ABSTRACT
This chapter deals with jargon in its various forms, cliches, colloquialisms, coinages, wordiness, equivocation, foreign words and phrases, confusable words, and commonly misspelt words—essential aspects oflanguage use within the business context. When visitors looking for the monkeys at a zoo are confronted with a sign which says ‘To the Arboreal Primates’, the authors see jargon at work. Jargon, a type of specialised vocabulary used in various fields and professions, is a constant target of criticism from readers of business documents, who complain that documents like letters and insurance policies are difficult to understand because they are full of jargon. It is unfortunate that jargon has accumulated these negative connotations, because eliminating jargon completely would deprive business writers of valuable shortcuts. Gobbledygook and sometimes spelt in Australia as ‘gobbledegook’, is used to describe pompous and unintelligible language.
