We here at Harpyness are utterly convinced that language matters. We’ve gone on record with our feelings on the multitude of names for ladyparts, for example. And we’re always up in someone’s grill about the way language contributes to sexism and stereotypes. But we’re also just plain into words, as you can probably tell by how many of them we pour into this site every day. Personally, I’ve spent my entire professional life making a living from words and writing, and every single day gives me a chance to appreciate the dynamism and versatility of English, which shamelessly borrows from every culture in the world, giving it the widest and deepest word pool of any language. It’s truly one of the greatest achievements of humankind.
That said, there are plenty of English words that are stupid or squicky or that you wish would just go away. And who better to ask about those words than poets, whose talent lies in distilling the fewest number of words into the most vivid language? At the recent Ledbury festival in England, poets were asked “which word do you hate most and why?“ Some of the responses were brilliant. Check out Philip Wells’s explanation of his hatred for the “should sound nice but doesn’t” word pulchritude:
“It violates all the magical impulses of balanced onomatopoeic language – it of course means”beautiful”, but its meaning is nothing of the sort, being stuffed to the brim with a brutally latinate cudgel of barbaric consonants. If consonants represent riverbanks and vowels the river’s flow, this is the word equivalent of the bottomless abyss of dry bones, where demons gather to spit acid.”
Top that!
The one I most agreed with, though, was Welsh poet Rhian Edwards on chillax: “the most unnecessary and obnoxious linguistic blend to have ever been coined.”
There are some similar words that raise my hackles with their sheer laziness. Don’t tell me you want to have a convo, for example. I love a conversation. A convo makes me want to smack you. So does your rhapsodizing about your great summer vacay. Just use the whole fucking word, okay? Cutting a syllable won’t save you that much time, but it will make you look like a moron.
And for the record, I’ve always hated herstory. I love feminism and I love history. I do not love it when feminism takes the perfectly decent and not even remotely sexist word history and gives gender reassignment surgery to its first syllable. The word is not a combination of the English words his+story. It’s from the Greek verb historien meaning “to inquire.” There’s no gendered English his to it, so can we all please direct our outraged red pens elsewhere? After all, there are plenty of other words and phrases that genuinely do need them.
What words get under your skin? Which ones should the language police crack down on? Let’s have a conversation in the comments…
Utilize. My 11th grade English teacher told us NEVER to use it in our writing, and now I totally understand why. It has no purpose! Why not just say USE! When someone uses “utilize”, it makes them sound like a pretentious jerk.
Also, many of my friends describe people as “cray cray”, which I guess they picked up in New Orleans, but it drives me insane. CRAZY, if you will.
But then again, I used to be a copy editor, and there is so much about the English language that pisses me off.
Oh, and I forgot this one!
Reference. As a verb.
For the record: one does not “reference” a place, an idea, an event, whatever. One “refers to” it.
This is more of a speaking tic than a writing error, but I hate when people say ‘nother. As in, “That’s a whole ‘nother thing.” I hear it everywhere — CNN, movies, real life. ‘Nother isn’t a word!!!
I have different rules for spoken and written language, and I love neologisms and slang and such, so a lot of stuff like “chillax” and “cray-cray” doesn’t really bother me (in its proper context). The word I hate the most, though, is “interesting.” “Interesting” is the word people use when they a) don’t know what the hell they’re talking about, or b) don’t have anything helpful to say. I must admit I occasionally use it myself in speech, but I hate it in writing, and I usually forbid my students from using it.
A personal pet peeve of mine is ‘teamed’ often used in bad novels as in ‘she wore a pair of Jimmy Choos teamed with a Marc Jacobs skirt’. No, really she didn’t.
Actually there are many words I could become enraged about – I am the person who had a three day argument with the New York Times book review over a review of mine where I (correctly) used the phrase ‘such as’ and they repeatedly and wrongly changed it to ‘like’. Pedantry is my middle name, so don’t get me started on people who misuse the following words: decimate, icon and legendary.
The most evil word in the English language, well I’d give a vote to the deeply annoying ‘cray cray’ as well but I truly hate interface. I do not interface with people or even with computers. It is not a word.
