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The following are the two main definitions of the verb peruse that the editors at Merriam-Webster.com have put forward:

: to look at or read (something) in an informal or relaxed way

: to examine or read (something) in a very careful way

In my humble opinion, those two acceptations of the said verb contradict each other. Wonder what on Earth is going on here; it's like saying "peruse is A" and "peruse is not A".

  • Why did the more modern-day definition make it to the top of a page in the Merriam-Webster Dictionary?
José Hdz. Stgo.
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    Peruse this Wikipedia article on auto-antonyms http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auto-antonym. – Frank Mar 20 '15 at 10:16
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    This sounds like a rant. What's the actual question? – starsplusplus Mar 20 '15 at 12:24
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    Peeving disguised as a question is off-topic. – RegDwigнt Mar 20 '15 at 12:29
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    Unlike say a computer programming language, for human languages there's no single entity that is the 'language designer' who attempts to clean up, optimize, make the language more efficient, removing inconsistencies, etc. M-W, like most modern dictionaries, are just recording how people use the words, and for 'peruse' the top two uses are contradictory. Most modern dictionaries will attempt to point out which one is the most standard or most acceptable, but it's impossible to record every nuance there. – Mitch Mar 20 '15 at 14:50
  • My theory: originally, the word meant carefully and thoroughly. However to read something carefully and thoroughly, you must read it slowly. From reading slowly, we can then come to the sense of reading in a relaxed or leisurely manner, and it's not hard to see that turning into casual reading, and thence to skimming. – barbecue Sep 03 '15 at 23:32

4 Answers4

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There appears to be no plausible reason why the term developed to mean also to browse, to skim but it is used with both meaning, and care should be taken not to give rise to misunderstanding.

Peruse: (Etymonline)

  • late 15c., "use up, wear out, go through," from Middle English per- "completely" (see per) + use (v.).Meaning "read carefully" is first recorded 1530s, but this could be a separate formation. Meaning "read casually" is from 19c.

Peruse: (Grammarist)

  • The traditional definition of peruse is to read thoroughly or with great care. It does not traditionally mean to skim, to look through, or to browse. All authoritative English reference sources agree on this. But peruse is so often used as a synonym of browse that this secondary definition may someday gain acceptance. The change is not yet fully established, though, and many people still think of this newer use of peruse as wrong.

  • The word first appeared around the the end of the 15th century. It was formed by adding the prefix per-, which then meant thoroughly, to the verb use, so its original sense was to use thoroughly. The sense to go through carefully or examine developed soon thereafter. Examples of peruse used in the newer sense (to browse or to skim) are easily found in sources from the middle 20th century, but they are rare or nonexistent before then.

  • Writers in this century often use peruse to mean simply view or observe, suggesting neither thoroughness nor quickness. In these cases, the word is vague because we can’t know whether the author means it in the older sense or the newer one. It often could be taken to mean to look through at one’s own pace, to look through while one is passing through, to look through when one has enough time, or to look through while engaged in something else.

Community
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    A word can acquire a new connotation (including one that is opposite to the hitherto established meaning) when people who are unfamiliar with it lack sufficient context to draw the correct conclusion regarding what the established meaning actually is. My guess is that this probably explains the emergence of the 'skim-read' sense of 'peruse' (though it is purely surmise on my part). – Erik Kowal Mar 23 '15 at 08:33
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Peruse follows the Anglo-Norman peruser - to examine.

Most senses recorded in the OED do refer to a very thorough examination. However the following note, under sense 4c is of great relevance and tends to confirm what @Josh61 reports from Etymoline.

Modern dictionaries and usage guides, perh. influenced by the word's earlier history in English, have sometimes claimed that the only ‘correct’ usage is in reference to reading closely or thoroughly (cf. senses 4a, 4b). However, peruse has been a broad synonym for read since the 16th cent., encompassing both careful and cursory reading; Johnson defined and used it as such. The implication of leisureliness, cursoriness, or haste is therefore not a recent development, although it is usually found in less formal contexts and is less frequent in earlier use (see quot. 1589 for an early example). The specific sense of browsing or skimming emerged relatively recently, generally in ironic or humorous inversion of the formal sense of thoroughness. Cf. scan v. for a similar development and range of senses.

The 1589 extract reads:

1589 G. Puttenham Arte Eng. Poesie i. xxviii. 45 An Epitaph is..pithie, quicke and sententious for the passer by to peruse, and iudge vpon without any long tariaunce.

And more recently:> >

2003 Nation (N.Y.) 9 June 26/2 Perusing its promotional materials, you might get the idea the pharmaceutical industry is a nonprofit research operation out to save the human race.

WS2
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From Wiktionary:

Etymology

From per-+use, from either Medieval Latin (peruti, perusitare (“wear out”)) or Anglo-Norman (peruser (“use up”)), originally leading two concurrent meanings, but only those derived from "to examine" survive today.

