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Ethelred
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November 7, 2014
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Your Pain Is Our Pleasure
24-Hour Proofreading Service—We proofread your Google Docs or Microsoft Word files. We hate grammatical errors with a passion. Learn More
Your Pain Is Our Pleasure
24-Hour Proofreading Service—We proofread your Google Docs or Microsoft Word files. We hate grammatical errors with a passion. Learn More
Username
Ethelred
Member Since
November 7, 2014
Total number of comments
1
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0
Bio
Meaningless Use of “key”
I too find 'gifted' when used to mean 'given' intensely irritating.
I suspect the rise of the usage derives from word processors which by default pounce on the passive, and flag 'given' as unacceptable.
'She was a gifted child' is OK in my mind, and I can tolerate 'the Guggenheim has been gifted the works of the artist by his estate' as there is to me something institutional about 'gifting.'
But I start jumping up and down when I hear or see something of the order of 'my mother has gifted us a box of biscuits this Christmas.'
It seems pompous, clunky, and to not improve upon 'mum gave us biscuits.'