Booher's Rules of Business Grammar - Dianna Booher 2009

Nonsense
Miscellaneous matters

NONWORDS, FILLERS, AND COLLOQUIALISMS

Experts who count such things estimate that there are 470,000 words in the English language. So it’s not as if we don’t have enough legitimate words to choose from. But some of us seem to have nothing better to do with our time than wander around digging up additional words to toss into the cacophony:

Rufus, like, is laughing at lunch, right, and returns to his office. So I wait until he finishes, okay? And then I tell him that his department is being downsized and that we’ll orientate all of them to finding a new job. They ain’t cuttin’ it. You know what I mean? That could be said of a lot of departments around here. Follow me? Then Rufus stops cold and goes, “Alright. No problem. I’m fixing to quit anyway.” Even though he’s dark-complected, I could tell by his face that he was upset. But he was trying hard to be way cool about it. But irregardless of what he said and all, pretty much anybody could have told that he was bummed out about it. I told the rest of his people in the department not to put callers who were trying to get ahold of him thru to him for the remainder of the day. I do agree, however, that people need to be incentivized better around here—both salary-wise and morale-wise. But you gotta do what you gotta do.

Do we use slang and colloquialisms when we talk? Sure. But there’s a difference between slang and colloquialisms (appropriate for casual conversation on occasion) and nonwords and fillers (inappropriate).

Granted, sometimes new ideas do call for new words. But nonwords describe ideas in odd ways.

Memory tip

Check the dictionary before deciding to coin a new word. You’re known by the company you keep and the words you speak.