"privilege"; "exempt"

[Jonathan Lighter]

It always makes me think of "Simonize."  But perhaps that's meant as part of
the fun.

JL

On Mon, Jul 26, 2010 at 8:59 AM, Charles C Doyle <cdoyle at uga.edu> wrote:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Charles C Doyle <cdoyle at UGA.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: "privilege"; "exempt"
>
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>
> Not to mention (though you almost did, Jonathan), that other favorite term
> of "theory" art(lessness):  "valorize."
>
> --Charlie
>
> ________________________________________
> From: American Dialect Society [ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] on behalf of
> Jonathan Lighter [wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM]
> Sent: Sunday, July 25, 2010 9:16 AM
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Cultural theorists have been using this word for decades as an
> indispensable
> term of art.  MW defines it as "to accord a higher value or superior
> position to."  Thus, e.g., "TV news privileges sensation over
> significance."
>
> Unlike the jargon of, say, atom-splitting, no real-life consequences are
> known for unheralded alterations in the jargon of Theory. Thus "privilege"
> has acquired an additional sense, as here:
>
> 2010 Mary A. Favret _War at a Distance_ (Princeton: P.U.P.) 176: Military
> dictionaries [of the 18th C.] assume that the average reader requires a
> bridge to this new, foreign world of experience. The language of military
> matters is thus privileged, but also exempted, set apart from the more
> general use of English.
>
> I don't know where or when this broader sense arose. "Privilege"
> here appears to mean something like, 'to value,' which is not at all the
> same as "to accord a higher value or superior position to."  (The context
> provides no clue as to what subjects, if any, "military matters" might have
> been privileged over.)
>
> I apologize if the online OED covers this, but I can't get through at the
> moment and don't want to think about this any longer than I have to.
>
> BTW, MW marks this use of _exempt_ ('set apart') as _obsolete_.
>
> JL
>
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