A Glossary for the Nineties: Chapter 12 - Trends and fads
[Taken from A Glossary for the Nineties, by David Rowan (Prion Books, 1998), based on the column of that name in The Guardian's Weekend magazine through most of the 1990s. © David Rowan]
CHAPTER 12: TRENDS AND FADS
What the fashionable nineties person is talking about
ALCOPOP n. The controversial drink to be seen with, this is lemonade with more than the usual fizz: 4.7 per cent alcohol, to be precise. It's the booze industry's latest wheeze, with about 20 potent brands of not-so-soft drinks on the shelves. All targeted at adults, of course: no pocket money if you suggest otherwise.
ALLIGATOR ALLEY adj. A new colour for the nineties, as invented by an outfit called the Color Marketing Group of America. They predict the fashionable hues of the season to come, and decided that this one (big in 1997) "reflects the core of society as an urban combat colour". Blackish-green, if you wanted to know.
'ROUND MIDNIGHT adj. Another of the Color Marketing Group's new predictions - and one which marks the continuingtrend towards "multiculturalism and ethnic diversity". We used to call it black. Do people pay for this sort of information?
AROMACOLOGY n. A new so-called science that claims to use odours to benefit your health. A scented patch worn on your arm, for instance, is claimed to put you off chocolate and so help your diet; but some scientists are not convinced that aromacology works, and, er, smell a rat.
BABYMOON n. The period that comes after a baby's birth when its parents enjoy a few days of pleasure and relaxation before the broader realities of child-rearing hit home (ie nappies, sleepless nights, adolescence etc). As described by editor Ian Hargreaves, who sent a postcard from his babymoon to the staff at New Statesman.
BLEEPER BONDAGE n. That mid-nineties burden of travelling salespeople, freelance journalists and besuited executives. Sleeping? Enjoying a quiet meal? Watching Schindler's List? Bleep . . . bleep . . . bleep . . . Time to call in, you technology slave.
BOBBITTECTOMY n. Yet another new word to have resulted from John Wayne B's famous penile accident at the hands of his wife. The Journal of American Speech has also spotted Bobbittize, do a Mrs Bobbitt, and Bobbitt syndrome: a feared rash of Bobbittectomies.
CALIFORNICATION n. The fashion among well-off urban types to find some unspoilt rural location and bring to it all their sinful city values. The word is current among Montana cattle ranchers to describe the interfering West-coast types "coming in and telling us what to do". The evils they bring include environmentalism, land protection, animal-rights activism and Jane Fonda.
CITOLOGY n. The systematic study of academic footnotes and references, a key pastime for scholars keen to show that their works have been cited in as many other papers as possible. For that makes them look almost indispensable . . .
CLICK v. To be as one with the trends of the times. A current Madison Avenue buzzword popularised by trend-analyst Faith Popcorn. But she ruins it by turning it into a pap acronym: c for courage, l for letting go, i for insight, c for commitment, k for knowledge. How very quaint.
CREMAINS n. What remains after a body has been cremated, in the term now used by the funeral industry. It has taken on a new significance because of the fashion for disposing of one's ashes in creative ways: one company will turn you into cremation jewellery, another will send you up into space. And a Marvel comic editor who died in 1996 left instructions for his cremains to be mixed with ink and used to print his final work . . .
CRUNCHY adj. Natural and environmentally aware: an adjective for the organic age. People, just like breakfast cereals, can be crunchy ; you might also hear them described as granolas. Best probably not to comment that their cagoule could do with a dry-clean.
DAVID MELLOR n. Fr. A French term, reported to be in common use among trendy Parisians in late 1992. And what does un David Mellor actually mean? "A bad haircut,'' informs our branche man on the street.
DEFINING MOMENT, THE phr. A phrase on commentators' lips throughout the mid-nineties, whether discussing Bosnian pull-backs, Northern Irish peace talks, or
extra-time goals. The cliche of the nineties. Possibly even the defining cliche.
DUMB DOWN v. To go downmarket, esp. a newspaper or broadcasting organisation , in a bid for more readers or viewers. The New York Times, which has just increased its type size, is the latest publication to be accused of dumbing down. But in these PC times, shouldn't we hold a seminar to debate that word "dumbing"?
EARLY BIRD n. The colour yellow, if you are a paint manufacturer. Yellow is also, depending on your exact shade, called first light', razzle dazzle, early bird, sonnet and solstice. Who said the manufacturing industries couldn't be creative?
EDGE-CITY n. That ill-defined urban are (between suburbs, town centres and green belt) inhabited by shopping centres, retail warehouses and executive housing. An idea from the US which has now firmly settled in here.
