Not before time!

[-pops-]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7948894.stm

[AlanHo]

In Birmingham and other large cities it is irrelevant. Most of the population don't understand plain English either.

[catgate]

As you say, "Not before time". But what else is there left, behind which the "Emporor/s with no Clothes" can hide.

Truly B.B.B.

It is faintly reminiscent, although in a different direction, to Gandalphs post on language a couple of days ago.

[Belatucadrus]

Problem I have with the list is that while much of it is clearly pretentious crap, a lot of it appears to be perfectly reasonable if used in context and banning them can only be seen as dumbing down.

[andsome]

That link should be sent to the government as well.

[-pops-]

Problem I have with the list is that while much of it is clearly pretentious crap, a lot of it appears to be perfectly reasonable if used in context and banning them can only be seen as dumbing down.

As you say, a few of the single words are OK if used in context but total rubbish if used otherwise - words like taxonomy, synergy and quantum have specific scientific/mathematical meanings. They are not words to be bandied around to sound impressive. Similarly with the portmanteau words like codeterminosity - the component word "derminosity" is meaningless anyway and combined with "co" makes it doubly so. As for the phrases, well words fail me although with such a vast selection to choose, they shouldn't do.

I was quite surprised last year at my last court appearance (as an expert witness, I might remind) that even in the Patents Arbitration Court, these words and phrases were being bandied around the courtroom. Patents, possibly more than anything else, require to be very exact in their wording to provide the best protection and it seemed odd to me that the precision required on the written page was abandoned in the oral proceedings.