AMEN, Dorky. When I used to tutor Freshman Comp students, I always told them to envision a a big red F on their paper every time they used the word “interesting”: “Othello’s situation is interesting” or “Miss Havisham is a very interesting character.” If there was one take-away from my tutoring it was that “interesting” is the kiss of death.
Apart from netspeak (tlkin liek dis dosnt mak u kewl, how hard is it to spend two more seconds to type something out?) I hate it when people pronounce the abbreviations GF and BF. In fact, I hate those words even when they’re not abbreviated. Ergh. Oh, and chillax gets on my nerves too.
I really can’t think of anything else, maybe because English isn’t my native language.
@emilyanne: How about “tragic”? I always roll my eyes when the talking heads on CNN, Fox, etc. use it to describe anything and everything that’s just plain bad or unfortunate: a tragic plane crash, a tragic mom with cancer, a tragic drive-by shooting, a tragic swine-flu epidemic….
I hate “orientate”. Just use “orient”.
@becky you don’t reference, you refer, and likewise, you don’t work on an install, you install an installation
The misuse of “literally”
I have to say, I kind of like “chillax,” for some odd reason my brain associates that word with some sort of fizzy cocktail. I can’t explain.
re BF and GF: Speaking of language, what do all you ladies (and gents) in relationships who aren’t married or engaged refer to your significant other as? I always say boyfriend even though its sort of juvenile. There just isn’t anything I like better.
I used to refer to an ex as “my buddy” but then there was confusion and an acquaintance of his thought we were just friends and started calling me constantly and asking me out. When I told him my situation he got offended and thought I was lying about the BF (sorry Watcher) to get rid of him. It was a mess. Now I stick with boyfriend.
The misuse of words is more irritating than any word itself.
“Hero”. Did you realize every person who’s ever been in the armed services is a hero? Now if you’ll excuse me, I think I’m going to meander down to Georgetown and observe the visiting Quantico jarheads, er, “heroes” bleat Journey songs, pick fights and call people faggots.
@bluebears: That’s a good question. I once went to a party with an ex who I was in a long-term relationship with and he referred to me as “my friend Becky” and I was like “O RLY? Your friend?” He said that he thought “girlfriend” sounded juvenile, and since he was almost 50 I could understand why he didn’t like it. I told him that he could just refer to me as his “lovah” if he needed to. I wish there was a better, gender-neutral word. “Partner” sounds kind of bloodless to me.
@BeckySharper: Ha, that reminds me of how weird it was to read, in every serious publication, about Wolfowitz getting a posh job for his “girlfriend” at the World Bank. Oh, “Wolfowitz” is also one of my least favorite words.
@becky: so funny that you said that about “partner” because when Watcher commented about how she (he?) didn’t like BF or GF I was trying to think of something better and my first though was “partner” but I just feel like it implies that me and that person are forming an LLC together. And of course “lover” is kind of squick.
@BearDownCBears: Ha! I think it’s “girlfriend” when they’re unmarried and “mistress” when they’re married (yeah, I’m looking at you, Mark Sanford). Oh, and enjoy your time with the heroes from Quantico. Ick. I think Colbert makes fun of that tendency to call everyone “hero” when he refers to his viewers as “you, the heroes!”
@bluebears: Yes, partner always sounds like an LLC to me. And in America it’s often used by gay people to refer to their SOs. Whereas in other countries, it’s used in a more gender-neutral way.I once got totally thrown when I was visiting a colleague in Australia and she said “You can meet my new partner when you come to dinner” and I just automatically assumed she meant another woman and was all “She’s a lesbian?” It didn’t help that the partner’s name was totally gender-neutral. Turned out the partner was a man and Aussies use the word partner for straight and gay couples alike.
When I don’t want to use boyfriend, I often say “gentleman caller” instead.
@bluebears – I’m with you about literally. I feel like that word no longer has a real meaning because people use it as a generic intensifier SO often. Grumble.
I have a problem with flower names. I think marigold is the beautiful work in the English language, but I think marigolds are gaudy and ugly. On the other hand, I love scabiosa, but I think it sounds like a venereal disease.
I despise the word “hubby.” It grates on my nerves like nothing else.
