leetspeak

From leet + -speak; the former element is from elite, respelled according to leetspeak conventions.

well, after all i am a student of languages... which lets me peek into sociology now and then. i haven't studied the 'leet guys very much, but it seems to me that as they all understand their form of "communication", the main purpose (ie separating themselves as a group from the mainstream) is successful. especially as it is almost impossible to understand leetspeak at first.

1996 May 7, Thomas Weigle, “Re: Realmz Scenario Summary”, in comp.sys.mac.games.adventure (Usenet), retrieved 2016-07-15, message-ID <thomas.weigle-0705961754080001@dialup96-1-16.swipnet.se>:

Murg is God [It's "/\/\U|>,g 15 g4\/\/D" in l33tsp33k]

1997 June 12, KaFRoKa, “Re: Another new cascade!”, in alt.games.final-fantasy (Usenet), retrieved 2016-07-15, message-ID <5npiei$lrn$1@thor.atcon.com>:

People associate "l33t-speak" with hackers, so when new hackers start to get into the scene they assume they need to write like that, which perpetuates the belief that hackers use l33t-sp34k.

1998 May 24, Ben Cantrick, “Re: Abuse of alphanumerics. Why do haX0r d00dz do it?”, in alt.2600 (Usenet), retrieved 2016-07-15, message-ID <6k9pf8$f5o@peabody.colorado.edu>:

(chiefly Internet slang) A form of chatspeak characterized most strongly by its alphanumeric substitutions.


econobabble

Once you cut through all the econobabble, it says we're headed for a recession.

Politicians now use econobabble as a tool of mass confusion, aimed at scaring the public into doing things they don't want to do while narrowing our policy choices.

Today's orthodoxy (free market economy) is being spearheaded by the Bank and the Fund through the Structural Adjustment Programme that has a rather suggestive acronym of SAP. The phrase, now part of the current econobabble […]

1992, Iqbal Jafar, The last frontier and other essays, page 143:

(informal) Excessively obscure economic jargon.


geekspeak

Most of his tweets are now labeled “disputed” by Twitter, which I would translate from geekspeak as a polite way of calling them lies.

2020 December 31, Kara Swisher, “Goodbye, Twitter Trump! And Other Predictions for 2021”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:

(colloquial) A type of slang used by geeks, especially computer geeks. It incorporates several terms derived from science fiction, as well as neologisms and grammar quirks, and is frequently found in combination with computer jargon.


academese

Sometimes during intellectual conversation, I would switch from academese to my native black English vernacular. I would utter observations replete with black linguistic idioms and colloquialisms.

2002, Lory Janelle Dance, Tough Fronts: The Impact of Street Culture on Schooling, Psychology Press, →ISBN, page 51:

One way this is communicated is through language use wherein the language of the researcher is often verbose and philosophically or methodologically inaccessible to the nonacademic, also known as academese […]

2016, Anastacia Kurylo, Tatyana Dumova, Social Networking: Redefining Communication in the Digital Age, Rowman & Littlefield, →ISBN, page 76:

(derogatory) A formal or artificial style of communicating prevalent in institutes of higher education.


artspeak

Mr. Quinn[…] was uptown exploring the new $26 million, 40,000 square foot museum addition because he takes students to museums as part of a course he teaches in New York on what to say about paintings—artspeak.

1987 February 4, William E. Geist, “The Art of Artspeak: Be Sophisticated”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:

Complication is what artspeak is all about. It seeks to confer status and worth on an artist's work by insisting on its obscurity, which it conveys through a grey porridge of abstract nouns.

2010 February 5, Jon Canter, “Artspeak? It's complicated”, in The Guardian:

On the other side of the wall, the affable Mr. Campbell, dressed in jeans and a camouflage baseball cap, attempted to assess the tattoo he chose for Mr. Gachot in the language of artspeak. “With skulls, there’s so much symbolism and power,” he said.

2015 November 13, Alex Williams, “Scott Campbell Turns Blind Trust Into Tattoos”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:

(often derogatory) The specialist vocabulary and language associated with art and artists, especially when seen as complicated or pretentious.


legalese

It is also his considered opinion that a condition precedent to any legislative action is that those best qualified to pronounce on the merits of a popular demand examine it in all its aspects. That is good Menzian legalese, as pompous as parody permits.

1937 October 9, Smith's Weekly, Sydney, page 12, column 1:

(informal, derogatory) Technical jargon common in the legal profession; the argot of lawyers.


treknobabble

/ˈtɹɛknəʊˌbæbəl/

I'd sooner trust treknobabble for an explanation than any thing you say.

1997 September 24, $teve2, “Re: SUNBURN : If you were not watching GITM”, in aus.tv.x-files (Usenet):

So you think up something like Voyager meets some Romulans stranded in the DQ, or some treknobabble takes down the command staff and Seven assumes command.

