{"id":70405,"date":"2013-08-22T14:45:34","date_gmt":"2013-08-22T13:45:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.strattoncraig.com\/insight\/the-copywriter-august\/"},"modified":"2013-08-22T14:45:34","modified_gmt":"2013-08-22T13:45:34","slug":"the-copywriter-august","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.strattoncraig.com\/us\/insight\/the-copywriter-august\/","title":{"rendered":"Looking back on a summer of synonyms, swearing and silence"},"content":{"rendered":"

There\u2019s been an unusually high number of stories this summer that revolve around words, or a lack of them in some cases. The team here at Stratton Craig has taken a quick look over some of the hottest word-related topics that matched the soaring temperatures in July and August.
\nA subtle shift in language sets a new agenda in Afghanistan<\/strong>
\nIt\u2019s been noticed by one of our team that the language used to announce deaths in the ongoing Afghanistan conflicts<\/a> has changed. For example, attackers are no longer referred to as \u2018insurgents\u2019 – they are now \u2018enemies of Afghanistan\u2019. The change represents a renewed focus on the Afghan people, and highlights their efforts to restore their country to a state of order. The wording – \u2018family\u2019 are informed, rather than \u2018next of kin\u2019 – is also an improvement in our opinion \u2013 it\u2019s more human, and sensitive to the fact that real people and lives are affected.
\nThe key to this adjustment is that it doesn\u2019t make light of the deaths. The tone has more empathy and feels less distant from the events. Simple changes to a tone of voice<\/a> can make a big difference, as they do here.
\nThe Royal Baby name keeps with years of tradition<\/strong>
\nPrince William and Princess Catherine played it safe with baby George Alexander Louis, using two traditionally \u2018royal\u2019 forenames that were favourites with bookmakers. As expected, they stuck to the \u2018acceptable royal baby names\u2019 list (that we\u2019re sure exists in PDF format somewhere), and the new addition to the family may become the seventh King George.
\nWith Harry emerging as the most popular name for baby boys in England and Wales yet again, the enduring appeal of a \u2018royal\u2019 name is clear.
\nGermany creates a storm in a teetasse with one new word<\/strong>
\nThose of us with a more, ahem, delicate vocabulary were stunned to find that a British swearword has recently entered the German dictionary. \u2018S**tstorm\u2019 is now a part of the country\u2019s vocabulary, having come to mean \u2018a public outcry, especially one that takes place online\u2019.
\nWe borrow from many other languages without translation<\/a>: entrepreneur is French, dungaree originates from Hindi and slalom is originally Norwegian. It\u2019s also not unusual to find that the meaning of a word changes over time – \u2018wicked\u2019 is now more good than bad, for example. The big shock here is the swearword, and the cultural difference that\u2019s made it an acceptable term in Germany.
\nTwitter users fight a war of words – by saying nothing at all<\/strong>
\nAt the start of August, thousands of people took part in a self-imposed silence on Twitter, in protest against threats and insults sent to feminist campaigner Caroline Criado-Perez. Interestingly, she chose not to join in with the #TwitterSilence, refusing to give up her voice to fight her critics. A separate group also decided against staying quiet and used their own hashtag to get involved, tacking #shoutback onto the end of their tweets.
\nBoth tactics worked as ways of raising awareness around the issue, but the increased buzz also saw more women receive similar threatening messages in the days following. The power of Twitter as a digital communications<\/a> tool has been clear for a long time, and while we really feel that Twitter does a whole lot of good for brands and communication this demonstrates the ability of social media to harm as well as help.
\nWe’d love you to share\u00a0your memorable\u00a0wordy moments\u00a0with us. Contact us\u00a0by email (copy@strattoncraig.co.uk<\/a>) or tweeting us (@strattoncraig<\/a>).
\nThank you for reading!<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There\u2019s been an unusually high number of stories this summer that revolve around words, or a lack of them in some cases. The team here at Stratton Craig has taken a quick look over some of the hottest word-related topics that matched the soaring temperatures in July and August. A subtle shift in language sets […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[453],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-70405","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-archived-content-us"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nLooking back on a summer of synonyms, swearing and silence - Stratton Craig - Global Copywriting & Content Marketing Agency<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.strattoncraig.com\/us\/insight\/the-copywriter-august\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Looking back on a summer of synonyms, swearing and silence - Stratton Craig - Global Copywriting & Content Marketing Agency\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"There\u2019s been an unusually high number of stories this summer that revolve around words, or a lack of them in some cases. 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