{"id":23806,"date":"2024-12-11T17:22:52","date_gmt":"2024-12-11T17:22:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/?p=23806"},"modified":"2024-12-11T17:22:54","modified_gmt":"2024-12-11T17:22:54","slug":"feeling-whelmed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/?p=23806","title":{"rendered":"Feeling Whelmed"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>You can be <strong>overwhelmed<\/strong> and <strong>underwhelmed<\/strong>, but can you just be <strong>whelmed<\/strong>?<\/p>\n<p><a data-flickr-embed=\"true\" href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/imuttoo\/4180839802\/in\/photolist-7nrU1S-p3G6m9-4boGpS-dE8qoB-hvUjT1-67kZnY-8r5huQ-2iq4dRh-wAwiD-2kVGnqu-3odSrP-89wpXR-aGRW7g-tVzmw-4wQnTP-jHLFb-N3p8N-9Gv1YL-F4jrs-dSXNkv-7PApxm-7xSiSN-8JzNGt-bX8hBY-cJHS2W-6V7vCS-524bU3-2npGZAx-2xsPr-bEAbqM-iC4GG-5ztawc-32emD7-6oQAqd-9np3qy-6P1W48-xF6Uys-A4LeK8-5VbYPM-7ivtzs-5Mafqc-8DBLew-6LhQY-8g5Lrs-WxxGEm-7JaARP-2upPv-2xQXKM-7qkXzd-2ai8fz\" title=\"Overwhelmed\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/4003\/4180839802_a6752d8ac6_z.jpg\" width=\"640\" height=\"427\" alt=\"Overwhelmed\"\/><\/a><script async src=\"\/\/embedr.flickr.com\/assets\/client-code.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p><strong>Overwhelmed<\/strong> comes from the verb <strong>to overwhelm<\/strong>, which means to engulf, surge over, submerge, overpower (emotionally), crush, cause to surround or to cover. So when you feel <strong>overwhelmed<\/strong>, you might feel crushed, overpowered or engulfed by everything [<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wiktionary.org\/wiki\/overwhelm#English\">source<\/a>].<\/p>\n<p><strong>Underwhelmed<\/strong> comes from <strong>to underwhelm<\/strong>, which means to fail to impress or perform disappointingly.  It was coined in the 1950s as a humorous negation of <strong>overwhelm<\/strong>. I hope you won&#8217;t be too <strong>underwhelmed<\/strong> by this blog post. [<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wiktionary.org\/wiki\/underwhelm#English\">source<\/a>].<\/p>\n<p>Both <strong>to overwhelm<\/strong> and <strong>to underwhelm<\/strong> come from <strong>to whelm<\/strong>, an old word that means to bury, cover, engulf, submerge, ruin, destroy or overcome with emotion. As a noun, <strong>whelm<\/strong> means a surge of water or a wooden drainpipe. They come from Middle English <em>whelmen<\/em> (to turn over, capsize, invert, turn upside down), perhaps from Old English <em>*hwealmnian<\/em>, a variant of <em>*hwealfnian<\/em>, from <em>hwealf<\/em> (arched, concave, vaulted), from Proto-West Germanic <em>*hwalb<\/em>, from Proto-Germanic <em>*hwalb\u0105<\/em> (arch, vault), from Proto-Indo-European <em>*k\u02b7elp-<\/em> (to curve) [<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wiktionary.org\/wiki\/whelm#English\">source<\/a>].<\/p>\n<p>Related words include <strong>unwhelm<\/strong> (to raise (sb) up from under something that has overwhelmed them), and <strong>whelming<\/strong> (something that covers or submerges).<\/p>\n<p>Words from the same roots include <strong>gulf<\/strong> in English, <strong>Walm<\/strong> (bevelled roof, particularly if triangular and in a gable) in German, <strong>welven<\/strong> (to arch, bend like an arch, be shaped like an arch) in Dutch, <strong>valv<\/strong> (vault, arch) in Swedish, and <strong>cupla<\/strong> (fault, guilt, blame) in Spanish [<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wiktionary.org\/wiki\/Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic\/hwalb%C4%85\">source<\/a>]. <\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.japanesepod101.com\/member\/go.php?r=759259&amp;i=b0\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/images\/banners\/banner_japanesepod.jpg\" alt=\"The Fastest Way to Learn Japanese Guaranteed with JapanesePod101.com\" width=\"630\" height=\"83\"><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>You can be overwhelmed and underwhelmed, but can you just be whelmed? Overwhelmed comes from the verb to overwhelm, which means to engulf, surge over, submerge, overpower (emotionally), crush, cause to surround or to cover. So when you feel overwhelmed, you might feel crushed, overpowered or engulfed by everything [source]. Underwhelmed comes from to underwhelm, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[102,104,107,116,10,26,33,44,45,202,64,67,78],"tags":[164,158,138,281,319,320,321,163],"class_list":["post-23806","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-dutch","category-english","category-etymology","category-german","category-language","category-middle-english","category-old-english-aenglisc","category-proto-germanic","category-proto-indo-european","category-proto-west-germanic","category-spanish","category-swedish","category-words-and-phrases","tag-english","tag-etymology","tag-language","tag-omniglot","tag-overwhelmed","tag-underwhelmed","tag-whelmed","tag-words"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23806","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=23806"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23806\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23811,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23806\/revisions\/23811"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=23806"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=23806"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=23806"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}