How TV Tropes Changed The Meaning Of "Trope" | Etymology (“Commonly Misused Words” Explained)

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How TV Tropes Changed The Meaning Of "Trope" | Etymology (“Commonly Misused Words” Explained)

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A Critical Hit! | "Critical Kate" Willært

Күн бұрын

Thanks to TV Tropes, you've probably been using the word "trope" wrong for most of your life. But don't be alarmed! Language is evolving all the time, and its perfectly natural for words to change in meaning. Unless people still find the original meaning useful, such as "irony," where grammar snobs fought back when Alanis Morissette's hit song "Ironic" nearly sealed in a new meaning. Or the case of "literally," a word that can now either mean literally or figuratively, because so many people have used the word "literally" ironically, i.e. using it to mean its opposite for dramatic effect. Which is a trope. Confused yet? Just watch the video and it'll all be much clearer.
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#etymology #literally #tvtropes

Пікірлер: 53

@Gnarlodious 2 жыл бұрын

The fact that 'literally' now means BOTH 'literally' AND 'figuratively' is a perfect example of the evolution of the 'contranym'.

@Zeecarver Жыл бұрын

it's truly unfortunate

@plutoh9958 Жыл бұрын

Literally has been used in place of figuratively for 100s of years. Merriam Webster has a video about it

@shrekatemyonions Жыл бұрын

The way I see it, tvTropes' definition isn't "misusing" the word, per se. Like the Google trends graph showed, the word hasn't been in common use for two centuries. Meaning, the meaning didn't mean much and basically lost its meaning because society no longer needed it to mean anything. We had outgrown our use of it. So when they came along and used _trope_ to mean "a literary device" instead of "a figurative device", it was just giving new meaning to a word that was pretty much already dead

@RabbitEarsCh 2 жыл бұрын

That was really well structured and I loved the punch of the sentence at the end. I am ESL so I learned the meaning of "trope" via tvtropes in 2008/2009...I bet tvtropes "taught" this meaning to a whole generation of English language learners.

@miguelalcala7492 2 жыл бұрын

that last sentence is so good

@EdmondDantes224 Жыл бұрын

Honestly this sounds less like a misuse and more like the term just simply evolved. Because in a weird way the TV Tropes usage of the word isn't that dissimilar to the classic usage.

@DjynnFlyssa 2 жыл бұрын

This video was an absolute joy to watch. Keep up the great work!

@byronholt2031 10 ай бұрын

The song "Ironic" is just using Dramatic Irony and not Situational Irony

@shaynathoon4009 8 ай бұрын

Yes, and it's also using cosmic irony like in "rain on your wedding day" as the narrator is seriously screwed with by the universe and she has no way to control it.

@luthamahtin 2 жыл бұрын

this video literally made my head explode

@sixtyfps 2 жыл бұрын

You make quality look effortless. I deeply admire you

@vomitdistrict1621 2 жыл бұрын

Been adoring your videos! Very succinct but in depth and stuff :)

@Tremmuh 2 жыл бұрын

Interesting, but now my brain literally hurts 😖😜

@AFGiant 2 жыл бұрын

Actually, yeah! That clears it up!!

@SeanNH94 2 жыл бұрын

Great video, I love etymology, I'm so glad I subscribed after your metroid video!

@JunYouko Жыл бұрын

This video was literally so good!

@SebastianVik 2 жыл бұрын

I literally ust got into Tv-tropes and searched up this topic. nice timing! Kudos on all the toungue and brain twisters in this video, thats awful!

@SebastianVik 2 жыл бұрын

This made me think about postmodernism and language. how everything is signified by these symbols (f.ex language), and the concept of symbols losing their anchor in reality when they take on a life, or world of their own. super interesting stuff!

@ryanstevens3822 2 жыл бұрын

idk, I was taught about tropes in 7th grade English in 1993 and pretty much the nuts and bolts. But have you read The Raw Shark Texts? The one that gets me is the modern use of anxious bugs me.

