Doublespeak: From “Revenue Enhancement” to “Terminal Living

Doublespeak: From “Revenue Enhancement” to “Terminal Living. How Government, Business, Advertisers, and Others Use Language to Deceive You by William Lutz

Overview: Doublespeak is the language of non-responsibility, carefully constructed to appear to communicate when it fact it doesn’t. In this lively and eye-opening expose, originally published in 1989, linguist William Lutz identifies the four most common types of doublespeak—euphemism, jargon, gobbledygook or “bureaucratese,” and inflated language—showing how each is used in business, advertising, medicine, government, and the military. In this seminal book, Lutz articulates that the goal of doublespeak is “to distort reality and corrupt thought.”