Word To Use Today: slogan.

If you're a Scottish historian then a slogan will be a Highland battle cry.

But, let's face it, most of us aren't Scottish historians, though I suppose the level of debate would be magnificent if we all were.

Mind you, it would be jolly difficult to find anyone to empty your dustbin or drill your filling.

Anyway, for the rest of us a slogan is something designed to be, well, not quite shouted, perhaps, but certainly said in a loud attention-seeking voice.

GUINNESS IS GOOD FOR YOU

 

GO TO WORK ON AN EGG

(The first is said to have been partly the responsibility of Dorothy L Sayers, and the second of Fay Weldon.)

Those slogans are trying to make you buy something. Slogans have been trying to change people's behaviour for thousands of years.

YES WE CAN 

 

 

[if you're British, that one is associated with Bob the Builder.]

is a particularly snappy example.

It's a powerful thing, is a slogan. It has been said, indeed, that a million housewives every day pick up a tin of beans and say Beanz Meanz Heinz.

Yes, the lure of the slogan is irresistible. So here's one of my own:

ENJOY WORDS

Says it all, really.

Word To Use Today: slogan. This word comes from the Gaelic slunagh-ghairm, war cry, from sluagh, army, plus gairm, cry.