1999 December 29, Bozo the Proctologist, “Re: Bad Voyager Plots”, in alt.tv.star-trek.voyager (Usenet):

Even if they won using the power of treknobabble, this force ratio does not show the audience how mighty and dangerous the Imperial warships are […]

2003 December 17, Kazuaki Shimazaki, “The More Detailed Critique”, in alt.startrek.vs.starwars (Usenet):

A kind of technobabble particular to the Star Trek universe, with a particularly heavy emphasis on configurations of pseudoscientific particles and waves.


psychobabble

From psycho- + babble. First use appears c. 1975 in an article by R.D. Rosen. See cite below.

We are living, practically no one has to be reminded, in a therapeutic age. The sign in every storefront reads: "Psychobabble spoken here".

May 27, 1975, R.D. Rosen, Boston Phoenix:

The psychological patter of the '70s is as inescapable as Muzak and just as numbing: Are you relating? Going through heavy changes? In touch with yourself and doing your own thing? Are you up front, or just hung up and uptight? Boston Writer R.D. (for Richard Dean) Rosen calls it psychobabble, and in his new book by that title (Atheneum, $8.95) sees America awash in soggy therapeutic clichés.

1977 December 3, “Psychobabble”, in Time:

He didn't want to hear any new-age psychobabble, like " find your inner peace."

2007, Max Brooks, “Saving Mel Brooks”, in Mens Health, section 22.2:

(somewhat derogatory) The jargon of psychology and psychoanalysis, especially when used pretentiously to discuss mundane issues.


psychobabble

en-verb

psychobabble (third-person singular simple present psychobabbles, present participle psychobabbling, simple past and past participle psychobabbled)

psychobabbles (present singular third-person)
psychobabbling (participle present)
psychobabbled (participle past)
psychobabbled (past)

(intransitive) To speak or converse using this kind of jargon.


weather speak

weatherspeak (alternative)
weather-speak (alternative)


journalese

en-noun

journalese (countable and uncountable, plural journaleses)

/ˌd͡ʒɜː.nəˈliːz/

We write journalese out of habit, sometimes from misguided training, and to sound urgent, authoritative and, well, journalistic. But it doesn't do any of that.

The veteran newspaper columnist, Keith Waterhouse, identifies two versions of this journalese. The first is officialese. It can be found everywhere […] The second version, which he calls tabloidese, is characterised by bolted-together monosyllables and sensationalism. Both types of journalese have this in common: people don't speak like that.

2004, Rick Thompson, Writing for Broadcast Journalists, Routledge, →ISBN, page 21:

A style of writing used in some newspapers and magazines, characterized by cliché, hyperbolic language, use of some vocabulary items that are mostly confined to this genre, and clipped syntax.


consultantese

The real problem is that the consultant is talking in broad, consultantese abstractions, [...]

2003, Russell D. Lambert, Executive's Guide to the Wireless Workforce, John Wiley and Sons, →ISBN, page 24:

We never quite converted him to consultantese (thank goodness), but we did move him a little toward the center.

1993, Jon R. Katzenbach, Douglas K. Smith, The Wisdom of Teams: creating the high-performance organization, Harvard Business School Press, →ISBN, page x:

Consultantese for starting out on an assignment with little or no prior outline

1974, Robert Kirk Mueller, Buzzwords: A Guide to the Language of Leadership, Van Nostrand Reinhold Co., →ISBN, page 54:

Jargon or buzzwords used by consultants.


chatspeak

Given that people are trying to speak by writing in real time, chatspeak is infused with extensive abbreviations and there is little punctuation.

2001, Edward Castronova, “Virtual Worlds: A First-Hand Account of Market and Society on the Cyberian Frontier”, in CESifo Working Papers, 618, p. 13:

Our students are using Internet shorthand or chatspeak in their online yakking in chat rooms and e-mails.

2002, Ronald A. Berk, Humor as an instructional defibrillator: evidence-based techniques in teaching and assessment, Stylus, page 140:

I don't mind saying 'u' instead of 'you' so much, mostly because I've become numb to it, and some people do it because it's 'cool' to speak chatspeak.

2004, “Hello, All (who ever that is)”, in Smite the illiterate:

Is it too much to imagine a Bible written entirely in the language of tomorrow: Internet chatspeak and text message shorthand?

2008, Tom Breen, The Messiah formerly known as Jesus : dispatches from the intersection of Christianity and pop culture, Baylor University Press, page 69:

(Internet, informal) The blend of informal language, conventional abbreviations and emoticons typical of chatrooms.


tabloidese

Tabloids have their own language. Maybe it's because the pages are smaller than the broadsheet papers, or perhaps it's because they have to make room to fit all those pictures of Jordan in her knickers in each day, but tabloidese is a language and a skill peculiar to the red tops. Forget anything you learned in your grammar lessons at school.

2010, Sharon Marshall, Tabloid Girl, Hachette UK, →ISBN:

The writing style of tabloid journalism.


governmentese

(informal) The jargon spoken in government.


bureaucratese

Help you fill out the application for food stamps and other government programs, break down the discouraging bureaucratese.

2019, Colson Whitehead, The Nickel Boys, Fleet, page 186:

(informal, derogatory) A style of language, used by bureaucrats, that involves jargon or euphemism to the detriment of broader understanding.

канцеларски стил

pejorative term for language typically used by bureaucrats

kapulakieli

pejorative term for language resembling that used by bureaucrats


officialese

officialese (countable and uncountable, plural officialeses)

These were men, the chronicler continued, who ‘spoke pleasantly’, in the smooth officialese that most of Henry's counsellors were accustomed to deploy […]

2011, Thomas Penn, Winter King, Penguin, published 2012, page 263:

But while using officialese might give your writing the outward appearance of being thorough and correct, that doesn't mean there's anything happening underneath. Officialese is a kind of defense mechanism. It's rooted in the fear of getting something wrong, or leaving something out, or looking stupid.

2021, Tom Albrighton, How to Write Clearly […] , ABC Business Communications Ltd, →ISBN, page 144:

The typical language of officials or official documents; legalistic and pompous language.


computerese

No Computerese!¶ Let's face it–when there's a task you don't know how to do but you need to get it done in a hurry, or when you're stuck in the middle of a task and can't figure out what to do next, there's nothing more frustrating than having to read page after page of technical background material.

1997, Jerry Joyce, Microsoft Word 97 At a Glance, Microsoft Press, page 1:

(informal, dated) The jargon associated with computers.


ecobabble

(informal, derogatory) Vacuous speech about environmental concerns.


managementese

Even phrased as they are in Higher Managementese, these comments touch the heart of the matter.

1971 November 14, Kenneth Lamott, “The Chancellor the State Colleges”, in Los Angeles Times, page U16:

The uniqueness of Perotspeak is its mixture of rustic metaphor with modern managementese.

1992 June 14, William Safire, “On Language: Perotspeak”, in New York Times, retrieved 2009-04-14:

Since February, we have been calling for the ridiculously named Consignia to change back to the good old Post Office. . . . [T]he chief executive, John Roberts, said of Consignia that it was a "modern, meaningful and entirely appropriate" name that "describes the full scope of the Post Office in a way that the words ‘post’ and ‘office’ cannot". That was clearly hogwash managementese of the worst variety.

2002 June 10, “Silly names for failure”, in Telegraph, UK, retrieved 2009-04-14:

(often derogatory) The jargon used by management.


cyberlingo

(informal) The lingo used on the Internet or in cyberspace.


cyberspeak

(informal) The language used on the Internet or in cyberspace.


corporatese

The jargon used in corporations and other bureaucracies.


headlinese

The jargon used in headlines of newspapers, often with unconventional grammar driven mainly by extreme brevity as a constraint of the medium.


edu-babble

Already notorious for edubabble, officials may have hit new depths with a four-page progress report used by the St. Louis public schools.

1992 November 17, “Schoolspeak”, in St. Louis Post-Dispatch:

Overwhelmed teachers yearn to escape the edu-babble of conflicting and unworkable policy directives

1998, Andy Hargreaves, International Handbook of Educational Change, page 412:

These terms, this way of talking, is what we like to refer to as “Edu-babble.” Orwell liked to call it doublespeak. Edu-babble is just that, with some hip catchphrases attached. And by hip I mean impractical.

2009, Gwendolyn Green, Edu-Babble: The Glamorous World of the New York City Public School System, page 3:

(education, derogatory) Jargon on educational topics; writing or speech containing a large amount of education jargon.


medspeak

The jargon used by the medical community.


femspeak

The aim of this jargon-sodden Femspeak is to set up a myth of women artists as a hated underclass, which they were not in 1975 and are not today; in such a scheme, vagina hatred is imputed to men as automatically as penis envy once was to women.

1980 December 15, Robert Hughes, “An Obsessive Feminist Pantheon”, in Time:

The Bergers assert that “the family is a problem”, and note that the concept of 'gender roles' is merely “femspeak” – a technique for arguing that the assignment of roles within the family is arbitrary and that it can/should be changed, so as to advance women's welfare (p 64).

2005, Ann Oakley, The Ann Oakley Reader: Gender, Women and Social Science, The Policy Press, →ISBN, page 44:

According to Warren Farrell, an Orwellian “lace curtain” of governing “femspeak” is virtually indistinguishable from the propaganda machinery of tyranny states.

2007, Robert Menzies, “Virtual Backlash: Representations of Men's 'Rights' and Feminist 'Wrongs' in Cyberspace”, in Susan B. Boyd, Dorothy E. Chunn, Hester Lessard, editors, Reaction and Resistance: Feminism, Law, and Social Change, UBC Press, →ISBN, page 83:

(derogatory) The characteristic jargon of feminists and feminist discourse.


Bargoens

Lowee generally spoke Bargoens, the language of thieves—a mixture of Dutch, Cockney, Yiddish, and Papiamento.

