I would not be debating here if I didn't care.

I hope you meant: "The misuse of the term CAME exclusively from within the folk music fraternity - deliberately and cynically so in most cases; any misconception outside arises from that fact."

Yes, and it happened long ago, or that list would be much much shorter.

Now we have a fait accompli - unfortunately.

"Then you have no case; your argument flies in the face of logic"

I'm not making an argument for this use being correct, because it's plainly not - it's wrong. I'm saying it's current - and if we want to be understood we have to work with that currency.

We still need to separate the 54 - even more so than in 54. But the word 'folk' is lost to us. if we maintain the definition intact, then we ARE doing EXACTLY what we both want to avoid. Coralling Mark Knopfler into the oral tradition!

It is to prevent this that I want to use a different word, which is still largely understood as something close to the 54.

You have never answered my analogy of the word 'Gay.'

Would you reserve this exclusively for "having or showing a merry, lively mood"?

Do you see any parallel?

Tom