The Neologisms Evolved and They Have a Plan

We're friends, now, right? We can talk about things? I mean, really talk?

Okay, good. The English language, she is beautiful, no? And it is our job, as writers, to protect her.

Language is a living thing, of course. It evolves over time to fit our e'er-changing society, and well it should. But there's a difference between evolution and scientific perversion--that's how our civilization ends up getting destroyed by robots.

I am involved in an organization that is continually advertising and discussing "webinars." And whenever I see this word, I get from my computer, go down the stairs, walk into the kitchen, open the utensil drawer, and stick a fork in my eye. The pain is exquisite, but better than a webinar.

Somewhere in this world walks free the person who decided to call the second Alvin and the Chipmunks movie "The Squeakquel." Now, we're not even going to discuss the fact that there is an Alvin and the Chipmunks movie, and that unless I start instilling a film snobbery in my little boy now it will be my lot to see such Squeakquels. And, frankly, I'm of two minds about the name. On the one hand, it clearly heralds the downfall of Western civilization. On the other hand, there's something obnoxiously clever about it, which is more than we had any right to hope from Alvin and the Chipmunks.

Maybe this reveals my bias, but I think it's the business world that's done the most harm; they've given us incentivize and synergize and deliverables and empower and impact-as-a-verb, not to mention bring to the table and out of the box and win-win. And of course, webinar. This is all jargon, the lexical equivalent of bringing a blow-up doll to life and electing it to the Senate. It's our job as writers to protect and celebrate the language, and keep unholy words like these from infecting us. That way, when the robots come, they'll take the incentivizers first.

Stinkpot Expanded and Reading Outloud

I did a reading last night. I've been doing quite a few readings lately. It was a poetry reading, which I always get the most out of. I hear my poems again. I see people nod or frown or smile, sometimes even laugh. I read my poems on the faces of my audience.

On a completely different subject or rather back a few posts, I'm totally into the Stinkpot. But I'd like to suggest that we expand it to bad writing in general, not limit it to incorrect grammar. Peter will occasionally read me some really bad sentences written by some decent writers. It can be stunning. Not that I don't find bad sentences when I read--but, again, having them read outloud makes them even worse. You can't skip over them.

Also, the ticks we have in our writing. At my last writing group meeting it was pointed out to me that I had several characters "drop their heads" and I was asked to demonstrate. Yup, this writing stuff is hard work.

The Stinkpot!

The ever-brilliant Ms. Chall has given us a place to come together to discuss the usage errors that drive us batshit crazy, and I am forever grateful. Sometimes you need a community if you are going to heal.

In college, I had a relationship that began to turn sour when I received an email with the word, "wierd." I imagined saying to our future offspring I know this is how Daddy spells it, but it's wrong. This conversation would have to come at an age when said offspring should be believing that his parents are infallible, and the ensuing psychological trauma would take years of psychotherapy to repair. That stuff's expensive.

The ones that really get to me these days are "loathe to" and "phased" (to mean "fazed"). You see them everywhere--published books, weekly magazines. If you see me in a corner somewhere twitching, that's probably why.

For your grammar-nerd needs, I recommend After Deadline,* the New York Times' Stinkpot.

*Though please note that the recent entry implying there could ever be such a thing as excessive use of em dashes was obviously written by someone with unresolved psychological trauma.