The New Oxford American Dictionary recently chose its word of the year. And what new word summed up the final year of this nameless decade? Unfriend. Fitting, no? The competition was stiff as the short list included a number of beloved words from technology and economics, such as ‘hashtag’, ‘intexticated’, ‘freemium’, and (a personal favorite) ‘zombie bank’.
So what about the word of the decade? Well, the Global Language Monitor (which, incidentally, now has the number of English words past the 1,000,000 mark) says the term ‘global warming’ was the most popular word of the decade. Apparently, ‘climate change’ was the ‘Top Phrase of the Decade’, which strikes me as odd since ‘global warming’ is also a phrase. But whatever. It’s all about the truthiness.
I’ve just read yet another recommendation on LinkedIn where someone said that their colleague could “think outside the box”. This must be one of the most common phrases in recommendations about people and in job ads. It’s become a cliché, and, as George Orwell and many other great communicators have said, you should use clichés with great caution. However, I also think it misses the point.
What people often mean is “come up with new ideas” or “think differently”. For people with even the slightest interest in creative thinking - and this is surely most people - then coming up with new ideas about anything that interests them is not hard. The challenge is coming up with ideas that are relevant and that have a good chance of actually working - if not tomorrow or next week, then in one, five or ten years. Whether it’s for an ad campaign, a business strategy, or a new product, a great visionary idea is one that might seem far-fetched, but the steps towards it are clearly definable and achievable.
For me, “thinking out of the box” is too simplistic and doesn’t imply the ability to understand fully the situation. So next time you’re preparing a job ad and you want to write that your new colleague should be to “think out of the box”, think again. What do you really want from them?
One of our good friends was lucky enough to go to last week’s Roskilde Festival, one of Europe’s biggest music festivals. Unfortunately, mass communications is not always at the forefront of organizers’ minds and a few amusing and confusing mistakes were spotted.
- Apparently, you could buy a burger with “ox meat” in it. (Danish: oksekød?!)
- There was a stall with washing machines that promotes washing clothes at 30 degrees and, unfortunately, (Novozymes should know better!) a big sign inviting people to do their “landry”. That one had us scratching our heads for a good few seconds.
- On another notice about the effects of global warming, some animals are apparently facing “extination”. Is that across between extinction and extermination?
Next to misplaced apostrophes (traditionally used by greengrocer’s to advertise banana’s), quotation marks are next on the list of punctuation that is thrown in generous handfuls at writing without any real idea why.
Most of the examples on Bethany Keeley’s blog seem to show that writers of posters and signs believe that quotes make their writing stand out - and so it does, but in completely the wrong way. But outside using it to show direct quotes, quotation marks are more correctly used to show ‘nonstandard, ironic, or other special sense’, according to the Chicago Manual of Style.
Which makes it all the funner when they are abused by people offering ‘food’ (what, you mean it isn’t really?). Or, like the picture here, a way out in case of ‘fire’ (no, go on you’re having a laugh).
Bizarre translations are always good fun, especially when they’re incredibly long and random. I just don’t even know where to begin with this one, but it does make me wonder what goes on in your typical Saigon park.
Just the other day I was watching a DVD from Hong Kong. The movie was of the typical Hollywood, English language variety. And it had subtitles. English ones… well, sort of. The words were English, but when strung together they made absolutely no sense. Occasionally you could pick out where the subtitles came together with the actual dialogue, but it took some effort. I couldn’t figure out why the movie didn’t have either Chinese subtitles or the original English ones.
So after reading the nonsensical bits of poetry for a few minutes, I think I figured it out. My hunch is that the movie originally had Chinese subtitles and someone translated these into English, literally. An example – an actor says “Warmongering?!” and the subtitle, believe it or not, reads, “You are warm hungry.” Turns out this already has a name – Engrish, which is basically a bad translation of another language (usually Japanese or Chinese) into English and, sometimes, a bad translation of English into another language followed by a (better) translation back into English.
I’ve even experienced this while watching English programs on Danish television – and those two languages have a lot more in common than English and Chinese! For example, I once read a subtitle that claimed a woman had just broken her window – when she’d just “cracked” it open. Which also begs the questions – do the people who write the subtitles even watch the video or do they just read the transcript? Isn’t context vital in understanding dialogue? And – how much really does get lost in translation?
Here are a few classic translation errors that’ll make you second guess the words at the bottom of your screen, or in your hotel lobby:
“Bite the wax tadpole.” – the original translation of Coca-Cola into Chinese.
“Pepsi brings your ancestors back from the grave.” – the “Pepsi Comes Alive” slogan translated into Chinese
“You are invited to take advantage of the chambermaid.” – a Japanese hotel’s guest directory from 1991
“It takes a virile man to make a chicken pregnant.” – a mistranslated Perdue chicken ad
We had an interesting question from one of our clients the other day:
“Could you give me your expert opinion on the word ‘learning’. At our company, people love to speak of one learning, two learnings, key learnings etc.
I hate it and maintain that the word does not exist in a countable version and that we should use ‘lessons learnt’. Am I outdated or correct?”
You’ll be pleased to know that we advised our client not to overuse the word ‘learning’, and certainly not to use it in plural form. But what do you think? Do you use the word ‘learning’?
(If you’re really having trouble answering that question, I can tell you he was not. He was a composer.)
In today’s world, it seems that unless you offer solutions then you’re a nobody. But for me, ‘solutions’ is just a most common example of lazy writing. It doesn’t actually tell you anything – and good writing should tell you all you need to know.
Eye for Image is not a provider of communications solutions. We write. And we give strategic advice. And we coach your communications team. We do all those things. And saying we offer ‘communications solutions’ sells us, and the reader, short.
Another thing with solutions: it comes from solve. And you solve problems. So if we offer solutions – and you want them – then you must have problems. But that isn’t always the case. Sometimes people just want something written. Or they want strategic advice. Or they want to be coached.
English has thousands of words. More than 500,000 according to Chambers 21st Century Dictionary. So surely we can find the right one for every situation. But all too often, we look for an adjective or adverb instead - and the result is heavier, wordier, less precise text.
This is explained concisely by Andy Maslen in his book Write to Sell:
“Unless they provide extra information, adjectives and adverbs are just a lazy writer’s excuse for not thinking harder. Here’s how to use more precise words instead:
Not a huge house, but a mansion
Not a forward-looking executive but a pioneer
Not a respected company but a standard-setter
It works for adverbs to:
