Word Elevation

I used to call jeans dungarees. I even had a pair in 1972 that had the word printed up the sides of the bell bottoms. My mother bought them for me at John Wanamakers---a high end department store in the Cross County shopping center in Yonkers.

Until I was about 30 years old I called pasta macaroni. The only time I use the word macaroni now is when I refer to it with cheese.

Janitors are now called custodians. And one does not study secretarial science anymore-- one studies office technology---the object is to become an office assistant—not a secretary.

Language evolves. Very often it has to do with elevating the meaning of a word. Or, as in the case of custodians, it is done to make a job sound less demeaning—and to dignify the person performing the task.

When “I’ll Have Another” was scratched the other day from the Belmont stakes there was a lot of press—it was all over the television news. And I was half listening when a phrase that I had never heard of before made its way through all the chatter to my ears. The phrase was equine athlete. I heard something about the prognosis of equine athletes with tendonitis. I wondered What’s an equine athlete? So my brain deconstructed the words and thought Seriously? Are they referring to a race horse? Does a horse need their job to sound less demeaning? Does a horse need to dignify its profession? Have we taken word elevation a bit too far?

Will seeing eye dogs demand to be called visual assistants? or will circus elephants refer to themselves as itinerant proboscidean performers?

C’mon people.

This morning on the news there was much ado about a graduation speech given by a high school English teacher in Massachusetts. His message was You are not that special. He wanted to convey to the graduates that success in life is not about job titles or catered events paid for by their Mommies. Success is earned by performance, not adjectives. No one is special or unique or talented until they make it active.

Which is why I am comfortable calling myself a housewife—even though the more elevated term might be household manager (and for an hour a day--amateur writer).