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Post by Dave on Jun 18, 2008 2:09:04 GMT
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Post by Pete on Jun 18, 2008 8:12:49 GMT
If two of the forum members would like to place a bet on this fight, I'll happily be the stakeholder. ;D Nice one, Vadim. Like it, a lot. ;D
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Post by Dave M on Jun 18, 2008 8:19:53 GMT
I think Pete has hit the main point, Twod: "stakeholders" is (purposely) the term used to encompass ALL those who may be affected by whatever change is being discussed - and that might include customers, or members of staff, or members of the club, etc, but will include others, too.
If you see it as management jargon, it'll grate; if you don't, it won't (same as all the other such words!) - point is, what is an alternative, which carries so accurate a meaning so neatly?
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Post by Pete on Jun 18, 2008 8:31:31 GMT
I think Pete has hit the main point, Twod: "stakeholders" is (purposely) the term used to encompass ALL those who may be affected by whatever change is being discussed - and that might include customers, or members of staff, or members of the club, etc, but will include others, too. If you see it as management jargon, it'll grate; if you don't, it won't (same as all the other such words!) - point is, what is an alternative, which carries so accurate a meaning so neatly? Perhaps a wider point is the question of whether this is a development of the English language. Much of the so-called management speak that we see is pretentious rowlocks (to use a boating term ) but occasionally a neologism arises which is so useful that we find ourselves wondering how we ever coped without it. I think this is one of those occasions. Without this type of linguisitic development, we wouldn't have words (or phrases) for some of the most common concepts in the English language, such as telephone, vacuum cleaner, shares (in companies), companies themselves, etc.
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Post by Dave M on Jun 18, 2008 8:38:35 GMT
I don't see it as much of a development, Pete: surely* we've been saying "he has a stake in this" for ages, without invoking the idea of betting. We just mean "he has an involvement, by which he will be affected by the proposed change, and has the right to be dealt with fairly". I say "surely" - but then I'm often surprised at how recently it was that a to-me "established" word was actually established
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Post by Pete on Jun 18, 2008 9:03:23 GMT
I don't see it as much of a development, Pete: surely* we've been saying "he has a stake in this" for ages, without invoking the idea of betting. We just mean "he has an involvement, by which he will be affected by the proposed change, and has the right to be dealt with fairly". I say "surely" - but then I'm often surprised at how recently it was that a to-me "established" word was actually established Point taken, Dave. Perhaps one of our multi-dictionaried colleagues could enlighten us as to the provenance of this use of "stakeholder".
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Post by Dave M on Jun 18, 2008 9:05:10 GMT
"To have a stake in" recorded from 1784 - Online Etymology Dictionary.
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Post by Pete on Jun 18, 2008 9:16:01 GMT
"To have a stake in" recorded from 1784 - Online Etymology Dictionary. Not a very neologism, then!
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Post by Verbivore on Jun 18, 2008 10:01:27 GMT
[...] Perhaps one of our multi-dictionaried colleagues could enlighten us as to the provenance of this use of "stakeholder". Okay, bait taken. SOED 5th (2002): So although the term has been around for a couple of centuries, its modern sense - as being discussed - would appear to be a neologistic application. M-W Collegiate 10th (2001): Interesting that the American dictionary gives only the original definition, not the management-speak one. Macquarie rev 3rd (2003) gives exemplar quotes thus: for the original meaning, Henry Lawson, 1907; for the modern meaning, The West Australian newspaper, 1992 (although that quotation gives it as two words: stake holder(s).
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Post by Dave M on Jun 18, 2008 11:22:15 GMT
> Interesting that the American dictionary gives only the original definition <
But what is "original"? And are we comparing the meaning by reference, or by the particular format?
The idea of "holding a stake" in something comes from the practice of staking out a claim (using stakes to mark out the land to which claim is made - 1330). The idea of "stakes" in betting comes (it is supposed) from the wagered monies being placed on a stake - the verb to stake (1530) being earlier than the noun stake (1540) - and the person holding the stake became, for that circumstance, the stakeholder (1708).
All that's happened recently is that the form "stakeholder" has been adopted for someone "holding a stake", where the stake is the "claim" type, rather than the "bet" type. It seems a natural enough move, especially as it had been made 300 years ago for the other meaning! We've now applied a natural word-form to the earlier meaning, so I still don't quite see what Twod's concern is. (Except, of course, when it is taken up as a "buzz-word", and is over-used and wrongly used - where we DO mean specifically "staff" or "customers", we should say so!)
We might note that we've been able to "drive a car" for well over a century, but cardriver is a logism so neo that we haven't actually encountered it yet!
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Post by Paul Doherty on Jun 18, 2008 13:15:17 GMT
It's like resources isn't it? Fair enough when it actually means resources (staff. money, property, motivation, skills etc) but it is very often used as a pretentious substitute for money.
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Post by Barry on Jun 18, 2008 13:23:24 GMT
what's the difference in usage here between Barry's homophone and the-said-poster's monograss was it?
It's Mondegreen. Technically, a mondegreen is the misinterpretation of a line in a lyric, poem or song; mondegreens are a subset of homophones. I suppose I might have used mondegreen for my examples, but it would be stretching the term slightly. Doe and dough are homophones, for example, but it would take something like Gladly, the cross-eyed bear (Gladly the cross I'd bear) to merit the description of a true mondegreen.
The term is derived from a mis-hearing of a line in the ballad 'The Bonnie Earl O' Murray', which finishes:
They hae slain the Earl O' Murray, And laid him on the green.
The mishearing was:
They hae slain the Earl Amurray, And Lady Mondegreen.
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Post by Vadim on Jun 18, 2008 14:59:20 GMT
Thanks for clearing that up, Barry. I shall engrave that on the brain!
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Post by Twoddle on Jun 18, 2008 18:26:59 GMT
I think Pete has hit the main point, Twod: "stakeholders" is (purposely) the term used to encompass ALL those who may be affected by whatever change is being discussed - and that might include customers, or members of staff, or members of the club, etc, but will include others, too. If you see it as management jargon, it'll grate; if you don't, it won't (same as all the other such words!) - point is, what is an alternative, which carries so accurate a meaning so neatly? You've probably hit the nail on the head, Dave M: I do see it as management jargon, because I only ever heard it used at work by the type of trendy management-twats who persistently trotted out all the other pretentious jargonese drivel that used to make me cringe. But I still wonder whether there was another all-encompassing word that was replaced by "stakeholder"; didn't business people need one in the "old" days?
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Post by Tone on Jun 18, 2008 20:54:46 GMT
>Here are some selected "silver bullet" references. I thought first of the Lone Ranger--didn't know about the vampire/werewolf thing!<
From the poem "The Fears that Change":
The silver bullets and sharpened stakes Are now no longer needed, For now the vampires and werewolves of old In men's sick minds are seeded.
...
Tone
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