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Usenet Posted 21 years ago
Usage
"fixture": a scheduled date
It's a strange feeling to find that an ordinary looking word has long been used in a strange sense that you've never heard of. I recently came across the word "fixture" meaning a scheduled date for an event. The New Shorter Oxford dates that sense early 19th century.
Where I found it was in a list of football-news headlines, where it said something like "Fixtures 2005-2006". It turned out to be a list of all games to be played in the Premiership and their dates during the coming season, with links to lists of "fixtures" in other leagues. ( http://tinyurl.com/chpn7 .)
I first thought it must be a British usage, but then I found it in Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary with no mention of its being British.
Is it really in use in American English to a significant degree?
I can think of various uses of "fixture", like "He has visited so often that he has become a fixture here", or "The office has desks, filing cabinets, and other common fixtures", but I can't imagine how any of the ordinary meanings of "fixture" could have developed into meaning the date of an event.
Comments?
Where I found it was in a list of football-news headlines, where it said something like "Fixtures 2005-2006". It turned out to be a list of all games to be played in the Premiership and their dates during the coming season, with links to lists of "fixtures" in other leagues. ( http://tinyurl.com/chpn7 .)
I first thought it must be a British usage, but then I found it in Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary with no mention of its being British.
Is it really in use in American English to a significant degree?
I can think of various uses of "fixture", like "He has visited so often that he has become a fixture here", or "The office has desks, filing cabinets, and other common fixtures", but I can't imagine how any of the ordinary meanings of "fixture" could have developed into meaning the date of an event.
Comments?
Top answer
[nq:1]It's a strange feeling to find that an ordinary looking word has long been used in a strange sense that ... imagine how any of the ordinary meanings of "fixture" could have developed into meaning the date of an event. [/nq] I can speculate from a British point of view.
- [nq:1]It's a strange feeling to find that an ordinary looking word has long been used in a strange sense that ...
- imagine how any of the ordinary meanings of "fixture" could have developed into meaning the date of an event.
- [/nq] I can speculate from a British point of view.
- In a sporting context a team forming part of a league will have a number of events in its season's schedule.
- Some of these dates will be determined by the organisers of the league, not independently by teams.
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1 Answers
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[nq:1]It's a strange feeling to find that an ordinary looking word has long been used in a strange sense that ... imagine how any of the ordinary meanings of "fixture" could have developed into meaning the date of an event. Comments?[/nq]
I can speculate from a British point of view.
In a sporting context a team forming part of a league will have a number of events in its season's schedule
I can speculate from a British point of view.
In a sporting context a team forming part of a league will have a number of events in its season's schedule
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