. First that they actually take those old English grammar teachers seriously (and impute their sins to modern prescriptivists), and second that they'll tell yo with a straight face that what they do is "descriptive" (rather than prescriptive with a different standard).