@cheeseburger2662 2 жыл бұрын

Good video Queen!

@limerence8365 2 ай бұрын

A word can't be used wrong if it adopts a new meaning. Ones meant for a language context, the other is used for a narrative context. This happens all the time.

@dugolas 2 жыл бұрын

words man, we made them up!

@pussthepupanddonkeythedog5135 Жыл бұрын

This deserves a lot more views.

@TheMaplestrip 2 жыл бұрын

Haha, this is great. Excellent video, Kate! ^_^

@MiauTheWorld Жыл бұрын

I need more alcohol to fully understand this video! Great content!! 😀

@javi0usly 2 жыл бұрын

Your videos are the best.

@sonicteeelo23 2 жыл бұрын

Why my brain hurts? Uh

@jadefae 2 жыл бұрын

Wow good vid damn

@domesticcat1725 10 ай бұрын

I feel like "blaming" this change in meaning on TVtropes really overestimates their role. The use of the word "trope" you can see on the site was used in film analysis in the 50s. Early literature on movie adaptations of novels describes how visual and narrative tropes came about due to the inability of the medium to otherwise represent verbal tropes from the source material. Movies have since had a huge impact on literature, making the cinema definition of "trope" relevant to all mediums In other words, the meaning of the word wasn't changed by misuse, it changed because the way we tell stories has changed

@ACriticalHit 10 ай бұрын

What's your source on it going back to the 50s?

@TheSteinmetzen Жыл бұрын

I think that a similar thing happened to the meme.

@thechugg4372 Ай бұрын

TV trope has ruined writing for so many people it's insane....

@codafett Жыл бұрын

Tvtropes convinced an entire generation of writers that cliches and pop culture references are essential to a good story.

@Alianger 2 жыл бұрын

Their evil deed always bothered me even though it's not my first language and I never use the site

@dahauns 2 жыл бұрын

Sooo...how'd you name TV Tropes then? :)

@Derpmind 2 жыл бұрын

Dictionaries did WHAT?!? What's even the point of the word "literally" if not to distinguish something from "figuratively"?

@musaran2 2 жыл бұрын

Dictionaries are descriptive. They list how the word is used, even if used wrong.

@aloneitan3819 2 жыл бұрын

The two meanings of the word are used in such different context it is literally impossible to misunderstand which meaning is being used. Also the other use of "literally" isn't "figuratively", it's an intensifier.

@Alianger 2 жыл бұрын

They literally buckled under the mob pressure!

@montithered4741 2 жыл бұрын

How is “rain on your wedding day” NOT ironic? It’s a strange and/or funny situation. It’s opposite of what is expected, planned, or hoped for. That seems to meet the definition of irony given in the video.

@ACriticalHit 2 жыл бұрын

Rain on your wedding day is simply a bummer. Rain on your wedding day when you're a weather reporter and you reported clear skies for that day would be ironic.

@spider-ball 29 күн бұрын

1:48 EUREKA! I always joked that TV Tropes Dot Com was a Bingo game played by Joss Whedon fans (because how many genres can he rip off in one show...)

@JoshForeman 2 жыл бұрын

I'm generally against all prescriptivist thought and action.... except when it comes to literally. Until we get a sufficient substitute that one is an actual loss of meaning for the language. Also, I just have to point out an amazing irony: I used that same footage of Ironic in my latest video! kzfaq.info/get/bejne/grJoadZ_39TXmKs.html

@SebastianVik 2 жыл бұрын

you mean the inclusion of the second definition is the loss to language? I agreed with you at first, but on second thought I think I disagree. It actually made me think, how would an AI be able to understand this? probably, it wouldn't. it might be a loss to language, but it might also be a boon to our cultural consciousness. Theres something playful in the nature of our consciousness that makes it both possible and necessary to understand the innate counterbalance in the concepts we want or need to talk about. its almost, like, humorous.