Oh, wow. This week alone I have face the following two barbarisms:
*Impactful
Yeah, wtf? You want to create an ‘impactful picture’, hm? Srsly?
*Learner
This is presented to me constantly as a substitute for ‘student’. ‘This lesson plan is ideal for 2nd grade learners.’
Colonel. Because it’s pronounced ‘kernel.’ WHY, PEOPLE?
This is not a criticism of anything in this post, but I’ve often wondered if grammar/word policing doesn’t have an element of classism to it. I like flexibility and adaptability, and although I like language a lot, I personally find it hard to get up in arms about this that or the other word.
Maybe this is just a symbol of my own insecurities about things, though.
The first word that came to mind is “carbs.” They are carbohydrates, and if you can’t spell that, then you probably don’t know enough about nutrition to be speaking of them. It doesn’t help that when you say “carbs” the first thing that comes to mind is that part that gave me so much trouble on my motorcycle back in college.
Also, misuse of the word surreal. Surreal≠spooky.
@Maggie: Blame the French.
@Maggie: Beats the fuck out of me. So does the fact that the Brits prounounce the word lieutenant “leftenant”.
@Ailei: “Impactful” is another non-word that I hate.
@PS: no thats a good point I think. Also, I think it can sometimes be a bit racist. Note the jokers over on fox news roll there eyes and smirk when they use words like “bling” or “baby mama.”
Conversate – a (non) word I can’t stand.
This thread reminds my of a New Yorker Talk of the Town piece during P. Diddy’s trial. In describing a bodyguard’s testimony: “[whatever bodyguard's name was], who never got out of a car without exiting a vehicle.” I found that line brilliant and it has stuck with me ever since. I wish I could give credit to the writer but can’t remember who it was.
er…their. DON’T JUDGE ME!
@blue_streak – on that theme, the use of “calories” in the common parlance bothers me not from a linguistic standpoint but from a scientific one. What people actually mean when they say “calorie” is “kilocalorie” and on top of that what a “calorie” is in food has only a very small relation to any thermodynamic quantity. It drives me crazy to hear people talking about “oh, this has x number of calories in it” as if that were a quantity with any sort of scientific meaning.
Haha bluebears.
I’m as apt to laugh at the occasional Gluryo Stinnerman spelling error as anyone else. But I feel like a jerk dedicating myself to policing the boundaries of language.
Take the history example. I guess we could place emphasis on the fact that the origins of the word were not patriarchal, but I feel like if it’s received by some people as writing them out of history, I’m not sure what the harm is in changing it to “herstory.” And I don’t know that asserting “well there’s just something you don’t know about language” is a helpful route. Which is why, also, I hate trotting out dictionary definitions about this sort of thing.
Sure there’s a element of classism. And it works no matter where you are on the class scale. Why say “pulchritude” instead of “beauty,” you snob? God, “chillax” is for peons. Equal opportunity offense (keeping in mind that “equal” is a relative term here). Of course, being in command of language, even if you double- (or more) code, is a great way to climb that social ladder.
bluebears, I call the Dude my partner. I like that it’s gender- and orientation-neutral. And he IS my partner, in just about every way I can name, and that aspect is far more relevant than the fact that he is also my lover. I also like the fact the people who don’t know me well can puzzle over the “gay or straight?” thing, because I hope it prompts some thinking about their assumptions about sex and gender, as well as what LTRs are for. I’ve been thought, called, or asked if I was gay many many times, but it’s not my problem (…partly because I do have straight privilege).
Oh, BearDown, HEROS. Jeezus Lordy on Toast, you’ve hit on it. But that’s usage, as SMC pointed out. “Literally,” too. David Cross has a great bit on the misuse of the word literally.
And as for words I just really dislike the sound/feel of: slacks.
@ Ms.Sharper:
I completely agree about reference. I work at the reference desk in a library, where we help people do RESEARCH!
I’m not sure which words I hate, but I love the words “juggernaut” and “belligerent.” I also adore words which don’t have a correct spelling yet, they are usually on the fringes of language, like cum/come.
Oh, the word seminal sucks.
@PSoul: Is language a tool of classism? Of course. Language is a tool of every “ism” out there.