EDIBLE LANDSCAPING n. The use of edible plants in your back graden - the fashionable way to garden for today's self-sufficient crunchy types (qv).
EQ n. The emotional quotient we are all now to be measured by, alongside the more conventional intelligence quotient. Blame Daniel Goleman's book Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ, which argues that success does not require a high IQ. The solution: learn the cultural habits of those who are winning in life, and do as they do.
FEEL-GOODISM n. The trend, particularly in publishing, to promise solutions to every known ailment and anxiety that consumers could possibly have. That way, the cure to everything from millennial fears to social phobias turns out to be a £10.99 purchase of your latest feel-good tome.
FEEWAY n. A new type of freeway where you must pay to drive. Invented in Los Angeles, where for $2.95 a day drivers can save 20 minutes by driving along a special 10-mile road. A concept popularly known among Angelenos as "polite highway robbery''.
GRANNY FARM v., n. To send elderly people in large numbers to a place where they can be safely ignored. The most controversial recent case of granny farming involved a shipment to the Costa Blanca. Don't expect a postcard.
GRUNGE adj. No, not the musical meaning. This one is a "trend-defining" colour - a grey-green that "reflects the youthful rebellion against establishment brights". Yes, it's more guff from that Color Marketing Group again. OK, OK, that's the last time we mention them.
HEGEMONY n. The current vogue-word, which has even overtaken paradigm, to throw into any scholarly analysis of modern pop culture. The academics' obsession with the word was noted in a recent conference of the Popular Culture Assocation, and its dominance was declared nothing short of hegemonic.
HEROIN CHIC n. The designer look of the mid-nineties: it involves gaunt, skinny and sullen models pretending to have just injected themselves with opiates. Or not pretending, as the case may be.
-ISM suffix. That linguistic suffix that seems to have peaked as a phenomenon in the nineties. Everyone, it seems, gets one - from Blair- to Major- toBenn-. The people at Collins Dictionaries have now identified well over 1,000 -isms, including those more recent coinages so-what-ism (1994), techno-fetishism (1993), and non-ism (1990 - that one's the extreme form of self denial when you do without meat, caffeine, alcohol, drugs and sex). The Independent for one has had enough: it has demanded an -ism schism. (See alsowasm.)
KENTUCKY-FRIED GEORGIAN adj. Stone-clad, satellite dish-covered, mock-Georgian fronted and UPVC-window-framed: it is the conservationist's nightmare home. Michael Howard, when Home Secretary, promised to resist the nasty "KFG" look. Maybe that's why his party lost the election . . .
LIGGERATI n. pl. That group of socialite hangers-on who tend to be omnipresent at all those showbiz parties that end up in gossip columns and magazine picture spreads. A ligger, in the music business, is a freeloader who seeks to gain free entry to concerts and parties; this bunch extend the habit to premieres, book launches and anywhere else there's a free glass of 'poo. Lately, journoliggers too have been spotted, according to the Daily Telegraph.
LOOKISM n. The practice of judging people by their looks, which followed racism, sexism and ageism to become a nineties form of unwelcome discrimination. In California, Santa Cruz city council even sought to outlaw lookism in 1993, on the grounds that some folks should not fare worse than others merely because they were "cosmetically challenged".
MANIMAL n. Tabloid-speak for the humanised animal that some scientists predict will soon result from cloning experiments between animals and human genes.
NANNY-CAM n. A tiny video camera, typically concealed inside the head of a child's cuddly teddy bear, from where it spies on the nanny, au pair or childminder. If you keep finding Winnie The Pooh in the toilet bowl, the nanny has probably twigged.
NEW BLACK n. The fashionable colour of the clothing season - defined as whatever fashion hacks are calling "the new black" (as in "brown is the new black . .."). Generally any colour so long as it's not black - although we're getting reports that black is soon to be the new black . . .
OLDMOBILE n. No, not an Oldsmobile - this one is a rather different type of car, being talked about by entrepreneurs keen to profit from our increasing longevity. The new vehicles now being designed for elderly people will have easy-to-hold steering wheels and built-in eye tests, and will use radar to guide cars into parking places.
OVERCLASS n. That ultra-privileged sector of society which, from its protected suburban ghettoes, blames the underclass for all its problems. Very big among right-wingers such as the American Nicholas Lemann, who calls them the "credentialed elite".
PARACHUTE KID n. A teenager from a wealthy family, often in the Far East, who is sent abroad for a cushier and less pressured education. A South Korean, for instance, might go to the US, or a Taiwanese to London, where they may try to settle and avoid military service and other disadvantages of their home country. Why the name? Because their high-achieving mums and dads who put them up to it are known as astronaut parents.
