About the word amateur

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hi there, here is something about the word amateur:

Popular usage of ‘amateur’ suggests poor standards, inconsistent application or dilettante attitudes but dictionary definitions offer ‘one who loves or has a taste for anything’ reflecting the French origins of the word (as ‘lover of ’) or even the earlier Latin root that had us all chanting at school ‘amo, amas, amat’: the verb to love.

my question is what does "‘one who loves or has a taste for anything’" mean? I know the word amateur, but I could not understand the definition given by the author and I didn't find it in any dictionaries I use neither.

thank you so much!

Anonymous · Accepted Answer

tile gray 403Popular usage of ‘amateur’ suggests poor standards, inconsistent application or dilettante attitudes

I wouldn't say that. It is not always depreciative. If you want that meaning, it has to be clear from the context, or you have to add "rank". The form "amateurish" is strictly derogatory, but the noun and adjective "amateur" only denote poorness of quality to the extent one might expect from non-professionals, and it doesn't mean that. If you go to see a play at the local amateur theater company, you don't expect a life-changing Hamlet, but you hope to be pleasantly surprised by their Ophelia. Jesse Owens was an amateur sprinter, and his 100-meter record stood for twenty years.

tile gray 403my question is what does "‘one who loves or has a taste for anything’" mean? I know the word amateur, but I could not understand the definition given by the author and I didn't find it in any dictionaries I use neither.

either

MW online shows this definition without comment (https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/amateur), inexplicably, but the OED calls it "Now rare and somewhat archaic." Think of it as a synonym for "devotee", and never use it.

About the word amateur

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