Before I fell in to PR and communications, I was a nerdy Queen’s student studying everything from phonology, phonetics, syntax and the many disciplines of Linguistics.
My favourite part of studying linguistics was learning about the evolution of languages. And I am not talking about old English vs. modern English. I am talking about each generation’s unique vocabulary and syntax structure. By the way, did you know the word “like”, despite its overuse by teenagers, follows a grammatical structure?
Earlier this year, the Merriam-Webster dictionary, among best-selling books in American history, introduced a few interesting new words in to their dictionary.
Apart from being a geeky linguistics nerd, there is a true lesson behind this post.
Remember, just because you speak English like your audience, depending on your audience’s generation, you may speak different languages. This can be found in the words you use or maybe the way you express your ideas. Before you communicate to an audience in a different generation than yourself, make sure you test it on a small sample group to make sure your message is effective and written in a language your audience will understand.
Happy Friday!