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May 04, 2005
Vishy's Indian English Dictionary: prepone
Never in the long and glorious *cough* history of the good ol' United States of America have its people had to deal to a significant degree with English speakers from an entirely different culture and background than their own. From the seventeenth century until the late twentieth century, foreign English speakers that USians have encountered have been from Canada, the United Kingdom and sometimes Australia. However, with the realities of the global labor market changing, USians regularly encounter competent speakers of English from India, either over the phone or at work. The English spoken by Indians makes quite the impression on an outsider for the raw pulse and vibrance that runs through it. Indians have adopted English in ways that astonish even so-called native speakers. Because of closer contact with Indians, knowledge of the Indian dialect of English may serve USians well. In this series, I'll pick words used by Indians and try to discuss their meanings in different senses.
prepone. PRE·pown. To change the schedule of an event so it occurs before its original schedule. The opposite of postpone. E.g. I have to change my flight tickets to India right away; my brother's wedding just got preponed because of my grandmother's failing health.
Prepone is a creative antonym to postpone. It makes a lot of sense when you think about it and I can only wonder why British or American English haven't adopted it. Oh well, all in good time.
Posted by Vishy at May 4, 2005 11:38 PM
Comments
I've had this argument with others that prepone is *not* a valid word, but it seems to be listed in several dictionaries lately. e.g: try running prepone against dictionary.com and it actually comes up with a reference from the Websters New Millenium dictionary!
Posted by: Krish at June 29, 2005 10:33 AM
Prepone may be a word, but it is definitely slang. Just because aint is in the dictionary does not make it proper English.
I'll give an example: “discombobulate”. How many “combobulated” people do you know? Just because you can create a logical antonym doesn't mean that it is automatically acceptable.
Posted by: Joe at August 15, 2005 12:51 PM
We can talk about whether a word *should* exist until the cows come home. There will always be purists who debate whether a word should exist. But the history of English has shown that it has been so wildly successful as an international language precisely because it is prepared to test its limits, try out new words and incorporate them into itself if they are successful. It is one of the best examples of linguistic laissez-faire, a free-market of words.
Prepone, in this case, fills a vacuum where a word is much needed. I am not sure who combobulated people, but it is much easier to negate an attribute such as combobulation without creating an antonym.
Posted by: Vishy at August 22, 2005 08:28 AM