Tag Archives: phrases

Words and phrases

Imagine that a time traveller popped up from the 50’s and 60’s who had somehow missed the decades between then and now. Rip Van Winkle – remember that story? Apart from the very obvious changes in buildings, shops, technology, instant communication etc etc, I think there are many words and phrases which would baffle them in conversation. Here is a very small selection.

Family

When I was starting my family in the early eighties, nobody had events called baby showers. I’m not sure when the idea first appeared here in Britain but it’s certainly massive now. When my children had a friend come to play or, when a bit older, had a friend come to stay the night, these were not called play-dates and sleepovers.

Music

Back in the 50’s and 60’s we had classical, jazz, blues, music from films and shows and rock and roll. In the early 60’s we saw the emergence of pop. Now there is a plethora of musical genres. Garage, hip hop, grime, dub, Indie … to name just a few!

Miscellaneous

The world of famous people has changed enormously, largely due to the new ease of communication. Some words which would bewilder a time traveller from the 50’s and 60’s are fashionista, paparazzi, celeb.

In the 1950s we had newspapers and some people had televisions. Now we have podcasts, sound bites, boxed sets, binge watching,

Back when I was a child ‘environment’ was a word we rarely heard and we never used expressions like ‘saving the planet’ or ‘good for the environment’, plant-based, eco friendly, flexitarian etc.

And finally . . .

Mindfulness, exfoliate, click and collect, chip and pin, glamping, fatbergs. And many, many more.

Note. This is my own work, written from my own memories and opinions. Credit to Wikipedia, Google, Google Images used for fact-checking. I make every effort to avoid infringing copyright. However, if anyone objects to my use of any particular image, please contact me and it will be removed.

New Words and Expressions.

This is just a quick run through some of the words and expressions which have appeared in the English language in the past several decades. I have made a point of keeping away from technological terms which would fill several blog posts by themselves. I feel that technology is a different world which is constantly evolving and is a subject in itself.

From the world of films and books we have blockbuster, sitcom, romcom, chick flick, chick lit and storyline (which surely just used to be known as plot?)

chick-flicks-1534953768    chick lit

Here are some from the world of fitness and exercise.  Aerobics, planking, spinning, jazzercise, Zumba – I could go on.

zumba    planking

Then there are the media words such as paparazzi,Twitterazzi, YouTuber, podcast and blog – blog just had to be in there!

youtube    Twitter

When we look at the language of environmental awareness there are words like biomass, global warming, freegan.

freegan_logo

Here are a few more with some history on their origins. Credit to Google, Wikipedia etc.

Glamping – not tried it. Although I have done lots of camping in my time.

The word “glamping” first appeared in the United Kingdom in 2005 and was added to the Oxford English Dictionary in 2016. The word is new, but the concept that “glamping” connotes, that of luxurious tent-living (or living in other camping accommodations), is not. In the 16th century, the Scottish Earl of Atholl prepared a lavish experience in the Highlands for the visiting King James V  and his mother. Here, the Duke pitched lavish tents and filled them with all the provisions of his own home palace.

Humongous – Humongous is an American slang word coined in the 1970’s, copying more proper words like tremendous or enormous. If you want to describe something that’s so big it’s hard to really measure, like the national debt or the number of cells in your body, you can use the world humongous. Just don’t use it in a formal paper.

24/ 7 – The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) defines the term as “twenty four hours a day, seven days a week; constantly”. It lists its first reference to 24/7 as from US magazine Sports Illustrated in 1983. The man to use it was basketball player Jerry Reynolds and he was talking about his jump shot.

 

I drafted this in January, decided it wasn’t that interesting and shelved it. However, we have since had a pandemic and a whole lot of new words have crept into everyday speech. Some already existed but were rarely heard. Here are some of the words and phrases we are suddenly hearing daily.

Furlough – I had heard this before but rarely, and always in connection with people taking leave from the forces. Here in Britain, it has been a lifesaver for many and we now hear it all the time.

Pandemic – we know what an epidemic is, most of us knew the meaning of the word pandemic but we never expected we would actually live through one for the best part of a year – and still counting.

Social Distancing – surely coined especially for a pandemic. I had certainly never heard the expression before.

Quarantine – Yes, we all knew this word already but this year it is in daily use everywhere as well as the expression ‘self-isolate’. The word quarantine comes from quarantena, meaning “forty days”, used in 14th–15th-century Venice and designating the period that all ships were required to be isolated before passengers and crew could go ashore during the Black Death plague epidemic.

Flattening the curve – Essentially a mathematical expression and now in common everyday parlance.

Algorithm – originally a mathematical term and now used a lot during this pandemic.

Staycation – The word staycation is a portmanteau of stay (meaning stay-at-home) and vacation. The terms “holistay” and “daycation” are also sometimes used. The earliest reference to this term as coming from a 2003 article by Terry Massey in The Sun News. It’s what everyone here did this summer when they had to cancel their holiday plans.

Some are existing words and expressions in common use by the medical profession alone and now being used by everyone. These include PPE, asymptomatic, antibodies, ventilators, respirators, community spread, contact tracing, herd immunity,containment.

Last but not least, a word I don’t think I’d ever used in my life before and now even hear my small grandchildren using – LOCKDOWN!