Question of the Day

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GordonG Aug 2017 2:47pm, 30 Aug 2017 7,223 posts	0 GordonG A colleague has just pointed out to me that sometimes we’re overwhelmed and sometimes we’re underwhelmed, but when things are OK why do we never say we’re whelmed? And what is the right level of whelm anyway?
swittle Aug 2017 2:49pm, 30 Aug 2017 45,263 posts	0 swittle We need a -whelm- continuum, perhaps.
lammo Aug 2017 2:55pm, 30 Aug 2017 7,920 posts	0 lammo whelm-ometer
swittle Aug 2017 3:02pm, 30 Aug 2017 45,264 posts	0 swittle Ye!
mulbs Aug 2017 4:10pm, 30 Aug 2017 13,161 posts	0 mulbs whelm verb [with object]archaic 1Engulf, submerge, or bury. ‘a swimmer whelmed in a raging storm’ 1.1no object Well up or flow. ‘the brook whelmed up from its source’
HappyG(rrr) Aug 2017 4:35pm, 30 Aug 2017 27,272 posts	0 HappyG(rrr) So "underwhelmed" is a bit contrived then? I know what it comes to mean, but does it come simply from someone being clever and inventing it as the opposite of over-whelmed (deliberately hyphenated, by the way) or was there a concept of insufficient whelming (as per mulbs's definition above) and the word under-whelmed evolved logically? We need to know. G