New words – 30 January 2012

granny tax noun informal a proposed tax on pensioners designed to help to pay for care of the elderly

Pensioners were told yesterday they could be hit with a ‘granny tax’ to fund their long term care.
[Daily Mirror (UK tabloid) 05 July 2011]

greycation noun a holiday in which several generations of a family, including elderly members, holiday together

Other markets to think about are couples who holiday as a group and extended families or ‘greycations’ where three generations of a family stay together.
[www.holidayhomeinformation.co.uk 01 Aug 2011]

LGBTQ abbreviation lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered, queer

The National Native American AIDS Prevention Center has recorded a special It Gets Better video aimed at LGBTQ Native American Youth to communicate to them that there is life after bullying and that they are valuable beyond measure.
[www.care2.com 02 Aug 2011]

About new words

5 thoughts on “New words – 30 January 2012

  1. Harry

    In “LGBTQ,” the last letter stands for “questioning.” Sexuality exists on a continuum, and “questioning” covers the young people who have not yet discovered where they stand. “Queer” is a politically charged synonym of both “lesbian” and “gay.”

    1. D

      “Questioning” – Interesting, I’ve never heard that one. In my experience, the Q in LGBTQ stands for ‘Queer’ not in the normally dated sense of gay (which is usually disapproving but has been somewhat reclaimed) but as a short form of ‘genderqueer’, meaning someone who is not comfortable with being placed in the gender binary (or with their sexuality being placed on it, and in this latter use, queer is more common).

      In groups where ‘T’ refers only to trans people who transition from one clearly-defined gender role to another, the ‘Q’ is clearly distinct. In other groups, the way the ‘T’ is used may (or so it is argued) be sufficiently broad as to include people who self-identify as genderqueer.

      Really, all of these labelling decisions are politically charged and controversial.

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