2007, A. C. Baantjer, DeKok and Murder on Blood Mountain, Fulcrum Publishing, →ISBN, page 74:

(historical) A Dutch cant historically spoken in Netherlands, most famously by criminals, until the early 20th century.


fanspeak

From fan + -speak, modeled after Newspeak.

fanspeak: The language, typography, and cliches of fandom. Term is derived from "newspeak," the language of the future, in George Orwell's 1984.

1952, Arthur Rapp, Lee Hoffman, Redd Boggs, Fanspeak, page 5:

The "lack" in the narrative's central relationship produces UST (fanspeak for "unresolved sexual tension") and more, a space for sublimated discourse about body and gender politics...

2000, Elyce Rae Helford, Fantasy girls, page 64:

(informal) The jargon used by science fiction fans.

(by extension, informal) The jargon used by fans of any genre of fiction or popular culture in general.


marketese

(usually derogatory) A choice of words with a promotional tone; marketing jargon.


crosswordese

"The Times puzzle is full of crosswordese – words nobody ever heard of," he said. "Take today March 10. He's got the clue 'corn mush.' The answer is 'samp.' Then there's 'dwarf buffalo.' The answer is 'anoa.' It's laughable. I know these words because I'm in the business. But why should you?"

20 March 1988, Sam Hodges, “Puzzlers Exchanging A Lot Of Cross Words”, in Orlando Sentinel:

(crosswording) The jargon of crossword puzzle clues or answers, often consisting of rare, archaic, or dialectal words.


neepery

From neep-neep, slang for a computer enthusiast, which reportedly arose at the California Institute of Technology in the 1970s.

But all this, he realized, was something he'd learned over the course of years with the Rebellion, years of dealing with the sophisticated technologies and scientific neepery available on Coruscant and its inner worlds.

1997, Barbara Hambly, Star Wars: Planet of Twilight, Bantam Books, →ISBN, page 154:

"…so we've got a LAN hooking up the office, the stable, and the kitchen, since your mom has access to the database if we get a call from a customer and I'm out in the fields," Dad said, as Tannim's head spun under the burden of all the computer neepery.

1999, Mercedes Lackey, Larry Dixon, The Chrome Borne, Baen Books, →ISBN:

Technical neepery -- it is not necessary or desirable for rope to grip pulleys.

2012 July 13, David Dyer-Bennet, “Re: purchase”, in alt.usage.english (Usenet):


nerdspeak

(colloquial) The language of nerds; technical or computer jargon.


netspeak

From net + -speak, coined by British linguist David Crystal in 2001 who originally wrote it capitalized as "Netspeak".

coinage

So, the point of this discussion is not just about the value of proofreading or the intrusion of netspeak—it's about the mistake of not understanding their impact on our ability to communicate with the customer.

2010, Ralph W. Crosby, It’s The Customer, Stupid!:

An informal form of written language used on the Internet, characterized by abbreviations and emoticons.


cablese

The terse jargon used in telegrams, often with unconventional grammar.


golfese

The jargon used by golf players and commentators.


coolspeak

The counterculture has become the lunch-counter culture. You can see this in ads that exhibit what one journalist has called "group coolspeak." Consumers are bombarded with countercultural commandments: Just do it! Be yourself! Be bold! Think different! Never blend in! Do exactly as we tell you!

2004, Paul McFedries, Word Spy: The Word Lover's Guide to Modern Culture, Broadway Books, →ISBN, page 102:

Novelist Chuck Palahniuk's fans have crowned him a prince of edge for a style that is, according to one reviewer, “equal parts potent imagery, nihilistic coolspeak, and doped-out craziness.”

2007, Arthur Plotnik, Sound & Bite: A Writer's Guide to Bold, Contemporary Style, Random House, →ISBN:

These messages are written in a creative blend of coolspeak and text message language.

2008, David Buckingham, editor, Youth, Identity, and Digital Media, MIT Press, →ISBN, page 29:

Language that is trendy and cool, or aims to be.


campaignspeak

"That's why I need you so badly, Zoë. You know how to translate the harsh realities of foreign policy into relatively intelligible campaignspeak."
Zoë laughed. "Intelligible campaignspeak is an oxymoron."

1998, Doris Mortman, The Lucky Ones, Zebra Books, →ISBN, page 50:

The media and the public do in fact relish catching politicians' lies, but these are the small lies — lies about money, sex, drug use and other peccadillos, and the ritual doubletalk of campaignspeak.

2000, William Blum, Rogue State: A Guide to the World's Only Superpower, Common Courage Press, →ISBN, page 11:

Unfortunately, The Political Brain doesn't follow up on the implications of this research. Rather, Westen, who describes himself as ardently "pro-Democratic," transposes his clinical findings into one-sided campaignspeak.

2007 July 15, Chris Lehmann, “Psyched”, in The Washington Post:

The jargon used by politicians, lobbyists, and commentators, especially during a political campaign.


electionspeak

Bolstered claims of mustering a simple majority are an integral part of electionspeak.

