English under threat from verbal sandbagging

Is English being choked to death by jargon? A controversial list of weird terms has been removed from an NHS website, but some warn that the language of tomorrow will be utterly confusing. It had been a long day for the junior NHS doctor. Now that cases of Covid-19 had fallen, there was a huge backlog of other patients to deal with. Exhausted, she was about to turn off her computer and head for home when a link to a document called "Glossary A to Z" caught her eye. As she read it, a look of bafflement spread across her face. The document contained a list of expressions. "Allyship" was one; "lived experience" was another. If the words were confusing, the definitions were even more so: "power over" apparently meant "The overt ability to use relational or positional power to shape events, frequently viewed as negative, but arguably sometimes of positive use." She did recognise some of the terms, such as "virtue signalling" and "identity politics". But what did they have to do with saving lives? To others, the document was worse than irrelevant: it was dangerous and divisive, providing definitions that were politically biased. Stephen Pollard, the editor of the Jewish Chronicle, called it "chilling in what it reveals about the mindset within an important part of the NHS". Such was the outcry that it has now been removed from public view. But to Janan Ganesh of the Financial Times, the incident was symptomatic of a wider problem: the "constant seepage" of jargon into everyday language. One example he gives is the verb "to centre". Its basic definition is simple enough: to move an object into the middle of a physical space. But a few years ago people started to talk about centring themselves - meaning to do something calming in a moment of stress. And now they are using it to mean something completely different: making someone or something more important than they should be. "At some point," he writes, "this kind of ambiguity stops being proof of a supple and textured language. It becomes the mark of an unusable one". Traditionally, he notes, there have been two arguments against jargon. One is aestheticConcerned with an artwork’s beauty. Aesthetics is the branch of philosopher that explores art, beauty and taste.: nobody with a feeling for language would use an expression as clumsy as "virtue-signalling" when "sanctimonious" is available as a mellifluous alternative. Nor would they say "call out" instead of "denounce". The second argument, put forward by George Orwell, is that jargon is politically insidiousSomething which is gradually and secretly causing harm. . DespoticTyrannical or using unlimited power over others in a cruel way. regimes, left-wing and right-wing alike, love it as a way of twisting the truth. A prime example is the Chinese government's use of "vocational training camps" to describe prisons where Uighurs are reportedly tortured and brainwashed.n Janan Ganesh acknowledges that languages should not become fossilised. Today, however, "The pace and obscurity of lexicographic change could mire English in the one thing a language of commerce, science and diplomacy cannot survive: confusion." "I used to think it a blessing that English never had its own Academie Francaise," he concludes. "I now wonder." Is English being choked to death by jargon? Clarity disparity Some say, yes. Every world has its own special language, which is often useful to those in it while incomprehensible to everyone else. The problem today is that such jargon is spreading more and more into everyday speech. It is hard enough for native English speakers to make sense of it; for those trying to learn English as a second language, it is virtually impossible. Others argue that languages are ultimately shaped by people who know how to use them properly, such as writers and orators. All jargon is a fad which by definition becomes outdated after a while. English is a robust, flexible language that can accommodate any amount of change; having survived for hundreds of years in a form we recognise, there is no reason it should not continue to do so. KeywordsAesthetic - Concerned with an artwork’s beauty. Aesthetics is the branch of philosopher that explores art, beauty and taste.