@JoshForeman 2 жыл бұрын

@@SebastianVik Oh! Let's have a fight in the comments! I haven't done that in ages! *dusts off olde timey oversized boxing gloves... Ok, so as I see it, this is a special case. For words like awful, incredible, radical, etc. yes, ADDING further definitions to them is culturally additive. This is playfulness that does not take away. This is because they have many easily accessible substitutes. Accessible here meaning easy for an English speaker of average intelligence or an ESL person to come up with substitutes. The meaning can still be conveyed quickly and easily with replacement words. Not so with literal. (And I'm aware that literal has hundreds of years of being used "incorrectly") I would also put the word sublime on this end of the spectrum as a word that's shifted in such a way that there is a loss to our language. None of the loss I perceive is worth being truly upset about, and definitely not worth shaming those who participate in the loss. But I still feel it. Now... do you need some unguent for that sick burn I just delivered?

@lmeeken 2 жыл бұрын

@@JoshForeman I would venture that in most contexts you could find a suitable replacement for literally. Language is pretty plastic. The 'misuse' of literally also rankles my descriptivist self, but I can recognize that that's more just because of my habits of language than some actual existential threat to meaning. I definitely shuddered more every time Kate asserted that a word was changed by being used "wrongly" than I typically do when someone uses "literally" for emphasis.

@cousinted 2 жыл бұрын

I'm of two minds of "literally" and its misuse - I support its misuse in an ironic fashion as outlined in the video (For instance, if I were to say someone is "literally the most annoying person in the world"), but what I find much more annoying is when it's added to a sentence for seemingly no reason except as to fill space (For instance "People misuse that word literally all the time"). In the former example, there's actual linguistic work work being done by the word - Calling someone "the most annoying person in the world" is typically a figurative statement and, while declaring someone to literally be the most annoying person in the world is factually incorrect, adding "literally" into that sentence is actually modifying its meaning by turning it into hyperbole: It makes it clear that I find the person in question so annoying that merely describing them as the most annoying person in the world as a figure of speech is not sufficient enough to express my disdain. In the latter, however, literally isn't really doing anything to modify or hyperbolize the sentence in question. Saying someone does something "all the time" isn't really a statement with a literal interpretation, so adding "literally" into that sentence doesn't really do anything to modify its meaning. If you just said "People misuse that word all the time" it would have the exact same impact - it's just adding an extra word to a sentence for no reason.

@JoshForeman 2 жыл бұрын

@@cousinted I would add to this "crime", the additional misuse that really gets my goat. The use of Literally as a soft emphasis. I agree that using it as comedic hyperbole is excellent. But saying your favorite restaurant has "literally the best dipping sauce in the world" is just annoying and destructive to the language. Again, with the caveat that must always be made on the internet: No, this does not warrant actual upset feelings or moral opprobrium.

@paultardspambot 2 ай бұрын

ok, random but.... Alanis Morrisette's use of "Ironic" wasn't actually incorrect and the claim here it coined a new meaning is absolutely wrong. The word "ironic" originally meant basically "unexpected". Clearly using that definition, Alanis is using the word properly. However, in common use, the old meaning of the word "ironic" had been replaced by the specific meaning "literary" or "situational" irony, which most of the examples in her songs do not qualify as. Now, one could argue, ok. but surely she didn't mean to use an outdated and obscure meaning of the word, she meant "literary or situational" irony but failed at it. This argument gets circular however. As the use of "unexpected" fits for the song whereas the more modern definition of irony doesn't, it seems clear that she (or whoever actually wrote the lyrics, I dont know if she wrote them herself) was using "ironic" to consistently mean "unexpected." Perhaps the controversy comes from her usages being close to, but not actual cases, of literary irony. At any rate, the usage of the word is consistent in the song. While probably unintentional, there is a meta level where the song name and the usage is in fact, ironic. I may doubt the song was that clever in its wordplay, but i dont really know. Regardless, the notion that she "popularized a new meaning of the word irony" is just incorrect. If she did popularize a meaning, it was not new one, but a re-populariztion of an older one that had gone out of fashion.