1999, India Today International, volume 24, page 276:

Such mindless, meaningless electionspeak brought to mind the words of Orwell: […]

2013, David Marsh, For Who the Bell Tolls: One Man's Quest for Grammatical Perfection, Faber and Faber Ltd, →ISBN:

Accustomed as they are to electionspeak, the mainstream media can’t seem to fathom that the selection of a pope is an altogether different sort of thing.

2013 February 13, Marybeth Hicks, “Media waste no time to display ignorance”, in The Washington Times:

The jargon or rhetoric of politicians, lobbyists, and commentators during an election campaign.


militaryspeak

The military had been reticent over casualty figures (defined in militaryspeak as 'collateral damage') during the slaughters of new militarist adventures in Grenada and Panama.

1997, Richard Keeble, Secret State, Silent Press: New Militarism, the Gulf and the Modern Image of Warfare, Indiana University Press, →ISBN, page 150:

They were terrorists, for sure—Tangos in militaryspeak.

2011, Lucianne Rivers, Entice Me, Entangled Publishing, LLC, →ISBN:

Harsh ratcheting sounds came from outside the SUV, penetrating the constant feed from the military band radio. The soldiers spoke in cryptic responses. Schofield was picking up the militaryspeak, but a lot of it remained Greek to him.

2013, Mel Odom, Renegade, Tyndale, →ISBN, page 162:


warspeak

In an interesting passage the author discusses what he considers the kind of "Warspeak that glorified and sanitized the actions of the U.S.-led allied forces (the use of words like eliminate, neutralize, loyal, brave, cautious, etc.) […]

1993, Political Science Quarterly, volume 108, page 184:

My personal favorite that emerged from the fog of warspeak was gorilla snot (2001), a gluelike substance that is spread over sand to prevent a dust cloud from forming whenever a helicopter takes off or lands.

2004, Paul McFedries, Word Spy: The Word Lover's Guide to Modern Culture, Broadway Books, →ISBN:

Whatever your views about the rights and wrongs of these military campaigns, you would probably agree that it is psychologically easier to kill 'gooks' and 'turkeys' than human beings. Here are some more examples of 'warspeak', which is often used to cover up the reality on the ground.

2015, Richard van de Lagemaat, Theory of Knowledge for the IB Diploma, Cambridge University Press, →ISBN, page 106:

The jargon of war and military operations.


blogspeak

Bloggers with a science background, like bloggers on most other topics, often demonstrate open scorn for the mainstream media (MSM in blogspeak).

2009 March 19, Geoff Brumfiel, “Science journalism: Supplanting the old media?”, in Nature, volume 458, number 7236, →DOI, page 276:

(informal, blogging) The variety of language used in blogs.


peacespeak

[…] the chief purpose of our armed forces would be not to "win wars" but to "avert wars," our leaders would be talking to us in "peacespeak," not "nukespeak," […]

1987, Leonard I. Sweet, The Lion's Pride: America and the Peaceable Community, Abingdon Press, →ISBN, page 38:

At the same time, we must not be uncritical of 'peacespeak' which sometimes glosses over the stark realities of painful choices in a fallen world.

1989 April, David Lyon, “Against The Stream”, in Third Way, volume 12, number 4, page 17:

But love-bombing, the Unionists couldn't handle. The long arm of 'friendship' is much more insidious. Irish nationalism takes many forms and peacespeak is just one of them.

2001, Eamon Delaney, The Accidental Diplomat: My Years in the Irish Foreign Service, 1987-1995, New Island, →ISBN, page 336:

The jargon of pacifism and anti-war discourse.


grimgribber

en-noun

grimgribber (usually uncountable, plural grimgribbers)

From fictional estate Grimgribber in Richard Steele's 1722 play The Conscious Lovers. Used pejoratively as “learned rubbish”.


thieves' Latin

(historical) The slang used by thieves among themselves.


Buffyspeak

As one would say in Buffyspeak, soak in the irony for a moment.

2006, Jennifer Ouellette, The Physics of the Buffyverse, unnumbered page:

During "The Writing for Teens and Television" symposium, in an exchange about adolescent language, Whedon readily admits, as he has done in other interviews, that Buffyspeak was his creation and not intended to be mimetic.

2007, Dear Angela: Remember My So-Called Life, page 216:

The linguistic distinctiveness of Buffyspeak is not reproduced in the Italian version, where teenagers' speech style is, at most, characterized by an informality which does not have any particular connotation as 'youth language.'

2008, Diana Bianchi, “Taming teen-language: The adaptation of Buffyspeak into Italian”, in Delia Chiaro, Christine Heiss, Chiara Bucaria, editors, Between Text and Image: Updating Research in Screen Translation, page 187:

(fandom slang) The invented slang used by characters on the television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer.


hamese

(informal) The jargon of ham radio enthusiasts.


Cosmospeak

Cosmopolitan, the magazine that goes on and on asking women in italicized Cosmospeak: “Don't you just love loving men, and don't you feel just miserable when you don't have a man to love, and wouldn't you love to learn how to love them better, and without fear or guilt and—best of all—to get the right one to love you?”

