admit that I now sometimes use some of
these phrases myself, or at least don’t
look so quizzical when I hear others
around me use them. One that I haven’t
used, but which became popular during
the recent recession, is “right-size” as
in “we have experienced a reduced
demand for corporate finance advice, so
needed to right-size that department”.
In reality that means down-size. That
means making people redundant. So
right-sizing sounds better.
That last sentence reminds me of my
current pet hate; starting an answer to a
question with “so.” People appearing as
guests on the Today programme seem
to have a particular penchant for it. An
example –
Q: “Could you explain what further help
is needed in the areas most affected by
the civil war?
A: “So, at the moment there are 1,000
people trapped in a hilltop village…..etc”
I’m not sure whether that counts as
jargon but it gets it off my chest.
Lawyers and business people are,
however, are probably not the worst
offenders regarding jargon. The
gold medal goes to the medics, who
manage to combine obscure terms
with an insistence on abbreviations
and illegible handwriting. Some doctors
have allegedly used abbreviations to
hide what they really think about their
patients’ conditions, such as;
ABITHAD - nother Blithering Idiot A
Thinks He’s A Doctor.
ETK(T)M - Every Test Known To Man
FLD -
Funny Looking Dad.
GOK -
God Only Knows
PIP -
Pyjama Induced Paralysis.
TMB -
Too Many Birthdays.
TTGA - Told To Go Away.
And then there are those medical notes
that contain a mix of Latin, Greek and
randomly selected symbols, which present
a challenge to our clinical negligence team
in terms of putting them in the right order
and understanding what they say. I’m not
sure why lawyers were told some while ago
that Latin phrases were no longer to be
used in presenting legal argument in Court,
but medics are able to use them at will in
their notes and correspondence, but I’m not
complaining, having barely scraped through
my Latin O level many years ago.
Lawyers and business
people, however,
are probably not
the worst offenders
regarding jargon.
The gold medal goes
to the medics
So (notice that one?), if we send you a
letter or e-mail that can only be understood
with the aid of a dictionary, Wikipedia or
an aunt schooled in the top stream at
Cheltenham Ladies’ College, please do let
me know, and I will reinforce our message
of plain speaking to the author. Unless
it’s from me of course, in which case mea
culpa autem quidquid Latine dictum sit
altum videtur.
(I am to blame, but anything said in Latin
sounds profound).
By Chris Randall
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