Talk:Jargon/Archive 1

Archive 1

Recent expansion

Spinoza1111 06:21, 16 November 2005 (UTC)Edward G. Nilges expanded the article with a discussion of recent evolution in the use of the word "jargon": hopefully NPOV: please review, correct and comment as you see fit.

Concur, too verbose. Starts off well enough, then gets into guild jargon without a mention of the other possible meanings of jargon.

This page is too verbose

It would help if someone shortened the definition in the intro so that it wasn't so verbose, and then followed up with some specific examples.

There is also a secret society named The Secret Society of Jargon.

I found this page VERY interesting and useful. Thank you to whoever made it. Leave it as it is and shut up

Somebody PLEASE edit this article for brevity and clarity. As a casual reader I found it to be obnoxiously prolix. Seems like it was written by a grad student in lit. analysis for the benefit of peers, and not for "hoi polloi". ;-)

I agree. This article needs headings to define the different areas on the page. It also looks like some of this is out of scope for this article, and could be moved/removed, but I don't have enough time to deal with this now. I've put up the needed tags, and I'll try and get back here later to edit and fix it up myself. --CalPaterson

• It's very difficult writing to read. It's just so *thick*. I've tried to clean it up some and put the more readable and relevant stuff up-front, but I'm afraid that trying to wrap my head around the text screwed me up a bit. It seems to me that there should be definition, popular usage, history, and some domain-specific examples. The examples should be computer jargon and military jargon, and possibly sports jargon, which are the usages which are most common, and most in line with most definitions (and meanings) of the word jargon. And a section of criticism, namely The Jargon of Authenticity. Additionally, I think it may well have actually been some student's essay. Why else would no time have been spent on wikification? Seems like it was just cut and pasted from some essay. --Flata 01:04, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

• Agreed. It lacks the wikipedian style, and is not, as far as I judge it, an encyclopedic article worthy. However, the topic has a good potential, and I suggest a rewrite from scratch -- that's often less work than formatting already written texts. --vidarlo 19:51, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

I'm looking at several summaries for the book mentioned in the introduction...I'd like to find another source, something else we can mention. The Jargon of Authenticity appears to adress in general terms his issues with the jargon of certain German existentialists, and it's thicker and drier than...something thick and dry :) I'm going to head to the library and see what I can dig up Tenebrous 07:39, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

I agree that this needs a great deal of help. However, I'm not so sure that breaking the article down according to specific categories of jargon is necessarily the best idea. There could potentially be thousands of different subcategories of jargon, and would quickly lead to serious article bloat. -- IronSheep 03:41, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

O dear. May I inquire why this article is repeating itself in a seemingly circular pattern when looked from the eye of one not familiar with the subject?!

Wow. A wikipedia page using jargon to explain jargon. See the part on "uses of jargon". Some terms there that I have never seen before. Also, it's never a good sign when I see a big portion of a wikipedia page missing wiki-links. 165.230.132.122 18:45, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

• Concur, too verbose. Starts off well enough, then gets into guild jargon without a mention of the other possible meanings of jargon. I noticed the circular pattern as well, but wasn't sure if it was just my lack of reading comprehension or indeed the author's handling of the subject.

Wikipedia:Jargon?

Is there a Wikipedia guideline about jargon or overly technical language in articles? --zandperl 02:02, 25 April 2006 (UTC)

Yes. Jdkkp (talk) 03:28, 17 December 2007 (UTC)

External Link Suggestion

I have read on the following page Wikipedia:External links#Links normally to be avoided that commercial sites are generally not linked to (but can be proposed on the discussion page). I understand and in most cases would support this because users of Wikipedia do not want to wade through adverts, but rather have access to good definitions and articles. Therefore, I unashamedly propose the following external link http://www.coza-web.co.za/blog003.htm on not only this page, but also the web design page. Yes, it is my commercial website, but the content is relevant and helpful to the user. And ultimately, the user is what Wikipedia is for. --cozaweb

Just adding links adds little value to the encyclopedia, and most of this content already exists. If there are terms that you think should be in the encyclopedia, feel free to add them to Computer jargon or List of computing and IT abbreviations or other related articles. --mtz206 (talk) 15:27, 12 July 2006 (UTC)

Origin of the Word

What is the origin of the word "jargon"? According to the language game page, "Jargon" is a language game in French; it involves replacing vowels with groups of letters ("o" becomes "odogo" and so on). So maybe the general term "jargon" in English derives from the French language game? Hugo Dufort 01:46, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

slang

Jargon isn't much like slang. The latter is informal.

