Police in Ferguson, Missouri disperse a protest using gas bombs.
One way events in Ferguson, Missouri have affected English usage is by promoting the second sense of “disperse” as a transitive verb. To disperse as an intransitive verb, of course, is to stop demonstrating and go back to your homes. The most common sense of “disperse” as a transitive verb, with an object, is “to distribute or spread over a wide area.” That is precisely what the Missouri National Guard, the state Highway Patrol, and dozens of police with military equipment hope not to do with protests in Ferguson. When they disperse protesters—with tear gas or simply by making it illegal to stand in one place—they do it in the second, less common sense: to “cause to go in different directions.” The protest does not disperse; it gets dispersed, but the word retains a savor of consent.
