This page is a permanent link to the reply below and its nested replies. See all post replies »
alan20 · M
I do think there's a problem with the use of the English language. Thus we were told locally that one group of women who were kicking a ball around a field had "thrashed" another group similarly employed. That must have been worth the watching! A local shopkeeper had "admitted" that a new one-way traffic system was adversely affecting his business; had he previously denied it? And so on. I wouldn't go back to the days when radio news readers had to wear evening suits but script writers need to be more careful about the language than "The Sun".
ArishMell · 70-79, M
@alan20 I agree.
Other examples are the sloppy misuse of technical terms, in metaphors meant to sound clever:
Epicentre, from seismology, does not mean centre.
You might choose your course (of action, policy, life, etc.), but you cannot choose your trajectory.
Technology, invented I think in the 1930s, is a word that never really had a proper definition but is now so utterly debased, that is as lazy and meaningless as its ugly abbreviation, tech.
Fracking is no more than slang, invented by American drilling-rig labourers; though the proper term, hydraulic fracturing could be shortened to just fracturing, when the context is clear.
'
Something may be inspiring, but is not inspirational!
The word is mix or blend, not meld.
The BBC's music presenters need also learn the difference between acoustic (adjective) and acoustics (noun), and that a large hall may be reverberant but cannot possibly be resonant to the human ear.
Please teach Melvin Bragg that even though many of his guest historians, like many modern novelists, have never learnt the Past Tense; he should have done. Weather forecasters similarly: but they need know the Future Tense!
@@@
There was a genuine reason for the formal dress in the past. The announcers themselves often had to interview important people - and politicians - in a studio or office so needed present themselves in a fully professional, smart style.
Their rather over-cultivated Received Pronunciation was allied to this. It stemmed from expecting high-quality British English clearly understood even to overseas listeners, or studio guests, for whom English was their second language.
Now many interviews are by telephone; increasingly unreliably so, probably due to increasing use of portable rather than wired, telephones.
Other examples are the sloppy misuse of technical terms, in metaphors meant to sound clever:
Epicentre, from seismology, does not mean centre.
You might choose your course (of action, policy, life, etc.), but you cannot choose your trajectory.
Technology, invented I think in the 1930s, is a word that never really had a proper definition but is now so utterly debased, that is as lazy and meaningless as its ugly abbreviation, tech.
Fracking is no more than slang, invented by American drilling-rig labourers; though the proper term, hydraulic fracturing could be shortened to just fracturing, when the context is clear.
'
Something may be inspiring, but is not inspirational!
The word is mix or blend, not meld.
The BBC's music presenters need also learn the difference between acoustic (adjective) and acoustics (noun), and that a large hall may be reverberant but cannot possibly be resonant to the human ear.
Please teach Melvin Bragg that even though many of his guest historians, like many modern novelists, have never learnt the Past Tense; he should have done. Weather forecasters similarly: but they need know the Future Tense!
@@@
There was a genuine reason for the formal dress in the past. The announcers themselves often had to interview important people - and politicians - in a studio or office so needed present themselves in a fully professional, smart style.
Their rather over-cultivated Received Pronunciation was allied to this. It stemmed from expecting high-quality British English clearly understood even to overseas listeners, or studio guests, for whom English was their second language.
Now many interviews are by telephone; increasingly unreliably so, probably due to increasing use of portable rather than wired, telephones.