Category Archives: Now trending

Observing and all too often criticizing language trends

Gate Keepers

After the last Super Bowl, “Deflate-gate” consumed football fans. Were the Patriots’ footballs too soft during the AFC championship game? If so, who let the air out? I am by no means interested in that scandal or that sport. Traditionally, I go to the movies during the Super Bowl in an attempt to ignore all the hoopla. But I am interested in the suffix -gate. It’s tacked onto various words to signal “scandal” or “wrongdoing plus a cover up” (which is, of course, a fine breeding ground for scandal).

I know the origin of the word, having lived through Watergate – the scandal about a break-in at a Democratic National Committee office that ultimately led to the resignation of Richard Nixon from the presidency. I know this because I am old. But many of those discussing squishy footballs or sitting in traffic (during “Bridgegate,” the questionable closing of most lanes leading to the George Washington Bridge, a major commuter route to New York City) had not even been born when burglars snuck into Washington’s Watergate complex. So how did they learn the meaning of -gate? My guess is that so many scandals have occurred between 1972 and the present day that the term never had a chance to become history. It has remained in the language because it’s always in use. A quick search for –gate on the Internet turns up dozens alleged scandals on several continents. Some, like Watergate itself, involve serious constitutional issues. Others, like “Bibgate” (champion skier jumps without his assigned bib), do not.

So -gate is keeping up with the times (partly because the Times prints the term fairly often). Which got me to thinking about other words or expressions that have remained long past what I’d have imagined their “sell-by” date to be. This sign, for example, appears on nearly every construction fence in New York:

Did you pay your bill?

No one sees these signs as banning public displays of electric bills or credit card statements. Nor is the sign interpreted as a demand that Congress keep its laws off our building sites. Despite the fact that this definition of bill – a public notice or advertisement – is old and uncommon, the signs persist. Maybe they need an update, given the number of “bills” plastered over them. I suspect, though, that blank fences will always tempt those searching for free advertising space, regardless of the language used. So why is post no bill still around? Because it’s short? Because it sounds firm – three single-syllable words? My working theory is that “post no bill” is a tradition. It persists because that’s what traditions do. I’m open to other theories, though. If you have one, feel free to comment here.

Just don’t expect me to bail you out if you post your ideas on a bill.

No workers, but lots of work

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The famous command of the Communist Manifesto — “Workers of the world, unite!’ — is obsolete, and not just because communism proved to be, as the old joke says, the most painful route from capitalism to capitalism. The communist ideology failed, but the slogan bites the dust for a completely different reason. Those who labor are no longer workers. Somehow it has become crass to refer to employees as the underlings they are, as this sign illustrates:

Who is the opponent?

The idea that “we’re all in this together” may appeal to management (where you’ll find many managers but few coaches), but I doubt that the store displaying this sign shares power and profits equally.

Another popular word for employee is partner, which is what you are when you work full time at Starbucks and Whole Foods, among other New Age enterprises. Barnes and Noble invites you to join its community of booksellers, not apply for a job. At Walmart you’re an associate, either management-level or hourly. Traditionally, an associate worked as a colleague, not always as an equal, but close to the power center. New lawyers become associates on their way (they hope) to partner status. Walmart has many employees (sorry, associates) who complain about forced overtime and underpayment. These claims may be without merit, but it’s hard to see the people at the registers of a discount store truly associating with those higher in the company structure, as associates in law firms do.

Conferring titles instead of power and increased pay isn’t confined to the business world. Just ask a distinguished professor or a professor emeritus. True, some with these designations see a small bump in salary, and many an adjunct (a college-level instructor paid a subsistence-level salary with no job security) would love to join their ranks. But the point is the same: Symbolic gestures, whatever the field, have come to replace concrete advantages.

Just ask the partner who bags your groceries.

Where beauty lies

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I’m no stranger to the silliness of advertising. I came of age in the Sixties, when beauty product companies sold a “no-makeup look” that required about a pound of cosmetics to achieve. But lately, those same companies or their descendants have been marketing their wares using some strange appeals. I wager that the average consumer has no idea what’s in these products. Take a look at this ad:

Wild-crafted?

I understand the definition of organic, but seriously — wild-crafted? Are these products mixed in a small clearing overhung with oaks or whatever trees grow in the Black Forest? And of course it has to be a “complete system,” not just a jar.

