I was reminded of the looming ordeal last week by a friendly email from the dentist listing the time of the appointment and claiming she was looking forward to seeing me.
‘‘Reach out’’!!! Is there a more annoying phrase in the English language?
In the good old days you reached out to pick up your pint or open a door but these days ‘‘reach out’’ is the universal ugliness used when people actually mean ‘‘get in touch with’’ or even ‘‘contact’’ - that last example being a bit of jargonese itself.
I first came across ‘‘reach out’’ in 1966 when as a juvenile disc jockey I was obliged to play a Four Tops No 1 hit called Reach Out (I’ll Be There).
I assumed they meant simply a shake of the hand or a consoling arm around the shoulders. Indeed, just four years later, after I’d thankfully been relieved of disc jockey duties, Diana Ross had a hit with Reach Out and Touch (Somebody’s Hand).
Ms Ross, when in concert, would ask audience members to ‘‘reach out’’ to their neighbours and touch hands. Rather like the compulsory and uncomfortable handshaking urged by preachers on their congregations in the more with-it churches.
Still, it all seemed a reasonable use of the phrase.
These days, though, ‘‘reach out’’ used instead of ‘‘contact’’ has become a proliferating pest and is regarded as the most overused email cliche of all.
Language professionals have energetically slammed the phrase. One wrote: ‘‘It makes my skin crawl when someone uses the euphemism ‘reach out’ as in ‘we wanted to reach out to you making you aware of our new product’.’’
‘‘Euphemism’’ is too kind. It is actually a grovelling attempt at persuasion.
One commentator summed up my own feelings with: ‘‘Every time a prospective vendor tells me they are calling to ‘reach out’ to me I have to bite my tongue to keep from telling them to keep their hands to themselves.’’
Along the same lines, one grammarian advises: ‘‘just say ‘let’s set up a meeting’ or ‘let’s contact this person’. Don’t say ‘reach out’ unless you want the human relations department breathing down your neck. Please don’t reach out unless clearly invited.’’
One management consultant summed it up well: ‘‘The image of someone reaching out to us is more than a little creepy’’ .
Yes, ‘‘creepy’’ is a fine old English word which reminds us that ‘‘reach out’’ is not just another piece of weaselly corporate jargon but that it also gives off an unpleasant vibration.
That this ordinary bit of English has become a horror for language lovers is, like most linguistic lunacy, an American blot on the wordscape.
Although the Oxford English Dictionary gives a 1912 example of the ‘‘misuse’’ of the phrase - ‘‘groups and agencies which are planning to reach out to low-income families with educational efforts in the area of sound family life’’ - it was the giant US telephone company AT&T which really started the rot.
It ran a major campaign to encourage long-distance phone calls using the slogan ‘‘Reach Out and Touch Someone.’’
At once, making a phone call was ‘‘reaching out’’ and New Zealanders, ever the gormless sheep following whatever they hear on American television shows, were soon ‘‘reaching out’’ instead of calling, phoning or contacting.
Not surprisingly, the phone advert jingle became an ‘‘earworm’’ in its home country and so popular that one American linguist has admitted defeat and urges her followers to embrace the phrase. My own choice would be to strangle it.
Interestingly, while researching this diatribe, I discovered that newspapers frequently use ‘‘reaching out’’ in headlines when the actual story is simply about getting in touch rather than about giving support, helping or commiserating.
So it’s helpful when headings need to be brief, but it’s still ugly.
If you’re ever tempted to use ‘‘reach out’’ remind yourself of the words of poet Robert Browning, who knew exactly how ‘‘reach’’ should be used.
In his dramatic monologue Andrea del Sarto - which I’ve never read - comes the oft-quoted lines, ‘‘Ah, a man’s reach should exceed his grasp/Or what’s a heaven for?’’
It may be hell rather than heaven later today, so wish me luck.
I think it’s just a few fillings and the only extraction will be a large one from my wallet and the only reaching out will be my hand grasping the door handle as I depart with relief.
• Jim Sullivan is a Patearoa writer.