PENTURBIA n. The reborn version of suburbia, where people attempt to rebuild a sense of community in a rural setting far away from urban alienation. Described by Jack Lessinger, a Seattle demographer who coined the term, as an enclave too far away from a city to be sucked into the suburban sprawl.
POLENTA-BELT n. Those aspiring circles (postcodes generally N1 or W11) determinedly ahead of culinary trends. Unwise to bring Le Piat D'Or to a dinner party here.
POST-BACKLASH n, adj. That current stage of the feminism debate exemplified by once-again-proud exponents such as Naomi Wolf and Katie Roiphe. According to those who know, the post-backlash era replaces that of victim feminism. And just as you were coming to terms with the pre-post-backlash . . .
REDUX n. Funny how a forgotten word can become all the rage: recently the Guardian has talked of John Major's "Macmillan Redux" and of "Jimmy Carter Redux", and the New Yorker of "Opium War Redux". First used in 1662, and meaning restored to an earlier healthy state, redux has lately experienced its own redux.
RETROISM n. The tendency, in fashion and music, towards what was hip some time ago. The term has led to retro-chic , or retro-hip, that trendy pursuit of all things nostalgic: it's why flares and Parkas come and go in and out of fashion, and why whatever you're wearing today, however unkempt, will someday be the sharpest style statement imaginable. Although not, possibly, with that brown stain you've left down the front . . .
SUBSTAIN v. To move back to the land, towards more locally-governed, self-sufficient units of society. A small-is-beautiful version of sustainability, which our road-protest friend Swampy explains will lead to a land "where rustic communities look after themselves, governing themselves, growing their own food".
TIME DEBT n. The new burden on well-to-do careerist parents: they may have the cash to finance the lifestyle, but are increasingly cutting out quality time with the kids. This debt is the one that hurts.
TORONTO BLESSING n. Among evangelical Christians, this is the fashionable mass prayer experience that, as a frantic dance-step, is to the 1990s what the Birdie Song was to the 1980s. Like the latter it can make you ill - but is it all just mass hysterics, as the Dean of Worcester claims?
WASM n. An -ism that no longer is. It's the term coined by the Economist for all those dead ideologies - from communism to Gaullism and socialism - that we've had to learn to abandon in the nineties.
CHAPTER 12: TRENDS AND FADS
What the fashionable nineties person is talking about
ALCOPOP n. The controversial drink to be seen with, this is lemonade with more than the usual fizz: 4.7 per cent alcohol, to be precise. It's the booze industry's latest wheeze, with about 20 potent brands of not-so-soft drinks on the shelves. All targeted at adults, of course: no pocket money if you suggest otherwise.
ALLIGATOR ALLEY adj. A new colour for the nineties, as invented by an outfit called the Color Marketing Group of America. They predict the fashionable hues of the season to come, and decided that this one (big in 1997) "reflects the core of society as an urban combat colour". Blackish-green, if you wanted to know.
'ROUND MIDNIGHT adj. Another of the Color Marketing Group's new predictions - and one which marks the continuingtrend towards "multiculturalism and ethnic diversity". We used to call it black. Do people pay for this sort of information?
AROMACOLOGY n. A new so-called science that claims to use odours to benefit your health. A scented patch worn on your arm, for instance, is claimed to put you off chocolate and so help your diet; but some scientists are not convinced that aromacology works, and, er, smell a rat.
BABYMOON n. The period that comes after a baby's birth when its parents enjoy a few days of pleasure and relaxation before the broader realities of child-rearing hit home (ie nappies, sleepless nights, adolescence etc). As described by editor Ian Hargreaves, who sent a postcard from his babymoon to the staff at New Statesman.
BLEEPER BONDAGE n. That mid-nineties burden of travelling salespeople, freelance journalists and besuited executives. Sleeping? Enjoying a quiet meal? Watching Schindler's List? Bleep . . . bleep . . . bleep . . . Time to call in, you technology slave.
BOBBITTECTOMY n. Yet another new word to have resulted from John Wayne B's famous penile accident at the hands of his wife. The Journal of American Speech has also spotted Bobbittize, do a Mrs Bobbitt, and Bobbitt syndrome: a feared rash of Bobbittectomies.
CALIFORNICATION n. The fashion among well-off urban types to find some unspoilt rural location and bring to it all their sinful city values. The word is current among Montana cattle ranchers to describe the interfering West-coast types "coming in and telling us what to do". The evils they bring include environmentalism, land protection, animal-rights activism and Jane Fonda.
