This article was originally published in December 2022.
Moist. Thrust. Ooze. Pus. If these words made you want to disappear into a hole, then this story is probably not for you. Caroline Williams investigates why some words make us feel uncomfortable.
A Stuff visual journalist is late to work because of car troubles, amongst other things. He’s had a hellish morning.
“And then I saw the ‘M’ word,” he said, which had apparently ruined his day.
He’s referring to an innocent story I’d written about the weather that morning, following a few unusually humid nights in Auckland.
“Why Auckland is so hot and moist at the moment” was the headline.
I was not trying to be crass or ruin anyone’s day. “Moist” was among the words used by a meteorologist who kindly explained that Auckland was being hit by hot, moist air blowing down from the subtropics.
Plus, my headline was not nearly as uncomfortable-sounding as a weather story earlier in December, which predicted “fingers of tropical moisture” for New Zealand.
Who ever uttered those words made a choice, and their choice was controversial.
University of Auckland linguistics lecturer Dr Keith Montgomery said displeasure with words often comes down to what we associate it with.
It only takes one person to connect the word with something taboo for the word to be ruined in our minds.
“[The words] invariably start off quite innocent, then people make these associations and people catch on.”
An example of this was the word “tart”, the delicious pastry treat. Once an endearing nickname for a man’s girlfriend, the word became inappropriate when used to describe a mistress or sex worker.
Supplied
How else will we describe a perfect cake if our hatred of the word “moist” leads to its demise?
“You would never dare call a woman a tart now, yet we still use the word when talking about jam tarts and it’s perfectly innocent,” Montgomery said.
And then there are words that make us cringe and scoff due to a combination of their sound and connotation.
Ooze and pus came to mind for Montgomery. The idea of bodily secretions and the onomatopoeic nature of the words would be unpleasant to most.
The same concept applies with the word moist. It’s association with fluids need not be discussed here.
The sound of the word might be enough to trigger someone with its sibilant (hissing) sound being reminiscent of the sounds liquid or water make.
It was hard to pinpoint the most hated words as it can be “so highly personal”, Montgomery said.
On the flip side, words can also come across as satisfying.
I tell Montgomery I rather enjoy the word ‘rotund’. It makes me think of birds, especially my favourite New Zealand native, the famously chonky kererū.
CHRISTEL YARDLEY/STUFF
There’s nothing weird about the word sausage, unless you make it weird.
“That’s an interesting word, not a word I would have thought of,” Montgomery said.
“For you, it’s a happy kind of word that is triggered with your associations to a bird”.
While the job of a linguist is to be objective towards words, Montgomery understood the gripe with the word moist.
“I will laugh along when people say ‘you can’t say that’.
“A moist cake is now starting to sound not that great”.
I mentioned how the word moist almost didn’t make it into my headline, with some in the newsroom preferring the word “humid”.
Montgomery said this was language change in process. When alternative words become the norm, the original word becomes rare.
“It’s the beginning of the end of [the word moist], by the sound of it.”
He didn’t think the word moist would disappear entirely in our lifetime, but expected its use would become increasingly limited.
“Once you get to that kind of level where people hate the word, the word will either be very scarcely used, or with some words, fall into complete disuse.”
I will keep that in mind for my next weather story, as no-one wants to eat a damp cake.