Concerning
Okay, I don't want to fall victim to the Recency Illusion, but it certainly seems to me that use of the adjective (or present participle) "concerning" has risen pretty sharply of late.
It's a perfectly natural usage, but one that strikes me as uncommon enough to be weird, yet recently I've seen it in a lot of cop/legal things on the news, as in "It was concerning" that Hinckley "searched the Internet for photos of his female dentist" on ABC News just tonight.
My dictionary (MW Unabridged) says, by the way, that it's archaic (and the gerund is obsolete).
3 Comments:
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At 8:17 PM, November 30, 2011
Kathie had this to say...
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At 10:48 AM, December 01, 2011
Mark had this to say...
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At 2:19 PM, December 01, 2011
The Ridger, FCD had this to say...
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<-- Older Post ^ Home Newer Post -->Perhaps the revival of the archaism "concerning" is a product of media corporate lawyers who strive to cover their employers' derrières by advocating the use of less-judgmental words for what most folks are really thinking, like "troubling," "disturbing," etc.
It sounds odd.
As an aside, my biggest problem with words like that is that they are judgemental. A reporter should not add editorial comments to a story. If it's a quote, that's fine, but I really don't care what the reporter feels about the story ("It was concerning ..." means "I was concerned ...") TV reporters/newsreaders are especially bad about it.
Well, in this case, they were quoting some DOJ official. I do agree with you, though.
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