Kathy from Evansville, Indiana, is bothered when she hears younger people use to verse as a verb, as in “Who are they versing?” and “We versed that team last week.” This term arose out of misunderstanding versus, a preposition in Latin that means to come toward or turn toward, but which sounds like a conjugated verb in English. The idea of players versing each other arose out of gaming culture and has become common enough that its use should be considered legitimate. This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “Versing, Meaning X Versus Y”
Hi there. You have A Way with Words.
This is Kathy from Evansville, Indiana.
Hi, Kathy.
Welcome to the show. What’s up?
I have a question about the word verse, as in V-E-R-S-E, and when people use it as a verb as to play or as to compete against someone.
Right.
To verse. Can you give us an example?
I have 11-year-old twins, and we are sports people. And, for instance, if they had a game this coming weekend and they weren’t sure who their opponents would be, they would ask me, who are they versing this week?
Right.
Or, in the past tense, they would say, we versed such and such team last week. Or, when we versed them in the present tense, we always play well.
Right.
And I hate it when people use it. And I’m a sports person. I’ve been around sports all my life. I watch lots of sports, and I never hear broadcasters or coaches or players ever use the word verse. And it drives me crazy. And I get on my girls every time. And so I was just wondering, where has this come from? Is there someone that used it on television or somewhere where some kids have heard it? And why are they saying it? Because it drives me crazy.
Oh, that’s too bad, because I feel like it’s a wonderful linguistic innovation.
I don’t know why. It just aggravates me. And I think it’s because I cannot physically think of someone versing as a verb.
Right.
That’s the crux of it, right? So you’re getting to the heart of the why. The why is people misunderstand when they hear versus, and it sounds like a conjugated verb to verse. So baboons versus the badgers sounds like they’re versing them, that there’s a verb in there. There’s an action taking place. But really, it’s not that. It’s a preposition that comes from Latin, ultimately, and it means toward or turn toward.
Against.
Against, yeah. So it’s A against B or baboon versus badger, right? And when I ask my girls, why do you say this? They will point to the schedule and say, well, it says right here. It’ll have their team name and VS with a period and then the other team. And that’s their explanation. And I just argue and say, but that’s not a verb.
You can’t hurt someone.
It’s easy to misunderstand, right? Because the full form maybe isn’t written out very often. The V-E-R-S-U-S just isn’t there.
Here’s the thing. It isn’t new. And it’s not only kids that do it.
No, no. This is at least 30 years old. I have evidence going back a little over 30 years old. I’m quite certain it’s older than that. It’s in two dictionaries that I know of. The American Heritage Dictionary thinks it’s common enough to record. And the Collins Dictionary. It is slangy. It’s not formal at all. You won’t find it used in the Supreme Court arguments at all.
Right, right.
But it’s in the U.S., in Canada, the U.K., Australia, New Zealand, and probably other English-speaking countries. You hear people use it. I heard it. I don’t listen to sports radio very often. I heard it on sports radio. I heard it now.
Really?
Yes. It was very clearly a conjugated verb that they were doing and not the preposition V-E-R-S-U-S.
Okay.
So as for your reaction, you get your skin crawls or your hair stands up in the back of your neck or it’s like fingers on a chalkboard. My advice to you is to try to record all the times that you hear this and begin to gather the data. It sounds like you’re well on your way to that. And when you turned it into an intellectual exercise, a lot of the frustration with the newness of things disappears. And you start to become fascinated with the why and the who and the where. And you become the expert on versus. So you kind of become the person in your group who knows the most about this new verb that came out of this preposition.
Okay.
You’re telling me it’s been going on for 30 years. I have to just give up and say, okay, you know, I’ve got to let it go.
You’re close. What has given it popularity is the rise of head-to-head gaming culture where the video games that you’re playing aren’t just you and a controller, but it’s you versus either NPC, which is a non-player character, or you versus somebody else on the Internet playing you through the Internet, you at home, them at home, and you’re playing head-to-head. So where you’re versing somebody is incredibly common in eSports where people gather to play video games in these big competitions. And so they will use it. You can actually hear it. You can see tons of videos on YouTube that use it.
Okay.
Thank you for giving me the permission to accept that it is okay and not to have to get aggravated when I hear it.
All right.
Well, glad that you were able to get it off of your mind.
Sure.
Thank you so much. I appreciate it.
All right.
Take care.
Bye.
All right.
Bye-bye.
Well, when it comes to language, is there something you’ve been noticing around you? Give us a call about it, 877-929-9673, or send your emails to words@waywordradio.org.
