Why it's ok to use the 'C' word...'Christmas' that is...

Source: http://christmasstockimages.com

Some words are so offensive we just can't bring ourselves to accept their use in common speech can we?  Yes, there are 'swear words' that we may feel are inappropriate in certain situations (although Stephen Fry's fantastic documentary series 'Planet Word' certainly made an excellent case for the function of swearing in our language), but other words are becoming taboo in some civic context particularly as they are seen to expose the organisations using them to criticism on the grounds of favouring one particular (religious) culture over another.

The specific 'C' word I'm talking about here is, of course,

'Christmas'.

Several city councils have, in recent years, changed their use of language at this time of year to studiously avoid using this particular 'C' word in order to be more 'inclusive', replacing it instead with 'Winter Festival' or similar.  As a non-religious linguaphile I find this mildly amusing.  Christmas is, of course, a word with Christian etymological roots (although scratch beneath this and you have Christ/Krishna and the Indo-European linguistic heritage of English to consider), and I appreciate the dilemma faced by councils, but really, the meaning of the word has evolved in common speech just as thousands of others have over time.  This is the great strength of the English language, its ability to adopt and adapt.

If you're a Christian you might mourn the loss of the religious connotation of the word in its use by some today; equally, if you are concerned about consumerism, you might think the word has been exploited by business. That's placing a heavy burden of political, ideological and religious thought on one little word. For me Christmas is just a word which we all understand, a signifier (as Saussure called it), which describes a cultural event that many people in the world participate in.  The meaning we each ascribe to the cultural event itself, our views on it and concerns about it, are a separate set of issues.  We need signifiers to be able to discuss the bigger issues, so let's not take them away...

With that in mind, and on a less serious note, earlier this week I made a video for my first year students with the answers to their Christmas quiz.  This little Christmas message from everyone at Swansea Business School was the by-product.  No religious connotations, just a bit of fun :)

The Business of Busyness

Have you noticed how busy everyone seems to be at the moment?  What an inane statement that is.  Everyone is always busy (or at least that's what they'll tell you). Well, I've been one of those people this month.  Too busy to complete anything to my usual standards (pernickity at the best of times), too busy to maintain friendships (bad friend), too busy to get a haircut (slatternly), and too busy to get the new brake discs and pads on my car the garage recommended during my MOT a few months ago (risky and stupid).  These last few months have been so physically and emotionally draining that I may have even considered postponing breathing for a while, I was so busy being busy.

So, this is my first blog post for a month, and I love blogging, so why haven't I been doing it?  Busy.  I had to dust my piano the other day - why hadn't I been playing it? Busy.  My PhD proposal is sitting there beckoning me towards it, but I can't seem to find a stretch of time long enough to do it justice.  Why?  Busy.

Sometimes we get so sucked into servicing the everyday demands placed before us, replying to emails, tweets, knocks on the office door etc., that we end up on a rollercoaster that is just going round and round the same track.  The initial adrenaline soon wears off and we just become sick and tired.  That's what has happened to me;  I've become sick (physically) and tired (emotionally), to the point where I'm desperate for a little Christmas respite.  Not just because it's a break - but more particularly because it's the only break where you know no-one else is going to be stacking up the work for your return.

This is a classic of the self-help book genre, it's a 'don't sweat the small stuff' and a '7 habits' lesson - goodness, it's a lesson the ancient philosophers could have taught us.  Yes, there is beauty in the small stuff, but if you let it prevent you from doing the big stuff, you're never going to get off that rollercoaster (the ancients are, of course, unlikely to have mentioned a rollercoaster - they were good engineers, but I don't think they'd progressed to pointless thrill-seeking at £30 a pop).

So, for two weeks this Christmas, I'm banning busy, getting off the rollercoaster, and taking a train somewhere instead.  Destination?  Who knows.