1974 August 11, Stephanie Harrington, “Ms. versus Cosmo”, in The New York Times:

Granted, these living Love Magnets must meet tough criteria. They must be good-looking, "self-made men" (that's Cosmospeak for "a nice bank account").

1989 March 14, Moira Bailey, “Bachelor No. 1 Faces Dating Game's Toughest Questions”, in The Orlando Sentinel:

She is also one of the stars of a politics spread in Cosmopolitan. In Cosmospeak, Clare, left, is an apparat-chick, a party girl, one of a new generation of young people who have embraced politics because they are tired of the way the aforementioned suits are ruining the country.

1995 September 19, “Power-dressing of party apparat-chick”, in The Herald, Scotland:

The characteristic jargon and copy style of Cosmopolitan magazine.


teenspeak

"Righteous" and "dude" were part of teenspeak at the time, and had already been immortalized by another clueless adult, Grace, the Wite-Out sniffing secretary (Edie McClurg) speaking of the hero in Ferris Bueller's Day Off.

2011, John Ross Bowie, Heathers, page 51:

Real teenspeak is a mess of ums, likes, you knows, tangents and runaway trains of thought that, when transcribed onto paper, are pretty much impenetrable.

2011, Deborah Halverson, M. T. Anderson, Writing Young Adult Fiction For Dummies, page 175:

[…] "Nice to meet you, Mr. Tomasi. Thank you for the party tonight. That's just sick."
"Sick means good in teenspeak," Audrey translated, before demanding, "What party?"

2013, Lucy Monroe, Million Dollar Christmas Proposal, page 107:

(derogatory or humorous) Communication by adolescents viewed as slangy, awkward, or immature.


educatorese

(informal) The jargon used by educators.


navalese

(informal) The jargon spoken in the navy.


bronyspeak

Brony communities invented ‘bronyspeak’ and use codes of community-enforced niceness so that ‘nopony’ has to suffer social rejection.

2013 April 7, Jon Coumes, “What Do Men's Rights Activists and Bronies Have in Common?”, in The American Prospect:

This playful "ponyspeak" is innocent and easy to decode, but it inspired the much more vernacular "bronyspeak," a hybrid of this official wordplay with oral urban slang.

2015, Bill Ellis, "What Bronies See When They Brohoof: Queering Animation on the Dark and Evil Internet", Journal of American Folklore, Volume 128, Number 509, Summer 2015

In the Brony fandom, despite referencing phrases and catch phrases from the show, the bronies have created a separate language, Bronyspeak.

2016, Nicolai Puggaard Hansen, "Fandom In The Digita; Age: An Exploration of Value Co-Creation in Online Fan Communities", thesis submitted to Copenhagen Business School, page 53

(fandom slang) The fanilect of the brony community.


cryptobabble

If the abbreviations begin to look like typical database cryptobabble, you needn’t bother with them, if you don’t mind typing in full sentences, which do approximate the mother tongue rather closely.

1984 December 24, Henry F. Beechhold, “Condor Jr.: This file manager proves you can be good without being complicated”, in InfoWorld, volume 6, number 52, page 41:

I've noticed that a certain biostatistician that I occasionally work with always talks in similar cryptobabble with me.

1991 October 30, Stephen Modena, “ask for help”, in bionet.biology.computational (Usenet):

Like most scientific specialties, the sequence alignment field uses a technical vocabulary that it greatly helps to learn. This does not make it cryptobabble.

1991 November 7, Michael Gribskov, “non-intersecting alignments”, in bionet.biology.computational (Usenet):

Now, this may look like meaningless cryptobabble, but it is in fact very funny to adolescent geeks.

1995, Aaron Weiss, The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Protecting Yourself on the Internet, Que, page 244:

The cryptobabble is four times as long as the message itself!

1997 April 9, Christopher Gray, “Browser Offsets in Netscape”, in comp.infosystems.www.authoring.html (Usenet):

Permadi foresees victory for Megawati, framing his prediction in Nostradamus-like cryptobabble: “There will be disruptions and chaos before or after the elections,” he said in a Reuters interview.

What the heck is that cryptobabble supposed to mean?

2000 March 7, GMCarter, “CD8 CTLs Can't Do It Alone”, in misc.health.aids (Usenet):

And if you want to hear “cryptobabble” – crusts talk all the time, she says—“you have to be very quiet and put your ear right next to the ground. You’ll hear this faint murmuring.”

More cryptobabble which means nothing.

2001 August 23, John Baker, “To all lotus-eaters”, in ns.general (Usenet):

Yes it has already been determined to be official snake oil by sci.crypt. The same is true about heaps of other highly marketed systems supported by meaningless cryptobabble and challenges that hide the exact details of the algorithm being used.

2002 April 4, Scott Contini, “Meganet's unbreakable Virtual Matrix Encryption (VME)”, in sci.crypt (Usenet):

Using typical military cryptobabble the commanders had assured the pilots that this threat would be neutralised.

