Green Vocabulary Makes it Into Chambers Dictionary
by Michael Graham Richard, Gatineau, Canada on 08.14.08
Greenspeak
Some of the words that were introduced in the 11th edition of the Chambers dictionary have green origins. BBC News reports:
"'Electrosmog' refers to the electromagnetic fields emitted by computers and mobile phones, 'eco-village' is a term used for small ecologically-sustainable communities and 'carbon footprint' is the measure of the impact human activities on the environment."
There is also 'food miles', referring to how far away your food come from, and 'green tax', in reference to putting a price on undesirable things like CO2 or mercury to reduce pollution.
Of course, it doesn't really matter to most if words are in a dictionary or not, as long as others know what you're talking about. But these inclusions are a good sign that green concepts are getting firmly established in mainstream consciousness.
Dictionary editor in chief Mary O'Neill said: "The new words we added to this 11th edition of The Chambers Dictionary paint a vivid picture of current interests and concerns."
Some of the other new word included in the Chambers are: 'credit crunch', 'wardrobe malfunction', 'social networking', 'fashion forward', and 'blue-on-blue'.
You can brush up on your greenspeak skills by checking out our Jargon watch series:
Green Jargon
Jargon Watch: Geothermal vs Ground Source Heat Pump
Jargon Watch: Slow Design
Jargon Watch: Locatects
Jargon Watch: 100 Mile Style
Jargon Watch: "Greenmuting"
More on Green Vocabulary in the Chambers Dictionary
BBC News
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This is great news! I believe dictionary editors monitor print and other sources to see how common a word or phrase really is before they add it to the dictionary, so this is really a sign of increasing public awareness.
C.E.
Yes, you're right. The editors of the Macquarie Dictionary (who I work for) monitor usage of words in print and online. They maintain a corpus of publications that they draw citations from.
They consider the dictionary to be descriptive rather than prescriptive, ie. the dictionary reflects our usage of English rather than tells us how we should use it.
AAAARRGH! The word 'electrosmog' makes me want to hit people anyway, but parading it as a wonderful example of all these lovely environmentally conscious words is too much. I know Treehugger is clearly not immune to a good dose of woo (such as that "Blade" fuel "saver" device a few days ago, shudder) but electrosmog DOES NOT EXIST. "Emissions" and "fields" from mobile phones, WiFi and all the rest do NOT make people sick, especially not in the way that the "electrosensitivity" sufferers claim. The research has been done, the jury is in, it's a load of crap. "Electrosmog" is not an environmental issue.
Sorry if this comes across as trollish, but "electrosensitivity" is one of my (minor) hot buttons. It can slow down the rollout of important, useful technologies, and it diverts attention from real, important health and environmental issues.
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MGR: Actually, I agree with you Julius.
Anybody who doesn't believe that electrosmog is a health issue, hasn't lived close to a substation of power line.
It is a serious issue, whether on a minor scale, like inside a dwelling (where I believe there to be a link to cotdeath) or anywhere else on a larger scale.
Start measuring the gauss and you will be able to draw some serious conclusions.