A Hard Working Word

I nearly wrote another ranty post about all the things that I object to eg. right-wing political figures, petty political correctness, destruction of beautiful old buildings, war, poverty, reality TV. However, I’d just get cross writing it and probably end up annoying at least a few people who didn’t agree with me.

Instead, I thought I’d look at the word from another angle. Grammar. It is one of those words that is used as both a noun and a verb.

When I use “object” as a verb, an action word, as my teachers used to say it’s something I am doing. As in “I object to the government’s policies.”

As a noun”Object” can be used to refer to a material thing, that’s pretty straightforward. An unidentified flying object could be a flying saucer or a tomato being chucked at one of the previously mentioned politicians.

However, it can also be used to mean purpose; as in “The object of the Ragtag Daily Prompt is to use a particular word in a post.”

But it can be used to pinpoint something or someone who has caused a reaction of some kind too. For example “The man was an object of ridicule in his red budgie smugglers.”

Object is a very hard-working word. As a native English speaker, I didn’t really learn the rules to this. Well, I probably did in Primary School but I just knew how to use the word from reading and listening. Trying to explain it in my own words was a lot harder and I used the definitions from the Collins online dictionary to help me get my thoughts in order.

https://www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/object

*Budgie Smugglers