A few years ago one of my work colleagues was feeling annoyed with her doctor, so I told her about a clueless doctor I had once seen called Dr Burke. I joked, "Burke by name, berk by nature!" The girl I worked with was confused by my comment and it turned out she had never heard of the word 'berk'.
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| An old typewriter for typing old words. |
As it turns out, my former work colleague isn't the only one to have never heard of some older words. According to a survey by Perspectus Global, here are a few more words that people aged 18-30 have never heard of:
1) Balderdash (27%)
When I discovered that 27% of 18-30 year olds have never heard of the word balderdash, my first reaction was, 'That's balderdash!"
For the benefit of anyone in the 27%, balderdash means nonsense. It's not a word I've ever personally used myself, but I think it would be cool if more people used it, because it has an amusing ring to it. It's the sort of word that just makes you smile by the sheer ridiculousness of it.
Balderdash!
I tend to associate the word 'balderdash' with posh people, so maybe it's not just a
generational thing as to why so many younger people have never heard of it.
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| A wooden pig next to a trough. Nothing to do with the word 'betrothed', but I like the photo, so I thought I'd include it anyway. |
2) Betrothed (29%)
A trough is something a pig eats out of of, but 'betrothed' has nothing to do with pigs. If you describe someone as betrothed it means they're engaged to be married.
The word 'betrothed' is a word I associate with old period dramas on TV, so I can kind of understand why it's dying out.
3) Kerfuffle (20%)
Kerfuffle is another word which I think people should use more often, because it has a funny sound to it, and just saying it brings a smile to my face.
For those who don't know, a kerfuffle is a commotion or a fuss. For example if lots of people were getting stressed out over an incident, you might remark, "What a kerfuffle!"
And then you would smile at how funny the word kerfuffle sounds.
4) Minted (15%)
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| Minted tea. Young people may be interested to learn that 'minted' can also be used to describe someone who is rich. |
I wonder what young people call rich people nowadays if they don't know what minted means? If any young person aged 18-30 is reading this, feel free to leave your answer as a comment!
5) Nincompoop (28%)
Nincompoop has to be a contender for the most ridiculous word on this list, and if balderdash and kerfuffle are silly words, then nincompoop is surely even sillier again.
A nincompoop, for the benefit of the 28% who have never heard of it, is an idiot or a fool. I would tend to associate nincompoop specifically with someone who acts like a clown, rather than someone purely with low intelligence, but I suppose you could use it to describe both.
6) Swot (22%)
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| A swot revising for their exams. |
Technically, a swot is someone who works hard and studies for their exams. However, when I was at school, the word swot did sometimes also get used to refer to people who were generally clever and did well in exams, even if they didn't have to work hard to get good results.
Anyway, I was shocked to discover that 22% of 18-30 year olds have never heard of the word swot. Does that mean that swots are dying out, or just the word? What do young people call swots nowadays?
7) Tosh (23%)
When I read that 23% of 18-30 years had never heard of the word tosh, my immediate reaction was, "That's balderdash!"
However, I could also have said, "That's tosh!" because the word 'tosh' means more or less the same as balderdash, i.e. nonsense.
8) Wally (36%)
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| Unfortunately I didn't have a photo of a wally, so I had to use this photo of a highly intelligent man instead. |
There was even an old ZX Spectrum game inspired by wallies called 'Everyone's A Wally'. The name was misleading, however, as only one of the characters in the game was called Wally. The rest were called Wilma, Tom, Dick and Harry, so everyone wasn't a wally after all. It looks like whoever named the game was a bit of a wally themself!
9) Berk (100%)
Finally, this wasn't in the survey from Perspectus Global, but according to my own survey, 100% of 18-30 year olds have never heard of the word berk!
Admittedly, I used a very small survey sample (one person, to be precise), but for the benefit of anyone who had previously never heard of the word, a berk is a fool or an idiot.
Or to describe it another way, a berk is a nincompoop or a wally!
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Once again, the survey was conducted by Perspectus Global, and they also revealed that apparently a third of people aged over 50 think it's sad that some words were dying out.
There were many more words which a suprisingly high percentage of 18-30 year olds have never heard of, so perhaps I'll feature them in a future blog post.
You can find more word related blog posts below:
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