Why "prophesize" ?

[ronbutters at AOL.COM]

I agree completely, and I add only that my point as that making "prophesy" a verb sans adding /z/ just feels WEIRD. Yet we have e.g. "allied" and other two-syllable words. Arnold has thought this out more carefully than I, though--as usual.
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-----Original Message-----
From: "Arnold M. Zwicky" <zwicky at CSLI.STANFORD.EDU>

Date:         Wed, 24 Oct 2007 17:22:13
To:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Subject:      Re: [ADS-L] Why "prophesize" ?


On Oct 24, 2007, at 3:01 PM, Ron Butters wrote:

> Is there a reluctance to turn "prophesy" into an ordinary verb
> because (most? all?) other 3&4-syllable nouns ending in /-si/
> cannot become verbs (e.g., "leprosy," "legacy," "agency," "piracy,"
> "presidency")?

1.  there are plenty of -ize verbs based on nouns ending in /i/, e.g.:

analogize, apologize; colonize, harmonize; deputize; summarize;
subsidize

so: /ti  di  ni  ri  Ji/.  why should /si/ be excluded?

2.  though -ize does many things (derive inchoatives, derive
causative-inchoatives, derive verbs meaning 'to supply with', derive
verbs meaning 'to behave like', 'to treat the way ... does', etc.),
there are semantic restrictions on the bases these various kinds of -
ize can combine with.  these semantic restrictions remove a large
number of bases in /si/ from consideration; in particular, abstract
nouns in -ancy/-ency are semantically inappropriate; and "leprosize"
would be as odd as "influenzize".  i'm not sure that we're left with
enough /si/ bases to justify a generalization.

3.  in addition, -ize is a very productive suffix; if you collect
verbs in -ize assiduously, you can find a new one almost every day:
fragranc(e)ize, condominiumize, condomize, Thatcherize, etc.  these
are nonce formations, but they're interpretable in context.  so the
fact that you haven't heard or seen a particular -ize word or that it
isn't in dictionaries doesn't mean it's impossible, only that people
haven't yet seen a use for it.  i can easily imagine "legacize"
'supply (with) a legacy, turn sth into a legacy' and "agencize" 'turn
sth into an agency' (as in "GWB agencized Homeland Security").

4.  "prophesize" (however you spell it) when it was first created
probably meant 'supply (with) prophecies' -- i.e., something very
close to "prophesy".  the material in the OED is not nearly enough to
indicate whether people who had both verbs might have used them a bit
differently.  but, in any case, "prophesize" is an improvement over
"prophesy" on morphological grounds.

5.  another fun fact: there's also a verb "prophetize", based on the
noun "prophet", presumably meaning originally 'behave like a prophet'
-- i.e., 'prophesy', once again.

arnold

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