CITOLOGY n. The systematic study of academic footnotes and references, a key pastime for scholars keen to show that their works have been cited in as many other papers as possible. For that makes them look almost indispensable . . .
CLICK v. To be as one with the trends of the times. A current Madison Avenue buzzword popularised by trend-analyst Faith Popcorn. But she ruins it by turning it into a pap acronym: c for courage, l for letting go, i for insight, c for commitment, k for knowledge. How very quaint.
CREMAINS n. What remains after a body has been cremated, in the term now used by the funeral industry. It has taken on a new significance because of the fashion for disposing of one's ashes in creative ways: one company will turn you into cremation jewellery, another will send you up into space. And a Marvel comic editor who died in 1996 left instructions for his cremains to be mixed with ink and used to print his final work . . .
CRUNCHY adj. Natural and environmentally aware: an adjective for the organic age. People, just like breakfast cereals, can be crunchy ; you might also hear them described as granolas. Best probably not to comment that their cagoule could do with a dry-clean.
DAVID MELLOR n. Fr. A French term, reported to be in common use among trendy Parisians in late 1992. And what does un David Mellor actually mean? "A bad haircut,'' informs our branche man on the street.
DEFINING MOMENT, THE phr. A phrase on commentators' lips throughout the mid-nineties, whether discussing Bosnian pull-backs, Northern Irish peace talks, or
extra-time goals. The cliche of the nineties. Possibly even the defining cliche.
DUMB DOWN v. To go downmarket, esp. a newspaper or broadcasting organisation , in a bid for more readers or viewers. The New York Times, which has just increased its type size, is the latest publication to be accused of dumbing down. But in these PC times, shouldn't we hold a seminar to debate that word "dumbing"?
EARLY BIRD n. The colour yellow, if you are a paint manufacturer. Yellow is also, depending on your exact shade, called first light', razzle dazzle, early bird, sonnet and solstice. Who said the manufacturing industries couldn't be creative?
EDGE-CITY n. That ill-defined urban are (between suburbs, town centres and green belt) inhabited by shopping centres, retail warehouses and executive housing. An idea from the US which has now firmly settled in here.
EDIBLE LANDSCAPING n. The use of edible plants in your back graden - the fashionable way to garden for today's self-sufficient crunchy types (qv).
EQ n. The emotional quotient we are all now to be measured by, alongside the more conventional intelligence quotient. Blame Daniel Goleman's book Emotional Intelligence: Why It Can Matter More Than IQ, which argues that success does not require a high IQ. The solution: learn the cultural habits of those who are winning in life, and do as they do.
FEEL-GOODISM n. The trend, particularly in publishing, to promise solutions to every known ailment and anxiety that consumers could possibly have. That way, the cure to everything from millennial fears to social phobias turns out to be a £10.99 purchase of your latest feel-good tome.
FEEWAY n. A new type of freeway where you must pay to drive. Invented in Los Angeles, where for $2.95 a day drivers can save 20 minutes by driving along a special 10-mile road. A concept popularly known among Angelenos as "polite highway robbery''.
GRANNY FARM v., n. To send elderly people in large numbers to a place where they can be safely ignored. The most controversial recent case of granny farming involved a shipment to the Costa Blanca. Don't expect a postcard.
GRUNGE adj. No, not the musical meaning. This one is a "trend-defining" colour - a grey-green that "reflects the youthful rebellion against establishment brights". Yes, it's more guff from that Color Marketing Group again. OK, OK, that's the last time we mention them.
HEGEMONY n. The current vogue-word, which has even overtaken paradigm, to throw into any scholarly analysis of modern pop culture. The academics' obsession with the word was noted in a recent conference of the Popular Culture Assocation, and its dominance was declared nothing short of hegemonic.
HEROIN CHIC n. The designer look of the mid-nineties: it involves gaunt, skinny and sullen models pretending to have just injected themselves with opiates. Or not pretending, as the case may be.
-ISM suffix. That linguistic suffix that seems to have peaked as a phenomenon in the nineties. Everyone, it seems, gets one - from Blair- to Major- toBenn-. The people at Collins Dictionaries have now identified well over 1,000 -isms, including those more recent coinages so-what-ism (1994), techno-fetishism (1993), and non-ism (1990 - that one's the extreme form of self denial when you do without meat, caffeine, alcohol, drugs and sex). The Independent for one has had enough: it has demanded an -ism schism. (See alsowasm.)