2008, George P. Robertson, War Against Islam, →ISBN, page 278:

What I make out of it is that you are posting some nonsense cryptobabble to make yourself seem more intelligent and mysterious.

2008 February 13, Ron's Inspector's Inspector, “Hermann Goering R.I.P”, in alt.religion.scientology (Usenet):

Much more fun was Jack Hunter, a new Indiana Jones-style action drama packed with sweat, guns and crypto[-]babble.

2008 November 9, Matthew Bell, “Thank heavens for royal families”, in The Independent, number 976, page 62:

Your entire participation here is only an attempt at playing a pointless, endless, nonsensical Usenet game in which you try to suck in suckers by writing nothing but a lot of cryptobabble.

2012 January 18, George Plimpton, “Re: WHO IS JESUS? ??????????”, in alt.agnosticism (Usenet):

Today, most sophisticated financial practitioners privately admit that they have to re-read the forms before client meetings because of the complications underlying them.... It’s crypto[-]babble....

2014, Martin K. Welge, Marc Eulerich, Corporate-Governance-Management, Springer Gabler, →ISBN, page 97:

See if you can recognize them in this hilarious cryptobabble from North American sophomores.

2015, Peter Swirski, American Political Fictions: War on Errorism in Contemporary American Literature, Culture, and Politics, Palgrave Macmillan:

I threw my hands wide, fed up with all the crypto-babble.

2015, Mary Buckham, Invisible Journey Book 4: Alex Noziak, →ISBN:

You survived the cryptobabble section of the book.

2017, Tal Ater, Building Progressive Web Apps: Bringing the Power of Native to the Browser, O’Reilly Media, page 202:

Technical jargon or pseudolanguage that seems incomprehensible.


labelese

A revision of the 1972 Care Labeling Rule, which became effective in January, makes the care information on clothing labels more consistent and succinct. To help you sort through the new labelese, the Federal Trade Commission offers a guide covering the rules and includes a glossary of standard terms manufacturers are encouraged to use.

1984 August, “Things to write for”, in Changing Times: The Kiplinger Magazine, volume 38, number 8, page 74:

Don’t despair, Fellow Computer User, in trying to read the labels - labelese can be fun. Clyde finally figured it out after studying labels for a long time. Labelese is a mixture of ancient Chinese text, mixed with Old Slavonic and interspersed with Old Celtic and written as if mortals could possibly interpret it. Clyde says forget it. Look for the FAT and SODIUM only. Ignore everything else.

2003, Clyde Cartwright, “Sector 002 - Dante’s Inferno”, in Clyde’s Guide to Computerese and Weight Loss, New York, N.Y.: Kroshka Books, →ISBN, pages 5–6:

Sure, the label says in big, bold print: “NO TRANS FATS.” But “zero” trans fats aren’t always zero. It might mean 0.5 milligrams in labelese.

2009, Elizabeth Somer, “Secret 1: Eat Real 75% of the Time”, in Eat Your Way to Happiness, Harlequin, →ISBN, section “The 75% Solution”, page 18:


TERFspeak

Truth be told parroting actual TERFspeak for it's^([sic]) comedy value might have been a bad call.

2018 March 13, venyle (@cold_inthewater), Twitter:

"Trans-identified male" is TERFspeak for trans woman.

2019 December 17, fern +r | Badenlily (@fernseasons), Twitter:

“Respecting other people’s boundaries” is just TERFspeak for “trans women are not welcome to use public spaces”.

2022 March 3, Bette Joy (@SlaggitySlag), Twitter:

The jargon and rhetoric of gender-critical or trans-exclusionary feminists.


pablumese

Mr. Lantos: [...] I don't want to characterize all IG reports as putting us to sleep, but most IG reports are a combination of accountese and pablumese and, in fact, give one the impression that instead of deliberately highlighting problems, many IG reports attempt to camouflage problems, to play down problems.

1990, United States House Committee on Government Operations, Employment and Housing Subcommittee, Abuses, Favoritism, and Mismanagement in HUD Programs: Hearings Before the Employment and Housing Subcommittee of the Committee on Government Operations, House of Representatives, One Hundred First Congress, First Session, page 722:

[…] reports are written in a combination of pablumese and accountese. They rely too heavily on auditor's terms which sometimes have the effect of downplaying the nature and extent of the problem.

1992, United States House Committee on Government Operations, Taking a Byte Out of History: The Archival Preservation of Federal Computer Records : Twenty-fifth Report, page 8:

[Conal Boyce responded:] "Here's one of the problems with ChatGPT and its brethren: Not only does it spew what Victor calls 'pablumese' but for technical questions it then mixes its pablumese with quantitative nonsense, creating a truly creepy kind of output."

2023 March 22, Victor Mair, Language Log:

, Zhengyuan Wang [University of Pennsylvania], Pablumese: Emerging AI Writing as an Alternative Approach to Chinese Poetics

large language models (LLMs)
large language model

(rare) A style of writing characterized by pablum, used for example by commercial large language models (LLMs).


therapy-speak

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-therapy-speak.wav

therapy speak (alternative)
therapyspeak (alternative)

We recommend that authors and reviewers carefully consider whether manuscript quality is enhanced by the use of therapy-speak.

