Britain’s traditional reluctance to speak directly for fear of causing embarrassment or offence has survived into the new world of blogging and instant communication across the world.
Far from turning into a frank, straightforward nation, the country has invented hundreds of new euphemisms to add to its ancient store of phrases, such as ‘my unmentionables†and ‘the departedâ€.
Modern employment rules and 24-hour media scrutiny of politics have played an important part, according to the new edition of Oxford University Press’s dictionary of euphemisms. Personnel departments, variously disguised as people, human relations and the use of similar, softer names, have an arsenal of restructuring, furthering your career, and other terms for the sack that imply no personal incompetence.
Warfare has seen the celebrated invention of ‘collateral damageâ€, adopted from the United States, a nation also keen on dodging the blunt, according to the book, How Not To Say What You Mean. The Americans have carried the tradition of turf accountant (for bookie) and rodent operative (for rat catcher) into the information technology world, with computer bug hunters rebranded as digital scatologists. Computer geeks have added to death’s central place in the world of euphemisms. Dying in the web world is variously described as ‘sent to the archiveâ€, ‘exported to a flat file†and ‘buying the disk farmâ€.
The speed with which euphemisms might become unacceptable is highlighted by the book’s author, retired academic Robert Holder. The relatively modern term of ‘timeshareâ€, for example, is rapidly being replaced by ‘seasonal ownershipâ€.
The dictionary acknowledges a handful of additions to the very rare category of euphemisms, which have a known coiner — most famously use the term ‘wardrobe malfunction†for clothes that slip to reveal intimate parts of the body. This was the invention of the singer Justin TimberÂlake after the exposure of his fellow performer Janet Jackson’s right breast in a show at Houston in 2004.
Curious British examples are a little more common. The Yorkshire seaside resort of Filey is the only place in the world where dying is referred to as ‘going to the North Ridingâ€. This stems from the traditional local government boundary that divides the town, with most people living in East Riding but the cemetery just across the old county border.
Other euphemisms for death, from ‘pushing up the daisies†to ‘promoted to gloryâ€, remain central to the collection, along with reams of expressions for sexual and lavatorial doings.
The new entries take their place beside thousands of lasting expressions, including the simplest of them all — the use of the word euphemism itself. This was playfully substituted for lavatory in Edward Albee’s play, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf, and later adopted by the bestselling children’s author, Dr Seuss, whose child hero in It’s Grinch Night innocently asks for permission to ‘go to the euphemismâ€. —