If forests aren’t your thing, how do you feel about the Dead Sea? Read this one and weep, because you missed the deadline (or the Dead Sea-line) for a session with a haircare expert, who came, as the sign says

Which 26 minerals?

I don’t know how many minerals are in my shampoo. Twenty six sounds like a lot. But the more the merrier – or the shinier.

Maybe your hair is in good shape, but what about the skin underneath it? Better be sure, with this service:

The ultimate selfie

I hope your scalp is photogenic! If it isn’t, move south a bit, to your eyes. They may be hungry:

: How do eyes eat?

Focus in on the cream, which appears on the window above the “nourish” tagline:

So glad the treatment doesn’t migrate!

And as long as you’re nourishing, consider this last sign:

: Vegetarian cosmetics?

This sign would make sense if it appeared on the window of a food shop, but it’s advertising cosmetics. So what is a vegetarian cosmetic? One not tested on animals? One not made from animal products? One that doesn’t eat animals? All three categories are fine with me, but the signage is not.

These stores are selling beauty, which certainly lies in the eye of the beholder. The ads, though, simply lie.

You are what (you think) you eat

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I didn’t bat an eye when I read two separate references to “artisanal pickles” in yesterday’s New York Times. I live in Manhattan, where signs advertising “artisanal food” or as in this sign, “artisan bread,” abound:

Sign by an adjective-challenged writer.

So I was fine with artisanal pickles, which I presume are soaked in brine lacking any ingredient with more than three syllables in its name. But an article about “artisanal fish” stopped me cold. What would an artisanal fish be? I pictured busy little fins, fluttering around watery workshops as they fashioned – well, what would an artisanal fish create? Seaweed cooked according to an old family recipe?

After some digging, I discovered that artisanal fish is the term for the opposite of large-scale, commercial fishing, with its miles-square nets and other ocean-destroying practices. If I eat an artisanal fish, I’m chewing on something caught on a hook at the end of a line held by a real person, plying the waters in a small boat inherited from a crusty-but-kind, weathered ancestor who patiently explained ancient methods before he sailed off beyond the horizon. Or at least that’s what the label hopes I think.

The term, though, has no real legal definition. At least the definition of “organic” has evolved from “any carbon-based life form” into “free from pesticides and genetic engineering,” with some legislation or certification to back it up. But artisanal, like its linguistic cousin craft, resides in the eye of the beholder. Or in this case, the mouth.

That got me thinking about other phrases I see on signs and menus. They may have meaning, and the products themselves may carry more flavor and nutritional value than others — but how do we really know? The term green in this sign hints at earth-friendly, natural (dare I say artisanal?) cooking, but the term may be either completely appropriate or totally undeserved.

Contrast the above sign with this one, whose products are identified only by color:

Or shape:

To be honest, these food products may not be as tasty as artisanal cheese and meat, but at least you know what aspect of the food they’re promoting. Which brings me to the main point. In our over-mechanized world, advertisers know that consumers often want to hurtle into the past – which they will find with the help of their voice-enabled, speech-recognizing, GPS-loaded, smartphone apps. The product may not be real, good, or natural. That’s fine, as long as it seems that way. You are what you eat, or in this case, what you think you’re eating.

“Euph” and Old Age

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The New York Times recently referred to a “residence for older adults.” My attention snagged on the term older. “Older than whom?” I wondered. The unfinished comparison brought to mind of one of my pet peeves: all the signs reporting that a shop’s coffee, beer, hamburger or whatever was “voted best” without explaining who cast the ballots — chef and spouse, 300 million Americans, everyone at the corner table . . . you get the idea.

Then I realized that older adult is just one of the many euphemisms for, well, the old. Somehow older sounds softer than old. The elderly is somewhere in the middle . . . not as harsh as old, but not as sappy as older. In the past (which we older adults remember well), retired people were known as Golden Agers, living in their Golden Years. Ironic terms, if the stats about the retirement income of most people aged 65+ are correct.

These terms replaced some fairly accurate, descriptive, but unpleasant labels: long in the tooth (just wait – your gums will recede someday too), graybeard (can’t shave with reading glasses on), and declining years (what’s not to sag?). These terms are the reverse of euphemisms (mal-misms?) but in some ways I prefer them to the shinier autumn of life or advanced age.

Think about advanced for a moment. “To advance” is “to move forward.” And where are you going at an advanced age? What is ahead of you? This expression is a close relative of senior, a term that showed up in the 1930s when old people ate free food at senior centers.

Senior. Sigh.

As a former high school teacher who dealt mainly with 12th graders, I shepherded many seniors toward graduation and college. Applying the term to the last stage of life (insert your favorite euphemism here) makes me think about my own graduation — from senior to . . . well, whatever’s next. And I’m not sure I’m ready for that one!

Maybe this sign has the best answer. From now on you can call me major, the opposite of minor.

“Under 40”?

Not Raining but Poring

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Nobody seems to look for anything these days, if my favorite newspaper, The New York Times, is any indication. A small selection from just a couple of days in April 2015:

CIA analysts “poring over drone video feeds, satellite data, electronic intercepts of cellphone conversations and informants’ reports.”
A writer “on her couch, poring over a new story.”
Football coaches “poring over game film and scouting reports” before the draft (for players, not for combat).
American “business and investment lawyers poring over the mash-up of laws in the existing trade embargo” of Cuba.
Angora rabbit fans (who knew they existed?) “who spend time coddling the rabbits and poring over their pedigrees.”
The South Korean government, “poring over private chats” in an invasion of privacy.

I’m not sure what to make of all this poring, which, by the way, is not related to climate change. “To pore over” is “to read or study carefully, in an attempt to remember,” according to one dictionary. That definition doesn’t seem to be the operative one lately. Instead, poring over is the new sifting through — checking a mountain of information for just the right fact. Not that sifting through has gone away entirely. I got more than 4000 hits when I searched for “poring” in the NY Times site, and a slightly higher number for “sifting through.” In the last two weeks, jurors were “sifting through” evidence in a high-profile murder case, a scholar was commended for “sifting through” early Modernist works, and an actor was depicted as “sifting through television and film scripts” in search of a new project. An employer was “sifting through resumes” and someone else was “sifting her memory for clues about her father’s secrets.”

And then there’s data mining. Can’t you just picture data miners, wearing reading glasses instead of helmets with those little headlights, poring over their algorithms, hoping to uncover something of value? The gold nugget, so to speak. Before data mining I often read about people massaging the data to find patterns. I’m not exactly sure what you do when you massage the data, but it sounds like a lot more fun than poring over or sifting through.

All these terms, though, mirror how overwhelmed we are. Documents, film, audio tapes, and rabbit pedigrees — how are we to keep up? The haystack keeps getting taller and the needle smaller. Me, I’ll just keep looking.

Upcycling

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Now trending, as they say in media far less long-winded than I am, is “upcycling” – taking discarded or undervalued material and pushing it up the value ladder. While I can appreciate the conversion of old rubber tires into sturdy sandals, I have some problems with upcycling language. Take a look at this sign, which turns a regular old cup of coffee into something else:

Small batch?

I guess “small-batch” is one of those terms you’re supposed to see as worth at least a dollar more per cup. After all, “small” implies that most people are excluded. The fact that this sign appears on a worldwide chain of coffee shops is irrelevant, though ironic. And speaking of “shops,” note the upcycling of this name:

Add two letters and double the price.

Here’s another, for those of you who slap some polish on their fingertips (if that) and assume they’re ready for the runway:

Design team?

Pause for a moment to pity the team-less. To console themselves, they can go to a bar. Or, as the next sign indicates, they can visit a “taproom” where they have “craft beer” and, if I’m being grammatically picky (and I always am), a “craft kitchen,” whatever that means. Nowadays, “craft beer” frequently carries about as much meaning as “small batch,” given that conglomerates have taken over many of what used to local beer companies that really did make small batches.

Not to belabor the point, which is already on overtime, here’s a sign that eschews (1) patriotism or (2) common sense by advocating “European Wax,” which is either a style of hair removal or a sticky product of bees residing abroad:

What’s wrong with American wax?

I think I’ll stay home, make a small batch of coffee, and drink it in my craft kitchen. You’re welcome to join me.

Didn’t we win that war?

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It’s been a long time since I studied American history, but until recently I was under the impression that we’d won the Revolutionary War. If we did, the Upper East Side apparently hasn’t gotten the message. Check out this sign from one of the local luxury food stores (yes, in this part of town there are several), which shall remain nameless to protect the pretentious:

Bespoke? Really?

