Overuse!
Dear Editor,
Please allow me to vent my feelings on what is becoming the modus operandi for the Jamaican media: overusing puns and alliterations. Both the written and electronic media are dominated by these figures of speech which obscure the main ideas, add humour to otherwise serious issues, give prominence to slang and reduce the universality of the English language to the lowest level.
If this continues it will soon be quite difficult for anyone other than Jamaicans to understand a news broadcast fully or an item in the papers. The overuse of these figures of speech does not encourage the proper use and understanding of the English language, and the last time I checked, failure to acknowledge their use is far from professional.
Editors and proofreaders, you are falling down on the job. Let’s get it right for 2010.
Phillip A Chambers
phillipdcchambers@yahoo.com
