The Guardian - Mind your language

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This page is a collection of articles about the English language, discussing very different things. The page contains articles discussing serious matters such as the empowerment of women and gay marriage, but also (slightly) less important topics such as "where to stick your apostrophe". Overall, the writers on The Guardian are discussing the uses and abuses of language.


Type "Illegal" into Google, Chances are it will Autocomplete to "immigration"


The article is focussing on colloquial language, the fact that "certain words just go. They tessellate. They interdigitate. Like harmonic notes and complementary colours and best friends at school, certain words sit nicely together" - but particularly the associations formed between "migrant", "immigrant" and "illegal".  When a child was playing a word association game, they happened to be given the word "illegal", to which they quickly responded with "immigrant". The power of colloquial words is evident in the fact that after being autocomplete, and read on social media so may times it seems that even in our brains we autocomplete "immigrant" and "illegal", permanently taking the innocence.


Gay or straight, let's embrace the language of marriage equality


"Gay marriage" is discussed in this article as a term that is quite peculiar. Much like the opening sentence - "Today I got out of my gay bed, kissed my gay boyfriend goodbye, went to the gym with my gay neighbour and then cycled my gay bike to my gay job", it seems ridiculous that this is how same-sex relationships are discussed. It seems that the fact that marriage is a religious ceremony (which is becoming less common in the 21st century), this type of marriage must be labelled as being almost 'unnatural' and 'wrong' compared to what a lot of people see as 'normal' marriage. The article suggests that this term could be changed to "same-sex marriage" as it seems less loaded than "gay". Although I do agree that the term itself seems superfluous, I can't see why "gay marriage" has to be labelled - it's just the marriage of two people after all.