Good point about slang...jargon is an attempt at a step above - its "unintentional intention," (or maybe that should be stated as "subliminal intention") is to support or elevate the speaker and his/her authority even when they may not be saying anything definitive or worthwhile....As a friend put it "jargon gives you a way to say something, without saying anything..."

In this Wiki article, I wonder if the difference between "terminology" and "jargon" could be further defined. Engr105th 05:26, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

+

this is very good page :) Nasz 07:32, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

Lets keep this page as it is-it is well written. If one alredy knows what jargon is, then they get that the article is a joke about jargon. If someone does not know what jargon is, they should not be looking it up in an encyclopedia so much as a dictionary. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.186.178.202 (talk) 01:19, 31 January 2009 (UTC)

Rework

I removed two dead links (one was an article that was deleted), I added a dictionary definition of "Jargon" rather than the un-sourced opening line, and tried to re-organize and NPOV the article.

There is still a lot of original research on this page. I added a reference section and added a dictionary citation. More work needs to be done though- the page reads a little bit like an anti-jargon polemic. *shrug* I will put it on my watch list to see how it proceeds.Alex Jackl 13:58, 5 May 2007 (UTC)

I removed the section on the Jargon of Authenticity. If it belongs anywhere, it belongs in a separate article on Adorno's book. —johndburger 00:02, 12 June 2007 (UTC)

Recent Edits

I reordered the sections a little to have the article flow in a more Wiki-manner. I had the "Uses of Jargon" and what it is before the "Pitfalls". I also renamed the section on pitfalls as such instead of "Social Uses" since Jargon both good and bad is a social use. As always happy to discuss any of these... Alex Jackl 18:04, 5 August 2007 (UTC)

Watch your language

Is there no Language project? I'm shocked... TREKphiler ^{hit me ♠} 05:53, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

Found it... TREKphiler ^{hit me ♠} 05:58, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

Intra-wiki-links

Arguing against changes which eliminate Jargon as an independent article:

• be:Жаргон
• be-x-old:Жаргон
• bg:Жаргон
• da:Jargon
• de:Jargon
• el:Τζάργκον
• es:Jerga
• fi:Jargon
• fr:Jargon
• hr:Žargon

• id:Jargon
• it:Gergo
• ka:ჟარგონი
• lt:Žargonas
• hu:Zsargon
• nl:Jargon
• ja:隠語
• no:Jargon
• pl:Żargon
• pt:Jargão

• ro:Jargon
• ru:Жаргон
• simple:Jargon
• sl:Žargon
• sr:Жаргон
• fi:Jargon
• sv:Jargong
• th:ภาษาเฉพาะอาชีพ
• zh:行話

This article should not be merged or deleted; although elements of the text may be better presented, understood or evaluated in the context of some other related article. The thrust of this article may need to be reconfigured; and I've been persuaded that SCZenz's point-of-view is well-informed ... but that doesn't mean doing away with jargon entirely. --Tenmei (talk) 23:37, 16 October 2008 (UTC)

You aren't proposing any solutions here. You aren't really even explaining why we should keep an article at this title; the fact that the term "jargon" is misused on other pages, and is misused on other Wikipedias and/or means something different in other languages, is not a good guide for what we should do here. -- SCZenz (talk) 07:50, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

Don't Merge

Certainly in computing/programming/hacking circles 'jargon' (aka The Lexicon/The Jargon File) is NOT the same as 'technical terminology' (what you'd get in an A-Z of Computing). Each has it's own vocabulary, usages and community of speakers.

See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jargon_File http://www.catb.org/~esr/jargon/html/index.html (particularly, http://www.catb.org/~esr/jargon/html/distinctions.html) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 62.232.250.50 (talk) 16:40, 21 October 2008 (UTC)

Absolutely. Jargon is a concept that needs its own article. Technical terminology and other specific examples are not identical, interchangeable concepts. This is particularly evident where 'jargon' may be a negative view of overly technical language, a concept clossr to bullshit than to the useful concepts embodied in technical and scientific terminology. ProfDEH (talk) 09:29, 9 June 2009 (UTC)

Neutrality tag

"Jargon" is a term that is often understood to be pejorative. Until jargon is either a balanced article that encompasses this meaning, or redirects to a less non-judgemental term like terminology or technical terminology, I dispute its neutrality. -- SCZenz (talk) 07:50, 17 October 2008 (UTC)

