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it's problematic, because people use it to mean the commoners (the prolitariat) and the snooty (the few). It doesn't matter that the latter is technically wrong - it's where you're likely to hear it in conversation.

it's like the phrase "fulsome praise". Can't really use it. is it lavish, or overdone/excessive?

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/fulsome



Also it is frequently misused - hoi polloi means 'the masses' but people always say 'the hoi polloi', meaning the the masses.

</pedantry>


so use hoi polloi 'correctly' as a noun in a sentence, without 'the' for me.

This pedantic objection is just another reason not to ever use the phrase. You just can't. :)


"This is something hoi polloi would enjoy"

May sound weird but thats only because people have been using it incorrectly for so long.


And what does "This is something hoi polloi would enjoy" mean for you? :) what kind of example things would you say that of?


It's like some kind of retro RAS Syndrome


... and now literally means figuratively. Language is silly.


my favourite: "egregious" meant "outstandingly good" (which it still does in languages other then english), and now means "very bad".


Another one is "terrific", which used to mean "causing terror" but now refers to something big and impressive.


Maybe in your country, but not in mine.


"Literally" has actually been used informally in that sense for a few hundred years.


Because internet.


"Snob" used to mean a low-class pretender, not a jerk of high social class. The abbreviation was "S. Nob", or "without nobility". (Sine is Latin for "without.")




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