“We live in unprecedented times.” “In these difficult and difficult times.” “Out of an abundance of caution.” “We’re in this together.”
According to a university, this took quite a while.
“It should come as no surprise that this year’s list was dominated by words and terms related to Covid-19,” Peter Szatmary, executive director of marketing and communications at LSSU, said in a statement.
More than 1,450 phrases from around the world have been nominated for consideration, LSSU said, and seven of the 10 phrases the university has selected for so-called “exile” this year are about coronavirus. These include “Covid-19”, “social distancing”, “we are all together”, “pivot”, “unprecedented” and any variation of “in plenty of caution” and “in these uncertain times”.
The university has compiled its annual “List of words expelled from the Queen’s English for misuse, overuse and general uselessness” since New Year’s Day 1976. The list aims to “support, protect and sustain linguistic excellence”, encouraging the avoidance of words and terms that have have been overused to the point of being “inefficient, confusing or irritating”.
LSSU’s list of banished words reflected signs of the times from its inception to the mid-1970s, and this year’s zeitgeist is: We are all together, banishing expressions such as “We are all together.” Certainly, Covid-19 is unprecedented in wreaking havoc and destroying lives. But so is the excessive reliance on “unprecedented” to frame things, so it has to work, “said Szatmary.
People named Karen might be glad to know that the term “Karen” made the list.
As the university states, “What began as an anti-racist critique of white women’s behavior in response to black and brown people has become a misogynistic umbrella term for criticizing women’s over-emotional perceived behavior.”
The LSSU has also called for an end to the use of “up”, the abbreviated form of suspicion, which is pervasive in our successful video game. The nominees of the term considered it too lazy not to express itself fully and should be limited to online gaming.
“In a small way, maybe this list will help ‘flatten the curve,’ which was also considered for expulsion,” said LSSU President Dr. Rodney S. Hanley. “We’re confident that ‘your new normal’ – another nominee competitor – won’t have to include that for next year.”
“It is not like that?” completed the list. The nominees considered that the sentence was absurd when I ask a question to which someone already knows the answer and it appears as uncertain.
Honestly, we’re not sure about the last one. It looks a bit up.