As a student of the English language, it has bothered me for some time how certain words have had their meaning stripped from them. Last night, I heard another one: ultimate.
We often hear this word used to refer to something really cool: the ultimate sports car, the ultimate roller coaster, the ultimate whitening toothpaste. How many people realize that this word means "beyond which it is impossible to go"? By definition, the ultimate is the very last. There will never be another better than the ultimate. The end.
So, do people really think that that sports car is the final culmination of automobile design and technology? That there will literally never be another car better than that one? I don't think so. I think that they don't know what that word means. Let's look at some proper uses of the word ultimate.
Mozart's ultimate work was the Requiem Mass. It was the last thing he ever wrote. Or, you could state an opinion and say, Mozart's ultimate work was Eine Kleine Nachtmusik. In your opinion, his musical genius was at its full realization when he composed that piece. Do you see? Mozart can have an ultimate work because he is dead. There will never be another work by Mozart, so we can pick which was his ultimate.
When people say that's the ultimate (fill in the blank), they are ignoring the future. And as a fan of science fiction, I choose to believe that there will always be a better (fill in the blank).
So I'd like to start a new word trend. Let's use the oft-ignored "penultimate" instead. It means next to last. This car is so amazing I can't imagine any car ever being more amazing, but because I'm willing to acknowledge a future in which there might be one, I will refer to it as the penultimate sports car. "That was the penultimate roller coaster, dude!" Because you know next year someone somewhere is going to build a better one.
And that' s my penultimate word on the subject.
- Jana, spokesperson for the Committee to Take Back Word Meanings, founded by Jana on Jana's blog
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