I don't entirely understand SCZenz's point-of-view, but I grasp enough of a point to respect the issue which has been put forward. Obviously, I don't have an appreciation of what kinds of steps will move this thread towards resolution, but I don't accept that it should be cursorily concluded without further development -- ergo my revert of AJackl's removal of that disputed neutrality tag. --Tenmei (talk) 19:43, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

A proper antonym

I was going to suggest that common parlance be inserted as a kind of antonym for jargon, but going to common parlance gives just a redirect to idiom. The issue is when there is a common parlance sense of a term and one or more that fall under jargon.Julzes (talk) 22:47, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

Jargon vs. Yiddish

In late 19th and early 20th century, in some places and languages "jargon" was the only name for Yiddish, and not always used pejoratively. For instance L. L. Zamenhof (initiator of Esperanto, Białystok 1859 - Warsaw 1917) spoke at times of his beloved native "jargon". — Tonymec (talk) 19:56, 13 December 2009 (UTC)

Condillac

I'm not familiar with reporting flaws, but I'd just like to note that Condillac died in 1780. 77.167.20.10 (talk) 22:22, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

Sabotage or neologism?

The article Jargon, when I consulted it, began: "Jargon is terminology which is especially defined in relationship to a specific activity, profession, group, or gitar." I can't find any plausible meaning to "gitar". Could someone please correct it or supply a serious definition with the necessary references? JonRichfield (talk) 13:40, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

I've reverted that edit. There was no explanation for it. - David Biddulph (talk) 14:07, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

Picture

I must be dense, but I don't see what the picture has to with the article. Wschart (talk) 04:41, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

I agree with Wschart, the picture has nothing to do with the article. I'm going to delete it. If it does have something to do with the article then I'm sorry for the deletion but to me, there is no obvious connection. Mobeelex (talk) 20:53, 14 January 2012 (UTC)

Pronunciation

I noticed there is no IPA pronunciation guide to this article, which in my experience is fairly commonly mispronounced. Might it be helpful to add the IPA?

Zach the Wanderer (talk) 14:22, 20 August 2012 (UTC)

This is only one meaning of "jargon"

It also means "obscure or pretentious language," according to Miriam-Webster. Is it possible to find a term for this concept without the pejorative implication? -- SCZenz (talk) 20:50, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

How about technical terminology ... ? It seems to mean the same thing, as far as I can tell. I propose to merge there, for the reason given above. -- SCZenz (talk) 20:51, 22 September 2008 (UTC)

I don't get it. Why do people want to use "a term for this concept without the pejorative implication?" ...which would be the wrong definition of jargon? As I argue below; Words mean something real, and we don't get to decide what that is. CHEESH! Would Wiki next argue that shit don't stink? ...or the stink is really just an odor? really? real? real.....?
Here are 32 slightly different dictionary definitions of jargon. To paraphrase, sometimes it implies "technical terminology," sometimes it implies "bullshit," but most often it means: "technical terminology or bullshit." Why is that concept so difficult?
--71.133.255.249 (talk) 15:02, 28 January 2014 (UTC)Doug Bashford

Merge: "technical terminology" should be merged here.

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

Jargon and technical terminology should be merged.

Redundancy. According to M-W, "jargon is the technical terminology or characteristic idiom of a special activity or group." More: "jargon refers to the special, usually technical idiom of any social, occupational, or professional group." See Garner's Modern American Usage by Bryan A. Garner, pg. 486-88. "Jargon covers a broad span of vocabulary." id. So, there is no support for distinguishing the two; technical terminology *is* in fact the usual form of jargon. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Fluous (talk • contribs) 00:08, 3 April 2013

Support merge. I support the merger. If a difference exists, it would elude 99% of readers. --Smokefoot (talk) 18:04, 7 September 2013 (UTC)

3. Disagree with merge. While yes, jargon can mean the neutral (or even positive) "technical terminology," it also often carries a negative implication of poor communication skills such as or related to grandiloquence or to pseudo-intellectual fustian explanations, or to pretentiousness, or worse. Paraphrased, extracted bits as samples:

jargon: American Heritage Dictionary of the English says: "1) Nonsensical, incoherent, or meaningless talk." 2)...hybrid...or dialect... pidgin. 3) ..specialized or technical language... 4)... pretentious vocabulary, convoluted...vague meaning. Collins English Dictionary says: "1)specialized language.... 2) ...pretentious syntax, vocabulary, or... 3) gibberish 4) ...pidgin
    But worse the original poster mis-represents Merriam-Webster's Online Dictionary which says: 1a : confused unintelligible... b : a strange, outlandish, or barbarous... c : a hybrid...simplified in vocabulary.... 2 : the technical terminology.... 3 : obscure....pretentious....circumlocutions and long words. intransitive verb: 1: twitter, warble.....

