Thursday, July 29, 2010

Overused and Trendy Words

Those of you who know me realize that I am prone to the occasional rant. I've avoided doing so here as I thought I would keep this blog relatively uncluttered. But every once in a while I get a little perturbed when I see things that seem to occur out of fashion or trendiness. I am speaking here of the overuse in the selection of certain words, to the point in which they become annoying.

Possibly you have noticed this too. A media outlet will start to use a word over and over. Culturally the word seems to pick up steam in terms of its use, to the point of being used to exhaustion. The writer seems to inject the word inappropriately, or even writes their headlines with the sole purpose of using the word. If you are a voracious reader like I am, you tend to notice patterns in language. And and if you do it long enough, you can see some words fall in and out of favor.

I am not talking about certain fashionable words, such as "eco-friendly", or "green". Those topics tend to populate the news these days, and as such we need language to describe them. And I am not talking about cliches such as "think outside the box". They can be annoying to, but I guess as a former management consultant I have used my share. I am talking here about the use of written words for the sake of the word only.

So this is my list. It is by no means exhaustive, but I may come back from time to time and update with more words I see being overused in the media:
  • "Row" - I am talking about the definition of "noisy dispute or quarrel; commotion" (see defintion #3). News editors love to use this in a headline, such as "Mike Jagger in a Row with Keith Richards". I am guessing that editors love this word because of its economical size, but it's just odd they want to use a word that falls outside the common spoken vernacular. CNN online would regularly use this one, and sometimes I could spot it in different headlines over the same week.
  • "Cover" - this is a word where I started to notice this trend. Although apparently the word was originally coined in the 60s, it didn't fall into prominence until the 90s. It continues to be overused to this day. This band does a cover of that band's songs. Bleh.
  • "Re-imagine" or "Reboot" - most commonly associated with movie properties that have lost their way, these words have become synonymous with big budget Hollywood studios giving way too much control to producres and directors who have no appreciation with their source material. Sometimes having the ability to change something doesn't necessarily mean you should (Barbara Broccoli and JJ Abrams I hope you are listening!).