1. "Quid Pro Quo" - In Latin, it means "this for that" or "a favor for a favor". Let's say my neighbor is good at basic engine repair and has a 2 acre yard he mows with a regular rotary push mower. Takes him a coupe hours. I have a riding mower I can't get to run (old gas, curburator needs cleaning). I offer to mow his yard once if he will clean the carburator to get it running.
We agree and both are happy. That is a Quid Pro Quo. But the idea is often wrongly applied to politics. As in, "you donate cash to my campaign and I will get your law passed that benefits you". Or "if you don't pass the law I want, my friends will trash your campaign headquarters".
Neither is truly a Quid Pro Quo. The first is a bribe; the second is extortion. Those are both illegal.
I did notice that some TV commenters started to realize the difference and started referring to bribery and extortion.
2. "Inflection Point" - Too many TV commentators seem to use this term to mean "a developing disagreement" or a "change in political momentum". An "inflection point" is a mathematic term describing a change in a graph:
I suspect the misuse comes from business types using it to describe graphs showing changes in company profits if certain new strategies are adopted. But those were still graphs.
When I was working in Government, I had a steady stream of higher-ups who were always seeking terms to make them look smarter than they were (and in fairness, some few WERE smart and well-respected among us lower-downs) and grabbed onto to any phrase that was new. And they loved that the phrases sounded impressive and no one else quite knew what they meant. "Unicorns, in the pipeline, move the needle, pain point, ladder up", and my favorite, "silos". The latter means keeping control over your office functions and information and was supposed to be bad but they all did it relentlessly.
3. "Tranch/Tranche" - Tranch/Tranche means "a portion of money, a slice, a portion". In TV commentary parlance, it has lately been used to mean "previously unreleased information held by a person". Why not just say "new information"? I have no objection to foreign words with nuanced meaning being introduced into English (which actually means almost all of them). Besides, "tranch" is a really awkward-sounding word in English.
Those are my "annoying 3" of 2019 (and they will probably continue in 2020). Have you any favorite bad ones?
4 comments:
Yep - management training courses are typically the best places to learn these new junk terms. "Deep dive" is one that I don't like.
Megan
Sydney, Australia
I did mean to include "deep dive" in the list. Great bad one!
And 2 thoughts about the management training courses I attended. "Way too obvious" or "unrealistic".
"Cache" pronounced "cash-ay." A cache is a hidden store of something (usually weapons in news stories). Cachet means prestige and several other things. (I yell at the TV about this.)
I hate "junta" pronounced "junta" (with j as in jump; rhymes with "wanta"). It should be pronounced "hunta" (hoon-tuh), although it's pronounced with a j so much by news anchors that the J-pronunciation has made the dictionary.
I'm tired of "unbelievable" and "incredible." If you use them to describe something, why should I believe it?
DH grumbles about "ideology" pronounced with "id" (the counterpart of ego), as it's from "idea" (although Dictionary.com lists both as acceptable).
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