--71.133.255.249 (talk) 00:00, 28 January 2014 (UTC)Doug Bashford

• Support merge. While jargon can refer to things other than technical language (e.g. Chinook Jargon), and technical language has somewhat different connotations than jargon, such linguistic niceties are irrelevant to the way Wikipedia is organized. Wikipedia articles treat topics, not the words that name those topics (except in cases, like Thou, where a word is the topic). Cnilep (talk) 04:14, 6 February 2014 (UTC)
• A March 2013 discussion at Talk:Technical terminology#Merge from jargon closed with no consensus to merge. Although two editors supported merging, four opposed it and another commented. Cnilep (talk) 04:40, 6 February 2014 (UTC) in technical words it is a common paraphare of the statement.

• Support merge. Both articles are fairly short, and the two terms mean roughly the same thing. True, there are differences of nuance between them – "technical terminology" having (broadly) positive overtones, and "jargon" having (often) negative overtones – but those distinctions can easily be explained in the body of the article, and the reader is likely to go away better informed. However, personally I'd prefer to see them merged under the more neutral term, Technical terminology, not here. GrindtXX (talk) 11:19, 6 February 2014 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

This article is all unsupported and wrong POV

Please see my (Bashford's) arguments and dictionary definitions paraphrased right above in the Talk, Merge section. The leading sentence of this article gives this POV as fact:
"Jargon is "the technical terminology or characteristic idiom of a special activity occupational or social group."[1]"
Trouble is, that reference; Merriam Webster (or http://www.webcitation.org/6FTtjox9D ) does NOT define it exclusively that way! Furthermore the entire article continues this author's unsupported and incorrect POV. While the term "jargon" does include that definition, (technical terminology,) it includes far more. Here are 32 slightly different dictionary definitions of JARGON. Few of them are what this article says it is (except Wikipedia and Wiktionary). Most dictionaries imply jargon can also be a somewhat derogatory term, often implying unintelligibility, pretentiousness, or other poor communication results. The neutral term: "technical terminology" does not carry that common bias.

Most of my life I've translated technical jargon into plain English, but never before have I seen such good reasons why jargon has a bad name as when I do that on Wikipedia. Most of the time it seems like an innocent expert with a lack of interest in communicating to non-specialists, or with other communication impediments. But too often it seems to be the results of fustian puffery sometimes by what seems to be precocious sixth-graders attempting to impress their peers. ...And related variations. IOW, particularly within the context of Wikipedia it is important that the term "jargon" not be given the bejeweled crown this article is attempting. Words mean something real, and we don't get to decide what that is.

For these reasons, I suggest a major re-write or edit, and removing the Merge tag.
--71.133.255.249 (talk) 01:28, 28 January 2014 (UTC)Doug Bashford

Only a nihilist would agree with the warped POV of This article

Of course, "Everything" is "everything"-- with both meanings.

(I laugh-- because reality does not matter when up against the POV in This article which begins with the dogma that the "meaningless chatter of birds" is a particular example of "using words in a precise sense in a particular subject".)

But according to the Oxford English Dictionary, "Term of art" has no fixed relationship to "Jargon".

Similarly, Language has no fixed relationship to Nonsense-- even though someone not understanding "Language" may think this sentence is "Nonsense".

Accordingly, I suggest that "Term of art" should have its own page-- with perhaps a link to "Jargon" for the cases that the 1) "Hearer" is "Ignorant" or the 2) Speaker is using a Secret code. --Rednblu (talk) 10:57, 8 December 2015 (UTC)

George Orwell is Marxist?

Is George Orwell actually Marxist (in the book at least) or is that vandalism? I have a feeling that the man who wrote Animal Farm and 1984 was distinctly against Communism. Please correct me if I'm wrong, and the article if I'm right. --XndrK (talk | contribs) 18:18, 5 March 2014 (UTC)

If memory serves, Orwell was a democratic socialist and anti-communist (they're not the same thing). Marxism includes various types of communism, but also democratic socialism. (Additionally, people may subscribe to Marxist economic or sociological theories without advocating communist or socialist political positions.) The cited source identifies Orwell as "a socialist, a leftist, a Marxist, who sought to encourage social progress". I don't see anything particularly WP:FRINGE about that description of him. Cnilep (talk) 07:04, 24 March 2014 (UTC)

Definition is jargon

"Jargon, technical terminology, or term of art,[1] is "the technical terminology or characteristic idiom of a special activity or group".[2] An industry term is a type of technical terminology that has a particular meaning within a specific industry."

