From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 X-Spam-Checker-Version: SpamAssassin 3.4.4 (2020-01-24) on polar.synack.me X-Spam-Level: X-Spam-Status: No, score=-0.0 required=5.0 tests=BAYES_20 autolearn=ham autolearn_force=no version=3.4.4 X-Google-Language: ENGLISH,ASCII-7-bit X-Google-Thread: 103376,2d0a25a73025910f X-Google-Attributes: gid103376,public X-Google-ArrivalTime: 1995-02-07 15:25:59 PST Path: swrinde!howland.reston.ans.net!news.cac.psu.edu!news.pop.psu.edu!hudson.lm.com!godot.cc.duq.edu!news.duke.edu!news.mathworks.com!newshost.marcam.com!zip.eecs.umich.edu!panix!cmcl2!thecourier.cims.nyu.edu!thecourier.cims.nyu.edu!nobody From: dewar@cs.nyu.edu (Robert Dewar) Newsgroups: comp.lang.ada Subject: Re: Summarise Date: 7 Feb 1995 15:00:38 -0500 Organization: Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences Message-ID: <3h8jh6$2i3@gnat.cs.nyu.edu> References: <1995Feb1.204503.1378@cs.tcd.ie> <3guv7j$l7t@gnat.cs.nyu.edu> <1995Feb6.153045.4445@sei.cmu.edu> NNTP-Posting-Host: gnat.cs.nyu.edu Date: 1995-02-07T15:00:38-05:00 List-Id: To points to make in response to Fobert Firth's authoritative sounding statement. First: summarize is not an invention of OED II, but is also the only acceptable spelling given in the first edition (sorry, can't give the proper reference, since I only have the annoying compact edition, where it appears on page 3150) That's a fair amount of accumulated authority there, though as Robert points out the spelling summarise appears in the quotations). Clearly the important bottom line for Ada here though is that the spelling finalize should certainly be regarded as acceptable British English, and you shouldn't let publishers change it! Second, anyone is free to play King Canute when it comes to language and grammar, but to say that finalize is not an English word seems pushing it to me. Yes it is a new word, appearing for the first time in OED II, but with a fairly long history of use (the first quote is 1922, it appears to origininate in Australia -- the Times first used it in 1955. The quotes are mostly the z spelling with just a couple of examples of s spellings. I guess brother Firth would have felt at home with N. Birkett who wrote in 1953 (Magic of Words, a pleasant reference): "When I hear of...things being adjumbreated, or visualized, or finalized..I think of the other aim of this [English] Association, 'To uphold the standards of English writing or speech'" Still that was I am sorry to point out 42 years ago, and at this stage attempting to maintain that finalize is not a word is as likely to succeed as my campaign to preserve the meanings of moot and oxymoron :-)