Clichés? I Avoid Them Like The Plague.

In a piece[1] that I wrote last June (http://rulesfoolsandwisemen.blogspot.co.uk/2013/06/a-question-of-grammar.html) I expressed some of my frustrations with regard to grammar; my foibles and bête noire's[2].  I wrote at the time that while " I hope that I have a reasonable command of English, I accept that I am by no means perfect" and this week I have been more than somewhat chastened, having read John Rentoul's book, "The Banned List: A Manifesto Against Jargon and Cliché" and learned that where my writing is concerned I am far from perfect; very far indeed.

I read John Rentoul's book because I followed a link on Twitter, which took me to a website called Buzzsaw (http://www.prbuzzsaw.com/), which has a tool which enables you to identify and then excise buzzwords from text that you paste into it[3]. There is also a link to Amazon's website, specifically to The Banned List, which I bought, read and immediately realised that no matter how hard I try, no matter how much I strive to avoid the hackneyed and the clichéd, the buzzwords and the jargon, whole rafts of it slip through. Sometimes they don't merely slip through, quite often they are there because I have consciously chosen to include them; oh, the shame!

John Rentoul

At the core of the book is a list of clichés, words, phrases, expressions and jargon which the author opines[4] we should avoid like the plague[5]. To my chagrin this list includes a great many words and phrases that are faithful companions of mine; as comfortable and cosy as a pair of well worn slippers. But, and this may be an important but, is John Rentoul right? A great many of the items in the list are, it has to be said glib and have become meaningless through overuse (or misuse) or are commonly used out of context or incorrectly, however there are many that the author objects to with which I can find little fault (or suitable alternative). Obviously John Rentoul, a journalist with The Independent and a published author, has superior writing credentials to me, but I would suggest that as with clothes and as with restaurants, so words and phrases slip in and out of fashion and that a newspaper like The Independent will have its own in house style which will influence what is deemed acceptable and what is beyond the pale. A writer for the Daily Mirror or the Daily Mail might well have come up with a very different list.

"Moving the goalposts." (Daily Telegraph).

I actually agree with the inclusion of a great many of the words or phrases on the list, but there are some for which I don't actually feel there are superior alternatives. And that is one difficulty that I have; the author himself says (in a different context) that proactive is a word " used to suggest vigour without troubling anyone with choices that might have been made" and it is easy enough to say that a particular phrase is a cliché, that a certain expression should not be used, but it is much more helpful to be proactive and suggest an alternative.

Having babbled on this far I suppose I need to justify what I have said with some examples, so here goes. I agree with (among others):

·         Draw a line under. It is not so much the expression as the circumstances under which it is frequently used. Most often it is employed by a politician or other public figure whose greed or lies or hypocrisy or infidelity or whatever has been exposed and who wishes to "move on" purely to avoid any further embarrassment, even though more debate may be in the public interest.

·         A big ask. In the same spirit as "a tough call", and probably better replaced with tough task or difficult challenge.

·         At the end of the day. Or you could say, when all is said and done, but ultimately you mean,  er ,ultimately (probably).

·         Any journey not describing travel from A to B. Much beloved by contestants on talent shows, this is sometimes synonymous with growth or improvement, but mostly it is nonsense.

·         Going forward. Presumably as opposed to going backwards, except it normally means in the future, so there is no alternative to going forward (as far as we know).

And if I may offer a personal bugbear[6] of mine, it would be That's the way I roll. In other words, that is the way I do thing. It conveys a smug superiority even when associated with the most mundane of tasks and every time I hear it I shudder.

But then there are the additions to the list with which I have issues[7].

·         Move the goalposts. Yes it is a cliché because it is so commonly used, but it is widely and easily understood. Alternatively one could say "change the rules after the game has started" except we probably aren't talking about a game anyway. If it ain't broke, don't let us bother trying to fix it.[8]

·         Not fit for purpose. It possibly depends on what industry one has worked in, but this sort of expression was very common where I worked; it may be a cliché but trying to find an alternative makes the user sound pretentious and doesn't aid understanding

·         Back office. Same goes for this one. If you work in a location like a bank branch that has a foyer, a counter and an area behind the counter then the correct name for that area is back office. To try and find an alternative is illogical, after all we wouldn't try to find an alternative to calling the cooking area of a restaurant a kitchen, now would we? Unless of course we are using "back-office" as a verb (but who does that?).

·         By virtue of the fact that. There is probably no justification for using this phrase and I include it as one I would defend the use of simply because I happen to use it (a lot).

·         Don't hold your breath. Like "well good luck with that" this phrase has a simple elegance despite its very sarcastic nature. I have no rational reason for arguing against it being on the list, I just like it.

Rentoul makes a valid point about jargon, that it is important in bureaucracies but that it can end up being used inappropriately in conversation with outsiders. That is the point about jargon, it is a sort of technical language understood by insiders, often because in a particular industry it makes perfect sense to use it, but too often it falls into disrepute when it escapes the confines of its specialty and wanders off into the world at large where it is used, abused and misused by the general public (and journalists).

On the whole I find in favour of John Rentoul's list. I suppose that many of the objections I have to some of the words on it are based on the fact that I use and have a fondness for some of them. I would recommend The Banned List to everyone who indulges in even the most modest of writing (like me), or to anyone who reads anything for that matter, because at the end of the day, this book does what it says on the tin.

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[1] "Piece" is a word from the Banned List. There are a number of other banned words and phrases in this blog. Some I have included through sheer devilment; others are there because I don't know any better.

[2] Foreign words and phrases are verboten, says Rentoul quoting George Orwell. If you can think of an everyday English alternative, use it. Of course, he didn't say verboten, or bête noire.

[3] I copied this blog into Buzzword and it received a 3% Buzz factor rating and contains 13 buzzwords, which is actually quite low considering the content.

[4] Opine is another word from the Banned List.

[5] Surprisingly, this expression does not feature in the list.

[6] Cliché alert!

[7] Or perhaps I should say problems.

[8] Rentoul suggests that we should refrain from using sporting expressions in general and American sporting metaphors in particular. Interestingly, he cites "rookie" as an example of such an Americanism, yet the first use of that word appears to come in a Kipling poem of 1892 and was in common use in the British Army in the early 20th century.