Quotation of the Day

Entries in Jargon (2)

The Golden Gobbledygook Award!

Adam Freeman, proprietor of The Party of the First Part blog, is looking for prize-winning examples of legal gobbledygook for the first ever Golden Gobbledygook Award.

…we’re looking for bad legalese. Exquisitely bad. Kind of like the Bulwer-Lytton Prize for the worst opening line of prose (“It was a dark and stormy night… . “).

… 

The winning entry and runners-up will be posted to the Hall Of Shame on the POFP website — and the person who submits the winning entry will get a signed copy of my new book, as well as the new audio book from star podcaster Grammar Girl, Anonymous Lawyer by Jeremy Blachman, and Lifting the Fog of Legalese by Joseph Kimble.

Kimble’s book alone is a great prize. I’ve interviewed Kimble (you can read it here); he’s a tireless advocate of plain English in legal documents, and his book is a treasure chest of great advice.

This contest promises to showcase some exquisite [exquisitely bad?] examples of legalese. Check it out, scour your legal documents (waranties, prospectuses, and credit card agreements qualify) and send Freeman your worst examples.

Posted on Tuesday, September 4, 2007 at 08:56AM by Registered CommenterRoy Jacobsen in | CommentsPost a Comment

On business jargon and lost opportunities

Related to my recent article on business jargon, Gene Weingarten of the Washington Post has a column about his experiment in using PR jargon to talk to PR professionals.

So I decided to call the PR people who issued these releases and tell them that The Washington Post wants to write a big piece about their little story. (To PR people, in terms of arousal, this is like mainlining pheromones.) Then I would tell them that I just had one teensy little question to ask, and once they answered it, we’d be good to go. The question would be written like their press releases. When they failed to understand me, I’d say, “Well, too bad. I guess I just can’t do the story.”

Things didn’t quite go as planned, though.

Me: Vis-a-vis the implementation of SAP technology, what is the source-related derivation of the acronymically based identifier of the service entity, and how does it operate so as to enhance production and profitability or, alternatively, improve the business model of the shelf-stable protein supplier of which Clarkston is now a client?

Angelia: So you’re asking me what SAP is an acronym for and how it helps Bumble Bee?

Me:

Angelia: Hello?

Me: You understood me?

Angelia: Sure, it was very clear.

Here he was looking for a quick laugh at poor Angelia’s expense, and she—and two other PR flacks that he called—didn’t play along. They understood what he was saying.

The problem with Weingarten’s column is simple: he forgot that, for PR people, that kind of language is natural. That’s what they speak.

And he lost a huge opportunity by not telling them that their “native” language leaves him—and pretty much everyone else—saying “Look, you’re really cute, but I can’t understand what you’re saying.”

Posted on Tuesday, May 29, 2007 at 07:21AM by Registered CommenterRoy Jacobsen in , , | CommentsPost a Comment