From Shakespeare's Globe to Fountain Gate: how pop culture shapes English
The evolution of our grand old English language is a dynamic process that finds inspiration in some unexpected places.
Certain words and phrases from popular TV shows have woven themselves into our vocabulary so successfully, that we don’t always realise where they came from.
Phrases catch on and become popular because they provide a pithy, and often funny, shorthand for expressing a cultural concept, emotion or idea.
The show’s audience is ‘in the know’, and they find a sense of community from sharing the ‘catchphrase’ in context. Yet, as a phrase enters the broader public sphere, it can shape the language of people who have no idea about its origins.
This became apparent to me when I heard my nephew quote a catchphrase from Brooklyn Nine-Nine, the American police sitcom that captured hearts around the world from 2013 to 2021. As a young Dutch person, he had never heard of the show. The phrase he used – ‘cool, cool, cool’ – is Detective Jake Peralta's epizeuxic retort to awkward and uncomfortable situations. Yet, it has become a widespread and popular expression of agreement or confirmation, uttered to co-workers, friends and demanding children.
It's a great example of how a simple line can transcend its script, become part of everyday discourse, and change its meaning along the way.
While TV’s impact on our language is a relatively recent phenomenon, the influence of popular culture on English has deep roots. Back in the 16th century when modern English was young, William Shakespeare immortalised hundreds of words in his plays (1,700 according to some experts). He captured language that already existed, but also invented many new words along the way.
Phrases like ‘elbow room’, ‘be all and end all’, ‘catch a cold’, ‘fancy-free’, ‘heart of gold’, ‘one fell swoop’, ‘wild goose chase’ and ‘too much of a good thing’ appeared first in Shakespeare’s works. He is credited with coining ‘bedroom’, ‘critic’, ‘eyeball’, ‘fashionable’, ‘kissing’, ‘puppy dog’, and ‘zany’, among others. These expressions have integrated seamlessly into English lexicon, to the point where only a lucky few of us are aware of their origin.
Closer to home, Kath & Kim introduced us to ‘It's noice, it's different, it's unusual.’ This fabulous phrase, delivered by Kath, Kim and Sharon to express approval or affirmation, perfectly encapsulates the show's distinctive Australian humour, in the way that it pokes gentle fun at the values and aspirations of suburban Australians.
Since Kath & Kim hasn’t been on our televisions since 2007, our use of this phrase will no doubt continue to evolve. In fact, ‘noice’ is so commonplace now that it has its own entry in the Macquarie Dictionary!
While our ‘Golden Age of Television’ endures, we can expect our favourite shows and characters to continue capturing the zeitgeist and enriching our language in evocative and delightful ways.