English Today
- English Today / Volume 2 / Issue 01 / January 1986, pp 7-9
- Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1986
- DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0266078400001619 (About DOI), Published online: 17 October 2008
Special Features
The Gobbledygook Syndrome
Jean Aitchison
Abstract
Gobbledygook, jargon, bureaucratese and legalese – people rail against them all. Can anything be said objectively about these ‘symptoms’ of a ‘diseased’ and ‘degenerate’ English? Is there, indeed a case for surgery?
