Each New Year's Eve, Lake Superior State University publishes a list of those words that deserve to be banished from the lexicon. It has become one of the events I anticipate every holiday season. In fact, they have been compiling this list for over 30 years now.
Some of the nuggets that have received this dubious achievement of late: amazing, baby bump, viral, man cave, epic and refudiate.
This enshrinement in no way causes these words to disappear from the status of the overused. I have been scratching my head for some time, wondering why this one particular word continues to appear on topics near and far. For, in 2009, Lake Superior State University deemed the word "iconic" to be worthy of this banishment. I could not agree more.
Dictionary.com defines iconic as: "of, pertaining to, or characteristic of an icon." Well, that doesn't help much. So, I next looked up icon: "a sign or representation that stands for its object by virtue of a resemblance or analogy to it." Okay, that's a little better.
At the place I worked most recently, our Director of Marketing referred to our building as iconic. Then, it started appearing all over the place, as if to haunt every turn in my un-iconic life. Since that time, I have heard the word applied to Chevrolet, Newt Gingrich, all New York sports teams (even those that ply their trade in New Jersey), the former Sears Tower, an early Atari game (pong?) and, most recently, Steven Spielberg and several full-length animated Disney films.
I am confused. Would not the multitude of people, places and things that are so designated diminish its very status as an icon? I am reminded of a headline I saw on some internet news site last year, referring to a tune as "the most downloaded song of all time." I guess that makes sense, if one is only defining "all time" as that period during which music could actually be downloaded, say, since 2001 or so. But, I digress...
Repeat after me: I solemnly promise not to use the word "iconic" in any sentence. Any violation of this vow will condemn the offender to a life, subject to bombardment of all the words banished by those wise folks at LSSU. Just sayin... Oh, sorry, that was on 2011's list.
I encourage you to peruse the lists yourself. I promise, you will not be disappointed.
Things that are iconic: the Statue of Liberty, the very first personal computer, Mickey Mouse, the invention of the moveable type.
ReplyDeletePeople that are iconic: Sidney Poitier.
Those are the only exceptions that I can think of. Those items you listed in your post are most certainly not iconic - not even in an ironic sense.
I would just like to point out that last May, you referred to (the new) Yankee Stadium as iconic. Because I'm a smart ass. Wonder where I get that from.
ReplyDeleteI think people like to use iconic to describe New York City, and sometimes I can't really blame them - there ARE a lot of things here that are symbolic and historical and beautiful. But for the most part, like many words out there, when it's overused, it loses its effectiveness.
Side note: amazing is an amazing word and LSSU can get over that.