It's often confusing but it's also very vibrant and exciting. The key issue is that language isn't reduced and we don't lose nuance. Some of our younger speakers can seem to manage on just a handful of words. They don't read widely or debate. That's worrying. We need subtlety and complexity in our wonderful language.
As someone who has, and still does suffer from severe depression, I can vouch that it is nothing like melancholia, which is a most pleasurable feeling.
How can you lie there and think of England When you don't even know who's in the team
I'm surprised that a definition with examples from 1614 is not early enough to be counted as one of the 'proper' meanings 😯. To see how old the word is considered to be, I looked at all the examples from 1400 or before. Even then there was a wide range of nuance. Do you insist on the 'original' spelling too, @Nanny Beach 😉?
Here are those 15th century examples from the OED (just because I thought some were quite lovely):
(not in any particular order)
'If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need.'
School dinners in North London too. Maybe it's a London thing. I remember designing an assessment worksheet for prospective literacy students. In one exercise, I mentioned the word 'lunch.' My boss told me to change it to 'dinner' as the word 'lunch' might not be understood. What she really meant that she thought it was too posh. My view was, if they didn't understand the word 'lunch' they needed an ESOL class, not a literacy class. It's not just accents that are used by some as class signifiers but vocabulary too. Napkins/ serviettes; toilets/ loos/ lavatories/ bogs. I've never had a supper because I'm not that posh.
, my hubby is just having his dinner... late by his standards, because we took the dogs out. Later he'll say"what's for supper". He eats by the clock. I eat when I am hungry. When I was a child,supper was crackers and ovaltine before bed. If you are really posh,it's luncheon. Napkins are for babies bottoms.
I've had Sunday lunch but only in a pub but any other day the main meal at home is dinner whether day or evening. I've heard of a fish and chip supper but never had one. It's a fund-raising raising thing, isn't it? That's nappies, not napkins @Nanny Beach It's a sheet of kitchen roll here unless it's a special occasion meal. Then we use a serviette . Dead common, me.
Dinner/lunch, tea/dinner etc. When I was a child, the middle-of-the day meal was dinner. It might be a school dinner served up by the dinnerladies, or pack-up, or you might go home for dinner. The evening meal was tea, whether it was beans on toast or sausage and mash or occasionally a chippy tea (I'd never heard of the term fish supper until I went down south to university). Supper was a biscuit or two before bedtime. Nowadays I use dinner/lunch and tea/dinner more-or-less interchangeably depending on who I'm talking to.
Doncaster, South Yorkshire. Soil type: sandy, well-drained
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When you don't even know who's in the team
S.Yorkshire/Derbyshire border
To see how old the word is considered to be, I looked at all the examples from 1400 or before. Even then there was a wide range of nuance. Do you insist on the 'original' spelling too, @Nanny Beach 😉?
Here are those 15th century examples from the OED (just because I thought some were quite lovely):
(not in any particular order)
I remember designing an assessment worksheet for prospective literacy students.
In one exercise, I mentioned the word 'lunch.' My boss told me to change it to 'dinner' as the word 'lunch' might not be understood. What she really meant that she thought it was too posh. My view was, if they didn't understand the word 'lunch' they needed an ESOL class, not a literacy class.
It's not just accents that are used by some as class signifiers but vocabulary too. Napkins/ serviettes; toilets/ loos/ lavatories/ bogs.
I've never had a supper because I'm not that posh.
That's nappies, not napkins @Nanny Beach
It's a sheet of kitchen roll here unless it's a special occasion meal. Then we use a serviette . Dead common, me.
I ♥ my garden.
I ♥ my garden.