As for the history example, I’m just pointing out that sometimes we impose our ideologies onto words when there’s no reason to. The root of the word ‘history’ is not at all patriarchial. If you see it that way, it’s because you’re imposing your own feelings about patriarchy onto it–which was my point.
And “trotting out dictionary definitions” is perfectly valid. Ignorance is not a desired state of affairs, IMO. I use dictionaries so that I know what a word means and what its orgins are. Don’t you?
@bellacoker: I think we’re secretly Elizabethan and we like words with flexible spelling! I always enjoy reading things that were written before spelling was codified. You can find some unexpected poetry in the old variable spellings!
“Invite” as a noun kills me.
Then I’m decidedly NOT Elizabethan, because poor spelling is a bugbear of mine.(I love you, Noah Webster!) Strange, since I like flexibility in language and all, and you often have to monkey with spelling to get that.
@SarahMC: “The misuse of words is more irritating than any word itself.”
Exactly.
As a grad student, I’ve been a TA for more years than I care to remember. I’ve marked a loooooot of first-year English lit papers. A single misuse? Meh. Marking 150 papers, in a week, all of them stuffed with malapropisms? Aaaaaack.
OK, this “convo” is veering in a couple different directions.
Language is a tool of many different things. To some folks, President Obama’s skill with the English language is proof of his “elitism.” I think that’s horseshit. Ignorance is not a good thing, and I will not apologize for caring about words and language.
However, dictionary definitions are limited in their usefulness. Language is not always as cut-and-dry as dictionary entries imply. Words take on connotations in society that can’t be found in the dictionary.
@SarahMC: Oh, I completely agree that language is slippery–words evolve new meanings all the time, which is why even something like the OED is a constnat work in progress. That said, you can take my OED when you pry it from my cold, dead fingers! I love dictionaries, esp. the OED, because to me knowing the history of a language–how the word came into English and when, and from what language or historical event–tells you so much about why we use the word the way we do and how our societies have evolved.
@PhDork: I really like reading Chaucer because of the weird-ass spellings–they just tickle me. I had a professor who used to make us read his work aloud using the pre-vowel-shift pronounciation, and I loved it.
Yeah, I use a dictionary sometimes Becky, though I don’t see what that has to do with this. No one’s arguing for ignorance.
Language to me is a tool of shared meaning, which means that often, how a word is received is just as important as its supposed “authoritative definition.” I mean, even the things we choose to say are authoritative involve some choices connected to power structures.
I guess my point is, there’s a reason we think that the Greek root of a word is more important than the way it sounds to someone living in this time and place. And that reason is not a neutral one. And that’s why I’m leery of dictionaries.
As far as the dictionary goes, what I mean is not so much that words evolve, but that not all information can be found in the dictionary, especially information pertaining to marginalized and oppressed groups.
For instance, some guy in the comments section of a Womanist Musings post once challenged another commenter’s use of the word “kyriarchy,” saying, “It’s not in the dictionary!” as though its absence meant it wasn’t a real concept.
“there’s a reason we think that the Greek root of a word is more important than the way it sounds to someone living in this time and place. And that reason is not a neutral one.”
My reason is that it’s linguistically correct. Then again, I’ve always been a language geek and I realize not everyone’s interested in linguistic history.
Becky: I’m no expert, but I always understood linguistics to be concerned with present as well as past usage. Is that not the case?
@PSoul: Linguistics is, yes, but I was talking about linguistic history. It’s the history of the language–its orgins, the different languages that created it, etc.
Yes, I can understand that, but I’m saying, the linguistic history is not the whole picture, to me, that’s all.
Cait, I think you might be my soul mate. ‘Utilize’ vs. ‘use’ is my number one language rant, above words like ‘synergy’ (almost meaningless) and phrases like ‘price point’ or ‘at this point in time’ (why not just say ‘price’ and ‘at this point’?)
Seriously, my friends tired years ago of my ranting about ‘utilize’.
I absolutely hate the word “eats” used as a noun, and I see it everywhere now. Everywhere! A restaurant review column — Good Eats. An email from a friend — Want to get some eats?
Ack, stop it!
“Disrespect” as a verb, as in, “she disrespected me.” No.