Chrysti the Wordsmith > Radio Scripts

The technical language of a profession, hobby, or sport is called jargon. Jargon or "shop talk" is necessary for the economical communication amongst peers. When jargon gets our of control, however, it can degenerate into polysyllabic gobbledygook.

Gobbledygook is a generic term encompassing language of bureaucratese, officialese, legalese or military parlance.

Coinage of this term is attributed to Texas Democratic representative Maury Maverick in 1944. As chairman of the Smaller War Parts Corporation during WWII, Maverick was obliged to attend bureaucratic meetings at which he endured such vague phrases as "alternative but nevertheless meaningful minimae."

On March 30, 1944, the plain-talking Maverick issued a formal order banning so-called "gobbledygook language." "Be short," he demanded, "and say what you're talking about...Anyone using the words 'activation' or 'implementation' will be shot."

When interviewed by the New York Times Magazine, Maverick explained, "People ask me where I got 'gobbledygook'...Perhaps I was thinking of the old bearded turkey gobbler back in Texas who was always gobbledy-gobbling and strutting with ludicrous pomposity."

Representative Maverick's eccentric coinage appears to have staying power; after 50 years it's still a colorful, serviceable American slang term.

Radio Script > Gobbledygook