KENTUCKY-FRIED GEORGIAN adj. Stone-clad, satellite dish-covered, mock-Georgian fronted and UPVC-window-framed: it is the conservationist's nightmare home. Michael Howard, when Home Secretary, promised to resist the nasty "KFG" look. Maybe that's why his party lost the election . . .
LIGGERATI n. pl. That group of socialite hangers-on who tend to be omnipresent at all those showbiz parties that end up in gossip columns and magazine picture spreads. A ligger, in the music business, is a freeloader who seeks to gain free entry to concerts and parties; this bunch extend the habit to premieres, book launches and anywhere else there's a free glass of 'poo. Lately, journoliggers too have been spotted, according to the Daily Telegraph.
LOOKISM n. The practice of judging people by their looks, which followed racism, sexism and ageism to become a nineties form of unwelcome discrimination. In California, Santa Cruz city council even sought to outlaw lookism in 1993, on the grounds that some folks should not fare worse than others merely because they were "cosmetically challenged".
MANIMAL n. Tabloid-speak for the humanised animal that some scientists predict will soon result from cloning experiments between animals and human genes.
NANNY-CAM n. A tiny video camera, typically concealed inside the head of a child's cuddly teddy bear, from where it spies on the nanny, au pair or childminder. If you keep finding Winnie The Pooh in the toilet bowl, the nanny has probably twigged.
NEW BLACK n. The fashionable colour of the clothing season - defined as whatever fashion hacks are calling "the new black" (as in "brown is the new black . .."). Generally any colour so long as it's not black - although we're getting reports that black is soon to be the new black . . .
OLDMOBILE n. No, not an Oldsmobile - this one is a rather different type of car, being talked about by entrepreneurs keen to profit from our increasing longevity. The new vehicles now being designed for elderly people will have easy-to-hold steering wheels and built-in eye tests, and will use radar to guide cars into parking places.
OVERCLASS n. That ultra-privileged sector of society which, from its protected suburban ghettoes, blames the underclass for all its problems. Very big among right-wingers such as the American Nicholas Lemann, who calls them the "credentialed elite".
PARACHUTE KID n. A teenager from a wealthy family, often in the Far East, who is sent abroad for a cushier and less pressured education. A South Korean, for instance, might go to the US, or a Taiwanese to London, where they may try to settle and avoid military service and other disadvantages of their home country. Why the name? Because their high-achieving mums and dads who put them up to it are known as astronaut parents.
PENTURBIA n. The reborn version of suburbia, where people attempt to rebuild a sense of community in a rural setting far away from urban alienation. Described by Jack Lessinger, a Seattle demographer who coined the term, as an enclave too far away from a city to be sucked into the suburban sprawl.
POLENTA-BELT n. Those aspiring circles (postcodes generally N1 or W11) determinedly ahead of culinary trends. Unwise to bring Le Piat D'Or to a dinner party here.
POST-BACKLASH n, adj. That current stage of the feminism debate exemplified by once-again-proud exponents such as Naomi Wolf and Katie Roiphe. According to those who know, the post-backlash era replaces that of victim feminism. And just as you were coming to terms with the pre-post-backlash . . .
REDUX n. Funny how a forgotten word can become all the rage: recently the Guardian has talked of John Major's "Macmillan Redux" and of "Jimmy Carter Redux", and the New Yorker of "Opium War Redux". First used in 1662, and meaning restored to an earlier healthy state, redux has lately experienced its own redux.
RETROISM n. The tendency, in fashion and music, towards what was hip some time ago. The term has led to retro-chic , or retro-hip, that trendy pursuit of all things nostalgic: it's why flares and Parkas come and go in and out of fashion, and why whatever you're wearing today, however unkempt, will someday be the sharpest style statement imaginable. Although not, possibly, with that brown stain you've left down the front . . .
SUBSTAIN v. To move back to the land, towards more locally-governed, self-sufficient units of society. A small-is-beautiful version of sustainability, which our road-protest friend Swampy explains will lead to a land "where rustic communities look after themselves, governing themselves, growing their own food".
TIME DEBT n. The new burden on well-to-do careerist parents: they may have the cash to finance the lifestyle, but are increasingly cutting out quality time with the kids. This debt is the one that hurts.
TORONTO BLESSING n. Among evangelical Christians, this is the fashionable mass prayer experience that, as a frantic dance-step, is to the 1990s what the Birdie Song was to the 1980s. Like the latter it can make you ill - but is it all just mass hysterics, as the Dean of Worcester claims?
WASM n. An -ism that no longer is. It's the term coined by the Economist for all those dead ideologies - from communism to Gaullism and socialism - that we've had to learn to abandon in the nineties.
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