Usage notes

The sense of "skimming" is proscribed by some authorities on usage, including the Oxford American Dictionary.[...]

Yohann V.
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“peruse quickly” (to skim)

  1. presented to him, to peruse quickly the embossed page, and to acquire correct ideas from the objects with which he is brought in contact. (1893)

  2. obviously one cannot study every page in much detail. The theological and literary works I can peruse quickly enough, since ... (1933)

  3. One has only to peruse quickly the history of ideas of the last few decades and look even superficially at current life the world over to feel convinced that secularism ... (1949)

  4. Let me say, Mr Chairman, that I had an opportunity to peruse quickly the report that came from Gen. Carl R. Grav on this matter ... (1963)

  5. The folders that you received have in them books which we sincerely hope you will peruse quickly and that you will make your exchanges as rapidly as possible, in order to assist the Committee. (1966)

  6. As such it will ease oceanographers' work load by allowing the scientists to peruse quickly all available data on the ocean's physical nature (1970)

  7. I have had an opportunity to peruse quickly through your testimony. I notice it is a long statement. You, of course, can read it if you desire. (1972)

  8. Like Aldo Leopold works, the art of photographer Les Blacklock is not something to peruse quickly. (1974)

  9. Consequently, lengthy climbing tales can slow those trying to peruse quickly. But several users said such stories attract them to rec.climbing. (1995)

  10. If a judge has not read the entire brief prior to oral argument, the Summary of Argument is a valuable substitute which the judge can peruse quickly prior to the hearing (1996)

  11. And for that reason, if the reader of this second half of the study wants to peruse quickly the most salient part of the preceding for a background, I recommend therein the first chapter's sections on Greek tragedy, ... (2004)

  12. If anyone desires intently to know the content of the whole book let him first peruse quickly these preceding chapter ... (2005)

  13. The chairman, presented with a passage to peruse quickly , refused 'for common decency's sake' to permit it to be read aloud (2006)

  14. This book will be written in plain language, often in point form because my objective for doing this is to make it easy for parents and other interested persons to peruse quickly (2009)

  15. Bart and Mark had drawn on their experience and training as trial lawyers to organize their notes into snippets that Christa could peruse quickly. She employed her speed-reading skills to absorb the dominant points that her assistants had ... (2011)

  16. There were some documents dealing with real estate holdings and, from what she could peruse quickly, documents and letters from other businesses and enterprises ... (2012)

Source: Google Books

These results exclude instances where a noun is between the verb and its adverb such as: to peruse the manual quickly, or peruse the reports quickly. It also excludes instances when the pronoun it and other adverbs are employed such as: I picked it up to peruse it real quick. Nevertheless. these examples prove without doubt that native speakers use peruse to mean “to skim” or “to glance through”.

The OP asks why the more recent definition of peruse has made its way to the top of Merriam-Webster's entry. The answer is to be found in Merriam-Webster's own website

How does a word get into a Merriam-Webster dictionary?

[emphasis mine]
This is one of the questions Merriam-Webster editors are most often asked.

The answer is simple: usage.

Tracking Word Usage

To decide which words to include in the dictionary and to determine what they mean, Merriam-Webster editors study the language as it's used. They carefully monitor which words people use most often and how they use them.

Each day most Merriam-Webster editors devote an hour or two to reading a cross section of published material, including books, newspapers, magazines, and electronic publications; in our office this activity is called "reading and marking." The editors scour the texts in search of new words, new usages of existing words, variant spellings, and inflected forms–in short, anything that might help in deciding if a word belongs in the dictionary, understanding what it means, and determining typical usage. Any word of interest is marked, along with surrounding context that offers insight into its form and use.
[. . .]
Merriam-Webster's citation files, which were begun in the 1880s, now contain 15.7 million examples of words used in context and cover all aspects of the English vocabulary. Citations are also available to editors in a searchable text database (linguists call it a corpus) that includes more than 70 million words drawn from a great variety of sources.
[. . .]

Size Does Matter

The size and type of dictionary also affects how many citations a word needs to gain admission. Because an abridged dictionary, such as Merriam-Webster's Collegiate® Dictionary, has fairly limited space, only the most commonly used words can be entered; to get into that type of dictionary, a word must be supported by a significant number of citations. But a large unabridged dictionary, such as Webster's Third New International Dictionary, has room for many more words, so terms with fewer citations can still be included.

Authority Without Authoritarianism

Change and variation are as natural in language as they are in other areas of human life and Merriam-Webster reference works must reflect that fact. By relying on citational evidence, we hope to keep our publications grounded in the details of current usage so they can calmly and dispassionately offer information about modern English. That way, our references can speak with authority without being authoritarian.

Mari-Lou A
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