When it comes to language, beware of “language groupthink”.

Wikipedia says that the term “groupthink” was coined in 1952 by William H. Whyte in the magazine Fortune and that it is “a type of thought exhibited by group members who try to minimize conflict and reach consensus without critically testing, analyzing, and evaluating ideas”.

Perhaps I am using the word “groupthink” differently than what Mr. Whyte intended, but I also see groupthink as applicable to the language that a group of people uses.

“Language groupthink” would be my term for this phenomenon.

For example, when I encounter a new acronym and ask people in the group that coined the acronym about that acronym, I often will get the general meaning of the acronym but often will not get the words behind the letters in the acronym.

In other words, a language groupthink overtakes the members of the group to the extent that nobody or almost nobody questions the origins of the group’s acronyms!

Another example relates to a misused word. It is extremely common in the telecommunications industry to use the noun “premise” to refer to a customer’s physical location.

As I wrote fifteen months ago, the correct noun for referring to a location is “premises”, not “premise”.

In other words, a language groupthink apparently overtook the telecommunications industry years ago to the point that many in the industry today continue to use “premise” when they mean “premises”.

You may have encountered other examples of language groupthink. If you have an example that might be of interest to fellow readers of this blog, then please send it to me and let me know whether you want me to give you attribution for the example.

Happy Language Non-Groupthinking!