Thursday, March 12, 2015

Usage of "Pet" in "Pet Peeve"


Why would someone want a peeve as a pet?


Upon searching for pet peeve, one explanation for the usage of pet was



the complaint is adopted like a pet




This meaning I can understand in



pet project



where one takes it under one's wing and cares for it. If I were to adopt a pet this is what I would do. Pets are usually warm and fuzzy, and certainly likeable. Peeves less so.


Except for possibly alliteration, why is a peeve, that I must always feel the need to complain about (another searched definition), a pet?



Answer



Welcome to English, where, on a long enough timeline, all things become their opposite. Case in point, the word epic, which now describes trivial things, like finding your favorite soda in a random corner store...


Pet is a synonym for favorite. Peeve is a synonym for annoyance. As you noted, "your favorite annoyance" seems incongruous. And it is!



This is an example of irony:



IRONY


noun


1.the expression of one's meaning by using language that normally signifies the opposite, typically for humorous or emphatic effect



Pet Peeves tend to be trivial, mundane things that, for all intents and purposes, should not annoy us, but they do, and in ways we cannot explain without sounding finicky or touchy.


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