Marshall comments on my postings on Actionable Sense:
Check a dictionary. The word “actionable” refers to something that you can be sued for doing. I recently heard someone in a corporation asking employees for “actionable suggestions”. They were trying to ask for suggestions that included things that could be acted upon to bring real improvement, but unfortunately, according to the dictionary, an “actionable suggestion” is actually a suggestion that you can be sued for making.
Indeed, the dictionary defines actionable as an adjective meaning “giving sufficient cause for action in a lawsuit”. I used the term in the meaning of “can be acted upon”, specifically knowledge that can be acted upon. So I make two mistakes here, first in the meaning of the word, and second using it as an adverb in the phrase “making actionable sense”. For both mistakes I plead not being a native speaker 🙂 It merely sounded right to my ears when I used it first.
And it still does. Because digging a little deeper into the dictionaries, I consistently come across the reference to the Latin “actionabilis”. Dusting of my old Latin dictionary and looking up actio, I find that “actio causae” means lawsuit and the phrase “actionem habere” means being able to sue, but only as its fourth and fifth meaning in specific contexts.
To me, but I’m no etymologist, it reads as if the general word “actio” in its legal sense “actio causae” has been taken up into the English language leaving out the special context. Much like saying intercourse when in fact sexual intercourse is meant and forgetting that intercourse originally means nothing more than having dealings with others.
So in this case I’m not inclined to change back my vocabulary, even while admitting my sin against the current definition of the word. Wouldn’t it be a fine thing when the corporate world upon hearing the word actionable would not be looking for their sollicitors phonenumber, but would feel their entrepeneurial spirit was called upon, would feel a call for action? Why not take this as a first step in shaping a new vocabulary, and one away from a corporate world stifled by the fear of litigation that looms like the sword of Damocles over their heads.
And if we keep using it, eventually it’ll end up in the dictionary. Does anyone know how many occurences are needed for a word to become a new addition to the dictionary?