Richard M. Langworth

Jargon and Monkey Motion

A friend sends a let­ter from a plan­ning firm, “reach­ing out” to his home­own­ers asso­ci­a­tion. The plan­ners seek a con­sul­tant con­tract. They promise “awe­some” results. Their pro­pos­als are so full of jar­gon that my friend won­dered what Churchill would make of it. The let­ter con­tains many sen­tences Churchill would have deplored:

“The com­mit­tee tasked us with the plan­ning and com­ple­tion of an inclu­sive and pro­duc­tive process.”

“Gen­er­al under­stand­ing offers guid­ance for the imple­men­ta­tion committee.”

And: “An out­ward and hon­est mar­ket­ing posi­tion achieves awe­some goals…”

“Tasked,” of course, is a new verb, con­vert­ed from the noun “task” by mod­ern Newspeak.…

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