2022 January 15, Amy M Franks, David Caldwell, “Unpacking the Use of Therapy-Speak in Scholarly Writing”, in American Journal of Pharmaceutical Education, volume 87, number 3, published 2023 April 1, →DOI:

Whatever Huberman’s failures of honesty and communication, for instance, he appears extremely well versed in the kind of therapy-speak that’s supposed to tame libidinous excess — suggesting that predators and cads can work through this system as well as any other.

2024 March 27, Ross Douthat, “The Quest for a New Vision of Sexual Morality”, in The New York Times:

The employment of psychologic jargon to converse with other people.


Usenetspeak

>(And "she/he/it" (or "s/he/it") is even worse... That one always comes out
>as "excrement" in Hillbillyspeak...)
And even UsenetSpeak.

1995 May 12, John Novak, “horn of valere -> ter'angreal?”, in rec.arts.sf.written.robert-jordan (Usenet):

Dave's apology IMHO was what make "Chuckletrousers" funny - before the apology, I just read over "Chuckletrousers" and went "Hm, Dave sure has picked up Usenetspeak in a hurry".

1996 October 27, Rose Marie Holt, “I met "The Dave"”, in alt.fan.dave_barry (Usenet):

Whine away in Usenetspeak, you anonymous elitist.

1999 December 18, Henry E. Kilpatrick Jr., “Russian Duma calls on Lewinski to stop bombings.”, in alt.politics.usa.republican (Usenet):

If yer think that's bad you should see some of the Usenetspeak that's used by allegedly trendy Herns on some groups. Prolly and Praps to name butt two. I use a prolly when it's brissing down - which can be quite painfull at my age!

2004 January 17, nemo, “Goon Shows on the Net”, in alt.fan.goons (Usenet):

(uncommon, Internet slang) The special slang used within the Usenet community.


fanilect

Blend of fan + familect coined by linguist Cynthia Gordon.

The internet serves as an accelerant to fanilects. Because song lyrics are readily available online, they have a characteristic linguists call "persistence," meaning anyone can refer to them and reuse them. […] If a familect exists within a family unit, then an online community’s fanilect expands exponentially, like invisible strings across distance and time.

2023 February 3, Pia Ceres, “Quoting Taylor Swift Lyrics Is an Actual Linguistic Thing”, in Wired, San Francisco, C.A.: Condé Nast Publications, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2023-05-19:

Taylor’s use of language is so precise that Swifties speak in their own “fanilect”.

2024 November 22, Matthew Jordon, Victoria Morton, “Move aside Shakespeare. Taylor Swift is the one we should all be studying”, in Toronto Star:

We already gave an example for this, namely, the Korean word oppa (오빠; 'older brother' [used by female speakers]), which underwent semantic shift in the K-pop fanilect (which as mentioned previously found its way into the OED).

2025, Sofia Rüdiger, Alex Baratta, Transnational Korean Englishes, Cambridge University Press:

(linguistics, fandom slang) The lect of a fandom, including in-group slang, phrases, and expressions.


Twitterspeak

A few weeks ago, I wrote a column in which I complained about being forced to write fewer words than usual. As a protest, I then petulantly switched to more concise languages, including teenage Twitterspeak, aboriginal Australian and also, in some places where my column was published, Hebrew.

2013 December 8, Gene Weingarten, “Repenting sins”, in Ray Rivera, editor, The Santa Fe New Mexican, 164th year, number 342, Santa Fe, N.M.: Ginny Sohn, →ISSN, →OCLC, page C-8, column 5:

Not all members are fans of corny terms such as tweeple. Others think that the Twitter-specific language is fun or an easy and obvious way to delineate something as being Twitter-specific. Either way, whether you plan to use Twitterspeak or not, it does help to know what this stuff means. Plenty of eccentric people use Twitter, not to mention loads of subcultures and subcommunities. Just because you see an unfamiliar term doesn’t mean that it’s part of the Twitter vernacular.

2015, Laura Fitton, Anum Hussain, Brittany Leaning, with Michael E. Gruen and Leslie Poston, “Language and abbreviations”, in Twitter For Dummies (For Dummies), 3rd edition, Hoboken, N.J.: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., →ISBN, part III (Twittering in High Gear), chapter 7 (How to Tweet Like Tweeps Do), “Following Twitter Protocol” section, page 109:

Tiring of the debate, Zimmer suggested that seeing as Kalanick wanted the last word, “I’ll let you have it so I can get to work.” He added the phrase “#respect”—which in Twitterspeak meant that Kalanick ought to have shown Zimmer some.

2017, Adam Lashinsky, “Growing Pains”, in Wild Ride: Inside Uber’s Quest for World Domination, New York, N.Y.: Portfolio/Penguin, →ISBN, page 117: