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PETER CALLAGHAN; STAFF WRITER
Published: 01/05/12 12:05 am
Like any other professional group or secret society, the Washington Legislature has its own terminology.
Knowing the lingo, therefore, is the first step toward breaking into the power structure. As a public service, here are some of the most-used and least-understood terms that lawmakers, staff members and lobbyists will use during the second regular session of the 62nd Legislature that convenes in Olympia Monday.
‘The debate about how far language ought to be allowed to evolve is an old one.’ Illustration: Adam Howling for the Guardian
Think of the word “atrocity”, and certain appalling behaviours spring to mind. Add “barbaric”, and the picture gets worse. How about a barbaric atrocity that’s “detestable” and provokes “horror”? At this point, it’s surely time for a UN intervention. We must act to halt this outrage! Except that all the words just quoted come from discussions of the uses and abuses of English. Simon Heffer, in his recent book Strictly English, thinks the so-called “greengrocer’s apostrophe” is an atrocity, and that academics write barbarically; William Zinsser’s guidebook On Writing Well also condemns some usages as atrocities, and others as detestable. Meanwhile, contributors to a BBC debate on Americanisms earlier this year spoke of their “horror” and “hate” in reaction to phrases that made them “feel the rage rising”. The debate about how far language ought to be allowed to evolve is an old one. But all this fury raises a more specific psychological question: what are people so angry about?
A panel of editors, lexicographers and others at Dictionary.com have chosen the Word of the Year for 2011. The word is…