“Awesome” is the new “massive” | Comma Queen

This is huge!!!

Posted by cond0011 at March 1, 2016 1:42 AM

As usual when it comes to experts, or purists (another word for snob) and or folks who spend way too much time on incidental bull excrement, it's not what is necessarily correct or not, but rather what they personally like or think is appropriate.

Notice in the examples from her visit to Australia - “massive problem”, "heap massive praise” she says they “sound wrong” but not that are wrong. And the reason is she thinks of the word in its “classic sense”.

All the while in the “historical order” from Webster the figurative use of the word,the definition of “large in comparison to what is typical” comes before what she thinks should be the proper use of the word - “having mass”.

So as she demonstrated herself, using the word massive is indeed correct when used to describe something larger than typical. Such as the massive time I’ve wasted here.

But this was so awesome.

Posted by tim at March 1, 2016 7:12 AM

Iconic.

Posted by Rob De Witt at March 1, 2016 8:37 AM

Awesome but not all?
Awesome but not awe-full?
Huh? But not huH?

Posted by Howard Nelson at March 1, 2016 9:19 AM

Massively insightful, Tim. And she's just perfecte as a language scold, don't you think?

Posted by vanderleun at March 1, 2016 9:35 AM