founder

flounder, founder

These two words are easily confused because their form and meanings are both close. The physical meaning of flounder is ‘to struggle in mud or while wading’ and hence ‘to stumble or move clumsily’, and from these meanings developed the abstract sense ‘to perform a task badly or without knowledge; to be out of one's depth’. The corresponding meanings of founder are (physical) with reference to a ship, ‘to fill with water and sink’, and (abstract) with reference to a plan, scheme, intention, etc., ‘to come to nothing, to fail’. In the abstract senses, where the confusion mostly lies, it is therefore normally people who flounder and plans and relationships (and suchlike) that founder. In practice the use of both words in their physical meanings as part of a larger metaphor (as in the 1980 example that follows) tends to blur the boundaries between literal and metaphorical use. The following examples will help to clarify the differences between flounder and founder: (flounder)

• The family physician bucks the case to a psychosomaticist, who flounders in jargon —Time, 1971

• ‘You'll feel better later on,’ he floundered —H. Forrester, 1990

• (counter example) Creativity, once a hallmark of primary education, floundered on the exams altar —Times Educational Supplement, 2007

• (founder) I wanted to leave England…I did not intend to be aboard when that particular Titanic finally foundered in a sea of bureaucracy —K. Hagenbach, 1980

• Without…help, the marriage may founder, thus providing…another dire example to romantic young people that ‘arranged marriages are best’ —P. Caplan, 1985

• Alfred's quest to obtain a vital set of aerial photographs has foundered in a Kafkaesque comedy of setbacks and misunderstandings —Times, 2006