I’m not going to touch the “dissappoint,” misspelled words being beneath my notice (usually), but it is a nice touch. This sign first appeared as a simple sheet of paper, printed by someone who hadn’t worried about the wavy red spellcheck line under what should read “disappoint.” About a week ago the store had the sign framed and mounted under a container of melon cubes. The busy employees don’t have time to read the sign aloud, so I can’t make a joke about someone who “misspoke” about “bespoke.” Sigh. What I can do is compare “bespoke fruit baskets” to “custom-made” or “made-to-order” fruit selections. What’s the difference? About thirty bucks, give or take. It’s the British influence. Associate a word with Colin Firth’s accent, and the price goes up.

The same principle is at work with “Stonehenge Realty,” a name I see on any number of NYC buildings. I would keep the name to myself, for the same reason I’m reserving identification of the foolish fruit-seller, but in this case the name itself is the point. Now don’t get me wrong. I have visited Stonehenge (the real thing, not the apartment buildings), and I’ve marveled at its power and history. But in New York? Can’t you just picture a real estate agent, Armani on and portfolio ready, extolling the virtues of living under a rock slab? “You’ll love the workmanship on this monolith,” the agent in my fantasy says, “and rocks are practically maintenance free. Of course, in December and June the Druids have access, but they add character, don’t you agree?”

Don’t think the tendency to turn to Britain for luxury references is purely a matter of money, with whoever names apartment buildings (and who does, do you know?) applying the names of economic powerhouses to their houses. If so, I’d expect to see the “Beijing” or possibly the “Riyadh.” If they’re out there, I can’t locate them. Nor is it a former colony’s desire to show reverence to the mother country. If it were, someone would be living in the “Chiapas,” because we beat Mexico in a war also. Okay, technically it was Spain, but don’t quibble.

No, it’s cultural bias, plain and simple, the same impulse that drives the ratings for Downton Abbey into the stratosphere. The Yanks won the war, but the British won the peace.

That’s it for today. I’m off to high tea.

No problem? Problem!

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In the supermarket where I have shopped for years, I hand my money to the cashier, and she returns my change. “Thank you,” I say, as I always do. She replies, “No problem.” No problem? Yes, I know that it is not a problem for her to give me my money. The change belongs to me, and it’s her job to return it. How is there no problem in doing one’s job? I think all these things, but I don’t say anything because I’ve known her for years, and she’s a very nice lady. I walk out of the store wondering why the old response to thank you, which is you’re welcome, has faded and why no problem has taken its place.

I have a couple of theories. The swiftest glance at the news immediately reveals that “problem” is the word of the day, every day, in pretty much every part of the world. I don’t know how you feel, but increasingly I have the sense that I can effect very little change (of money or anything else). Perhaps no problem has become a way of saying that yes, in this area I’m in charge, and there’s no problem I can’t fix. The tiny assertion of control in this sense can be powerfully comforting.

Another possibility arises from the fact that customers in New York City are not known for their placid, patient demeanor. A “New York minute” lasts about five nanoseconds, and the chin-out, baseball-cap- twisted-backwards style of confrontation was invented here — or, if not invented, at least perfected. So thank you may be a nice change, a respite in the semi-mythical land of no problem. Maybe no problem is short for I have no problem with you, though I do have problems with pretty much everyone else.

You’re welcome may have lost favor because it comes from a different time and emotional place. Perhaps it implies that you are here, and I’m glad you’re here, and you are welcome to this service, however small. In this struggling economy, that’s a good statement for a business owner to make. But it’s a stretch for staff who are overworked (how many layoffs have dumped additional tasks on remaining employees?) and underpaid (where did unions go?). Gratitude for having a job may be overwhelmed by anger at the amount of work and compensation.

I can’t leave this topic without mentioning the equivalent terms in Spanish, as I’ve just returned from a week in Madrid. “Gracias” is the Spanish word for “thanks.” The root word is related to “grace,” “gift,” “ease,” and “humor.” The response in Spanish is “de nada” (“of nothing,” literally) or “nada” (“nothing”). A variation is “no hay de que” (“there’s nothing to speak of”). Gracias implies that the person being thanked has been given something joyful. The responses signal that really, nothing much happened. In other words – there’s no problem.

For the record, I favor a return to you’re welcome. I’d like to believe that the store employees want me there, and not just for my business. Yes, that’s delusional, but it’s also human.

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