Junk English

TorgoX on 2002-05-20T20:45:42

Dear Log,

Here's an interesting book that I saw talked up by its author on BookTV the other day: Junk English. In theory, it sounds like all of it can be reduced to "say it in a few simple words, and don't use shill-talk". But the book actually works through phrases and formulations that you should not use: don't say "the thought process" when you can say just "thinking", don't say "on a daily basis" when you can say just "every day", etc.

Notably, the author independently arrives at something I've complaining about for years: "issue" when used as a twee synonym for "problem", as in telling your network admin that you're having "bandwidth issues" instead of "bandwidth problems". My standard line on this is: "Whether mankind has free will is an issue. If it's something that doesn't work, it's a problem."

An interesting possibility here is programming word-processors to catch a lot of these things, since so many of them are set phrases that you almost never actually want; and other things from the book are sort of "red flag" words that are often (but not always) abused: "process", "issue", "unique", "revolutionary", "visionary", etc. Other things are a bit harder to get a computer to see -- like to know that "broad overview" is redundant.

---

Book TV

gnat on 2002-05-20T21:58:38

Ha! I saw the same thing. I was contemplating having him at OSCON as an interesting diversion, but he didn't seem entirely comfortable speaking. Perhaps it was the cameras.

He had great examples of horrendous twisting of the language: "concretize" was the one that stuck with me. His point wasn't just that these sorts of neologisms are ugly, but that they're deliberately designed by advertisers, PR lackeys, and politicos to conceal the truth and inflate.

An interesting twist on the same would be a "How to Lie with English" book, along the same lines as "How to Lie with Statistics".

--Nat

PEEVE

chromatic on 2002-05-21T00:27:31

I'm no big fan of "utilize", as it's nearly always clearer as "use". My big peeve lately is "methodology". Supposing we were to study ways of developing software, would we call it "methodologyology"?

Yes, but

jdavidb on 2002-05-21T01:36:28

... the other Perl programmer at work keeps telling me that I have "issues." :)

Politics and the English Language

quidity on 2002-05-21T16:38:49

George Orwell wrote a good essay on this, Politics and the English Language, two bits of which I liked in particular:

It is easier -- even quicker, once you have the habit -- to say "In my opinion it is not an unjustifiable assumption that" than to say "I think".

And this set of rules for writing well:

1. Never use a metaphor, simile, or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.
2. Never us a long word where a short one will do.
3. If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.
4. Never use the passive where you can use the active.
5. Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.
6. Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.

Re:Politics and the English Language

koschei on 2002-05-22T06:51:08

Strunk and White, "The Elements of Style". Good book to live by.

They even had your rule 3 as a rule. "Omit needless words."

Re:Politics and the English Language

grinder on 2002-08-25T22:31:07

Indeed.

There is even a (cookie free) online version, although .th is Thailand, if I'm not mistaken. Otherwise there's this version but it wants a cookie.

Re:Politics and the English Language

koschei on 2002-08-26T00:17:25

Yep. However, do note that the current edition is the 4th edition, and what those sites have is the first. The 4th is somewhat more modern (it mentions computery stuff, but doesn't offer an opinion on terms such as email).

It's usually best to have some form of modern style reference =)