This definition is itself jargon. I can't tell if it was meant on purpose to be funny or if it's another sign of JARGON GONE WILD! Rissa, Guild of Copy Editors (talk) 01:45, 9 March 2015 (UTC)

Well, one can tell that it wasn't meant to be funny because it was a quote from a dictionary definition. However, your point was a good one—a Wikipedia lede should open with much better readability and, frankly, better word choice, avoidance of circumlocution, and better ontology all around. Which is to say, if truth be told, Wikipedia must end up being better than most other reference works as they have existed so far, and may raise the bar for them in coming decades, if it succeeds. Quercus solaris (talk) 17:14, 9 March 2015 (UTC)

I am not sure if I agree with the definition of jargon because it can be used by a specific group of people in a profession or vernacular. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 147.9.76.86 (talk) 13:27, 5 February 2019 (UTC)

Modern vs. postmodern opinions on the use of jargon

I deleted this section. It is a jumbled summary of an equally jumbled self-published screed by an MD pathologist in Kansas City (not that there's anything wrong with that), who delivers himself of opinions on Marxism, Freudianism, the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, and postmodernism, among other things. In my opinion he gets all of this really wrong, but for the present purposes it's enough to say that Wikipedia has no business presenting this as settled fact -- or even as anything more than the opinion of one nonspecialist blogger. (See http://www.pathguy.com/index1.htm) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ecwaine (talk • contribs) 01:30, 10 April 2015 (UTC)

Terms of art

This concept should probably be covered in at least a short section of its own. It's not really synonymous with "jargon", but a particular subset. The lead acknowledges this, but the article doesn't elaborate any further.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ<  23:11, 5 October 2017 (UTC)

More specifically, a term of art is a term (word or phrase) with a specialized doctrinal meaning within a particular field of expertise, which may conflict with usage outside of it, or simply be unique to the field. Jargon generally begins as terms of art, and then spreads to neighboring fields then sometimes into general usage (while still remaining jargony). E.g., most adult native speakers of English probably know that myocardial infarction is a jargony way of saying "heart attack", and also know what bandwidth means (at least in a vague sense) with regard to their Internet connection, because Internet service providers have made the term familiar. But many things remain terms of art, and are apt to be not understood at all, e.g. yod coalescence (a linguistics term of art that is completely meaningless to non-linguists) – or which may be outright misinterpreted by people outside the specialty to which the term pertains, e.g. the legal term of art real property (which has nothing to do with extant versus hypothetical belongings).

Perhaps the best example is that theory still remains a term of art in science, and has a very different and more specific meaning (roughly, "a repeatedly confirmed and coherent explanation of a phenomenon, with broad scientific consensus") in science, versus what this word conveys in everyday usage (which is roughly "anyone's suggested explanation or guess"); thus the "evolution is just a theory" line of thinking that has a strong effect on the public policy debate around teaching creationism in schools.

While it takes some work to tease apart terms of art as a distinct subset of jargon, it's worth doing just for clarity and completeness, and also because having it in the lead without explanation strongly implies to readers unfamiliar with the phrase term of art that we mean "terms having to do with the fine arts". Oh, and term of art doesn't have the sometimes-negative connotation of jargon.
 — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ >^ʌⱷ҅_ᴥⱷ^ʌ<  00:11, 6 October 2017 (UTC)

I never heard of it. But I've used your "theory" explanation many times...and oddly,(?) never considered it jargon. Are you sure of your definition? Your two conditions: "be unique," and "may conflict" seem to be unrelated to each other. Perhaps you should write that section. Are you talking about what I am when I say below: "But the danger is in (say;) sound-alike or crypto jargon that makes sense, but means something very differently. For example...?" I'm particularly concerned with that type because it seems more costly/dangerous than others, such as it "has a strong effect on the public policy," —in part because it's more prone to misunderstanding —because it's invisible to the victim. (I think I tried to explain that in Wiki guidelines Talk Jargon once.)
--2602:306:CFCE:1EE0:48B1:FABE:6C83:FC2F (talk) 05:02, 10 December 2017 (UTC)Doug Bashford

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