The New York Times is Bemused
Posted on November 11, 2008
Phillip B. Corbett ponders the correct meaning of the word "bemused." He looks over the Times' usage of the word in past columns and concludes that even the Times writers don't really know what the word means. The correct meaning of the word is "bewildered." But over time people have mis-used the word, giving it a new meaning of "detached amusement." So which is correct?
The popularity of this modifier seems undiminished by the fact that many writers, and readers, aren't quite sure what it means.Corbett then ruthlessly displays examples of all the times the newspaper has misused the word bemuse. We've always used bemuse to indicate befuddlement, but we do see an increasing use of the word to indicate wry amusement. It's all quite....bemusing.As The Times�s stylebook says, in careful, traditional use, "bemused" means "bewildered,� "confused" or even "stupefied." An extended meaning is "preoccupied, lost in thought."
But the similarity in sound to "amused" leads many writers to merge the meaning of the two words, using "bemused" to suggest a sort of detached amusement. A few dictionaries have started to accept this as an alternate sense.
Such shifts in meaning based on an initial misunderstanding are common as the language evolves. Sometimes the derived use becomes so widespread and accepted that it's pedantic and pointless to insist on only the original sense. For instance, not long ago we dropped our stylebook's longtime admonition against using "careen" � rather than "career" -- in the sense of "lurch along wildly at high speed." The original distinction had eroded so completely that there was little to gain in clinging to it.
But there's a reason to go slowly on such changes. Preserving the original sense of a word like "bemused" gives the careful writer an additional, precise tool. When its meaning starts to blur or merge with another word's, the result, at least for a while, is confusion and a loss of variety. So let's try to hold the line on "bemused."
