I’ve been thinking about language and how parlance shifts, changes and adapts to ‘the times’. Depending on our time of life, our reaction to these changes – and how they reflect our perception of culture – may be more or less acute. Ten examples below of before and after innovations in English parlance that in recent years have stood out like huge linguistic pimples:
| “Thanks for getting in touch” | “Thanks for reaching out” |
| “The thing is that….” | “The thing is, is that, ……” |
| “I’m excited about…” | “I’m excited for….” |
| “I” | “I myself” |
| “I’ll get back to you” | “I’ll circle back” |
| “So….” | All sentences that don’t need to start with “so” |
| LOL | Mostly things that aren’t that hilarious |
| “Let’s be clear” | I’m about to lie, or employ avoidance. Anything but clarity |
| “It’s the right thing to do” | It quite clearly is not the right thing to do, or I have no idea. Either way I’ll take a robust tone and sound convinced |
| “Smashed it from the park / killed it” | It was not bad and sorted something. |
| “Whatevs” | You bore me, or I bore myself. |
Those of us that work with language and business / brands day in day out are probably over-sensitive
to linguistic change, but given language is a gift so many of us are lucky enough to use and
understand, it’s interesting that we don’t in general comment, analyse and react.
