Comments on: No bad thing

By: Health surveys – what do they tell us?- Crocstar Media

Health surveys – what do they tell us?- Crocstar Media — Mon, 21 Jun 2010 13:39:08 +0000

[...] in 2001 and has been re-edited for this guest blog post. If you enjoy it, why not read his other guest post in this blog: No Bad Thing on how the English language [...]

By: Rose Darling

Rose Darling — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 10:00:59 +0000

Nice post My bugbear happens repeatedly on the BBC, when they say: ‘The [organisation] have/are/do’ – it shouldn’t be plural!

By: Bob Mathers

Bob Mathers — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 16:26:08 +0000

Yes, I agree Emily. There are two things going on – firstly, the more people use language loosely and lazily, the more likely it is that inaccuracies will creep in. We can only tolerate it while doing what we can to persevere with our own version of perfection.

Secondly, there is the trend to verbosity you identify i.e. more words + bigger words = me sounding clever, but also me trying to hide something. Add to this your ‘business jargon’ (BJ) and we have an unedifying cocktail of exclusion, confusion and sometimes obfuscation. It’s hard not to sound like a ‘comma-spotter’ when I talk about this.

I wonder if BJ is not just a verbal manifestation of fashion with people wanting to be seen (and heard) knowing all the latest ‘buzz’ words and ‘key’ phrases (I’m doing it myself). Or is BJ just another version of BS?

I haven’t read Cochrane’s book but I shall look out for it, thank you. You might like to have a look at a short book by Harry G Frankfurt, Professor of Philosophy Emeritus at Princeton University, called ‘On Bullshit’ (2005). He makes fascinating observations on the relationship of language to people’s purpose, which only a philosopher could come up with.

By: Emily Knight

Emily Knight — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 15:22:17 +0000

It’s business jargon that gets me…not just the “blue sky thinking” and “low hanging fruit” type business jargon, but also being overly verbose in an attempt to impress when a simple sentence would do.

Have you read James Cochrane’s “Between You and I: A Little Book of Bad English”? John Humphrys wrote the introduction: an introduction that includes, talking about language, the sentence “It is powerful and it is potent…”. Two adjectives meaning the same thing, in the same sentence…?