Timeline for Usage "in spite of" and "despite of"
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
8 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
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| Dec 12, 2019 at 10:13 | comment | added | Daniel | @Jim I came here looking to see if my interpretation of this (albeit subtle) difference was correct. Despite the counter-arguments, your explanation and observations on intent make sense. I would say that if we were scholars discussing the use of this phrase in a poem, the difference between the two forms would not be dismissed as easily. | |
| Dec 3, 2013 at 4:59 | history | edited | Jim | CC BY-SA 3.0 |
Tried to make the point a bit clearer
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| Dec 3, 2013 at 4:01 | comment | added | Jim | @Kaz- I will admit that it's a subtle distinction. To spite his parents is not what I'm getting at here- we are not spiting our parents directly, we are, in a sense, thumbing our nose at the warning, i.e., warning be damned, I'm doing it anyway | |
| Dec 3, 2013 at 2:00 | comment | added | Kaz | @WendiKidd I have to go with WendiKidd. "in spite of" is disrobed of all connotations of rebellion or disdain. (And since "despite" is also rooted in "spite", there is no reason why it would not also borrow the same connotation, if it were true.) Fact is, going downtown "in spite of" or "despite" one's parent's warning means exactly the same thing. To express rebellion we would have to say something like "To spite his parents, he dropped out of college to be a musician". "in spite of X" is a canned phrase, not expressing the idea that X is being treated with disdain or rebellion. | |
| Feb 5, 2013 at 4:59 | comment | added | Jim | @WendiKidd- I think we'll have to just disagree here. While the resulting action is the same (they went downtown) I maintain that the motive behind the action is subtly different. I realize that many people don't make this distinction and use the two interchangeably, but if you break it apart, spite means a desire to hurt, annoy, or offend so if you do something in spite it is the same as doing it out of spite and adding the prepositional just clears up who is being spited. | |
| Feb 5, 2013 at 4:31 | comment | added | WendiKidd | Actually I don't think this is correct. In your example about the parent's warning, both "despite" and "in spite of" mean exactly the same thing--the person was warned, but went downtown anyway. There's no differentiation there. I think you're confusing "in spite of" with "to spite". If you do something "to spite" someone, you are doing it on purpose just to make them mad. If you do it "in spite of" their warning, you're not doing it to upset them; you're just doing it even though they recommended you shouldn't. No malice involved. | |
| Jan 27, 2013 at 1:18 | review | First posts | |||
| Jan 27, 2013 at 1:20 | |||||
| Jan 27, 2013 at 0:59 | history | answered | Jim | CC BY-SA 3.0 |