Last week’s column sent a couple of acquaintances to the dictionary to keep me honest; I’d used the word “sublime” as a verb, in the context of causing a solid to convert to a vapor, and back again, with the application of heat.
Granted, to sublime something is not an expression one hears every day, except in laboratories. Nevertheless, these friends, who at first challenged my use of the word, managed to work it into a later conversation. But their tone indicated disdain, as if to say, “Yeah, sure, you think you’ve coined a word and expect us to fall for it,” rather than “Gee, I never thought of that.”
One of them then brought up her pet peeve, namely gluing “-ize” to words that shouldn’t have such attachments. For example, it’s acceptable, and even efficient, to choose “hospitalize” in place of “admit to the hospital,” or “politicize” in place of “inject politics into.” These terms are fine, and we have many of them. But why utilize “utilize” when we should use “use”?