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‘It’s dog eat dog in this rat race.’
‘We’ll burn that bridge when we come to it.’
‘I hope to come first or second, or at least to win it.’
The information superhighway brings more text to our door than ever before. It’s just that most of it gets mangled along the way.
Twenty years ago, Harold Scruby’s Manglish became an instant bestseller. This version expands on the consummate mangles of the original, with all-new Scrubyisms and recent classics from the shame files of the Plain English Foundation.
Modern Manglish explores the traditional linguistic traps of mixed metaphors and mispronunciation, new words and old clichés, and euphemisms, tautologies, and jargon. It also exposes the latest Manglish in serially offending professions such as politics, business, and the law. When exactly did we all become ‘stakeholders seeking to leverage our paradigms to achieve best-practice scenarios moving forward’? Alongside these are the newest contenders for the Manglish crown, ranging from sports talk to silly signs, and from food speak to fancy-pants job titles.
For your delectation — and perhaps chagrin — here are the worst excesses of Manglish, illustrated by Australia’s premier editorial cartoonist, Alan Moir.
“People who love to note misuse of language will adore this book, which analyses our epidemic of gobbledegook. Ignorance of English usage is one problem, jargon another. Politico-speak gets a thrashing here, as does willful obfuscation…If you love language, this will make you laugh and groan.”
—Lucy Sussex, Sunday Age
“A must-read for all politicians, businesspeople, and sports commentators. Hopefully to become an audiobook for footballers.”
—Leo Schofield
“If I die laughing my family will sue the authors.”
—Phillip Adams
“Despite the evidence presented here, do not despair about the state of the language, do not lose hope. For in exposing this language James and Scruby arm you with the best weapon for fighting back: laughter. So read, laugh, and keep this book close at all times. It’s your survival manual for the language jungle.”
—William Lutz, author of Doublespeak