"casualty"

Thu Oct 14 20:37:22 UTC 2010

It looks to me as though the DOD reports clearly distinguish between "dead"
and "WIA" ("wounded in action"), which are broken  further down into "RTD"
("returned to duty") and "Not RTD."  "Dead" and "WIA" make up the total
casualties.

The lines about "fatalities" seem merely to indicate the most recent
updatings of those specific figures.

JL
On Thu, Oct 14, 2010 at 1:03 PM, Paul Frank <paulfrank at post.harvard.edu>wrote:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Paul Frank <paulfrank at POST.HARVARD.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: "casualty"
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> In the DOD casualty reports available here, casualties appear to be
> synonymous with fatalities:
>
>
> http://search.dma.mil/search?&filter=0&q=casualties&site=DEFENSE_gov&entqr=0&sort=date:D:L:d1&output=xml_no_dtd&client=DEFENSE_frontend&ud=1&oe=UTF-8&ie=UTF-8&proxystylesheet=DEFENSE_frontend
>
> But casualties still means "deaths and injuries" to many. See for instance:
>
> "The human cost of the armed conflict in Afghanistan is escalating in
> 2010. In the first six months of the year civilian casualties â€“
> including deaths and injuries of civilians increased by 31 per cent
> over the same period in 2009."
> <
> http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/rwb.nsf/db900SID/SKEA-887GWN?OpenDocument&Click=
> >
>
> In the ICRC (where my wife works) casualty means "death and/or injury."
>
> Paul
>
> Paul Frank
> Translator
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>
> On Thu, Oct 14, 2010 at 6:27 PM, Bill Palmer <w_a_palmer at bellsouth.net>
> wrote:
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> > Sender: Â  Â  Â  American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Poster: Â  Â  Â  Bill Palmer <w_a_palmer at BELLSOUTH.NET>
> > Subject: Â  Â  Â Re: "casualty"
> >
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > In the US Navy's system of reporting and remaing abreast of unit
> operational
> > readiness, failed equipment or machinery is termed a "casualty".
> >
> > The formatted report to higher authority is a CASREP. Â This has become a
> > verb, e.g., "We have to casrep the air search radar"
> >
> > Bill P
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: "Victor Steinbok" <aardvark66 at GMAIL.COM>
> > To: <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Sent: Thursday, October 14, 2010 11:15 AM
> > Subject: Re: "casualty"
> >
> >
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> >> Sender: Â  Â  Â  American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> >> Poster: Â  Â  Â  Victor Steinbok <aardvark66 at GMAIL.COM>
> >> Subject: Â  Â  Â Re: "casualty"
> >>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >>
> >> Â OK, OED is not the only dictionary on the planet. The top-level
> >> OneLook definitions:
> >>
> >>> ? noun: Â a decrease of military personnel or equipment
> >>> ? noun: Â someone injured or killed in an accident
> >>> ? noun: Â someone injured or killed or captured or missing in a
> >>> military engagement
> >>> ? noun: Â an accident that causes someone to die
>  >>
> >> Note that there is even an ambiguity between first, second and third
> >> definitions. There is confusion between second and fourth as well,
> >> although, obviously, not between first and fourth.
> >>
> >> Wiktionary adds two more for "casualty":
> >>
> >>> Something that happens by chance, especially an unfortunate event; an
> >>> accident, a disaster.
> >>> (UK) The accident and emergency department of a hospital
> >>
> >> and one more for "casualties":
> >>
> >>> The collective tally of injuries and fatalities of an event.
> >>
> >> Note that this /does not/ include the missing or captured. In fact, it's
> >> been quite some time since I've heard anyone refer to captured soldiers
> >> as "casualties", but Jon has been around much longer than I and has
> >> spoken the language longer still.
> >>
> >> MWD of Law adds the insurance use (as in "life and casualty"):
> >>
> >>> something lost, stolen, damaged, or destroyed
> >>
> >> Then, of course, there is Nabokov:
> >>
> >>> I wonder where you got your statistics when you say that Theirs
> >>> executed more people than did the Terreur? I object to this kind of
> >>> excuse for two reasons. Although from a Christian's or a
> >>> mathematician's point of view a thousand people killed in battle a
> >>> hundred years ago equal a thousand people killed in a battle of today,
> >>> historically the first definition is "slaughter" and the second "some
> >>> casualties." Secondly: one cannot compare the slapdash suppression,
> >>> however abominable, of a revolt with the thorough application of a
> >>> system of murder.
> >>
> >> I don't find the use as problematic as Jon does. Perhaps it's a
> >> generations gap. When did we start worrying about the evolution of words
> >> into multiple, even overlapping, meanings? I always thought this was
> >> something we left to the French...
> >>
> >> Â  Â  VS-)
>  >>
> >>
> >> On 10/13/2010 7:58 PM, Garson O'Toole wrote:
> >>> The passage uses the term "casualties" as a synonym for "dead
> >>> causalities". I think that Jon finds this "very misleading and to be
> >>> deplored".
> >>> The use of "casualties" with this constrained meaning is non-ambiguous
> >>> in this example because the previous sentence says "worthy monument to
> >>> our dead". It does not say "worthy monument to our dead and wounded".
> >>>
> >>> I am reminded of this riddle:
> >>> Question: A planes crashes on the US-Canada border. Where are the
> >>> survivors buried?
> >>> Answer: Survivors are not buried.
> >>>
> >>> Here is an similar riddle I just constructed (or remembered).
> >>> Question: A planes crashes on the US-Canada border. One of the
> >>> casualties is not buried for more than 50 years. Why not?
> >>
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