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From: chabot@miles.DEC (L. S. Chabot)
Newsgroups: net.flame
Subject: Re: Poor English (here too)
Message-ID: <987@decwrl.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 7-Mar-85 09:08:16 EST
Article-I.D.: decwrl.987
Posted: Thu Mar  7 09:08:16 1985
Date-Received: Sat, 9-Mar-85 11:09:50 EST
Sender: daemon@decwrl.UUCP
Organization: DEC Engineering Network
Lines: 19

Robert Herndon  ==  >
>   Why is it that the "word" ORIENTATE seems so popular in computer circles? 
> The verb is ORIENT!! 

Yes, "orient" is a verb, and so is "orientate" (see The American Heritage
Dictionary: it means "to orient").

I admit, I used to think "orientate" pretty annoying too.  Until I found an
occasion in which it was most appropriately used: in one of the Judge Dee
mystery novels by van Gulik, Judge Dee and a distinguished elder Chinese
gentlemen with whom he is conversing are described as "orientating" themselves
about something; clearly, as writer Pamela C. Dean has agreed with me, 
"orienting" themselves would be redundant, since, well, they already are
oriental.  

L S Chabot
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