Douglas Coupland Book Neo-logisms
Historical
Underdosing: (page 7)
To live in
a period of time when nothing seems to happen. Major symptoms
include addiction to newspapers, magazines and TV news broadcasts.
Homeowner
Envy: (page 144)
Feelings
of jealousy generated by the young and the disenfranchised when
faced with gruesome housing statistics.
Jack-and-Jill
Party: (page 143)
A Squire
tradition; baby showers to which both men and women friends are
invited as opposed to only women. Doubled purchasing power of
bisexual attendance brings gift values up to Eisenhower-era standards.
Japanese
Minimalism: (page 75)
The most
frequently offered interior design aesthetic used by rootless
career-hopping young people.
Knee-Jerk
Irony: (page 150)
The tendency
to make flippant ironic comments as a reflexive matter of course
in everyday conversation.
Legislated
Nostalgia: (page 41)
To force
a body of people to have memories that do not actually possess:
"How can I be a part of the 1960s generation when I don't
even remember any of it?"
Lessness:
(page 54)
A philosophy
whereby one reconciles oneself with diminishing expectations of
material wealth: "I've given up wanting to make a killing
or be a bigshot. I just want to find happiness and maybe open
up a little roadside cafe in Idaho."
McJob:
(page 5)
A low-pay,
low-prestige, low-dignity, low-benefit, no-future job in the service
sector. Frequently considered a satisfying career choice by people
who have never held one.
Me-ism:
(page 126)
A search
by an individual, in the absence of training or traditional religious
tenets, to formulate a personally tailored religion by himself.
Most frequently a mishmash of reincarnation, personal dialogue
with a nebulously defined god figure, naturalism, and karmic eye-for-eye
attitudes.
Mental
Ground Zero: (page 63)
The location
where one visualizes oneself during the dropping of the atomic
bomb; frequently, a shopping mall.
Metaphasia:
(page 164)
An inability
to perceive metaphor.
Mid-Twenties
Breakdown: (page 27)
A period
of mental collapse occurring in one's twenties, often caused by
an inability to function outside of school or structured environments
coupled with a realization of one's aloneness in the world. Often
marks the induction into the ritual of pharmaceutical usage.
Musical
Hairsplitting: (page 85)
The act of
classifying music and musicians into pathologically picayune categories:
"The Vienna Franks are a good example of urban white acid
folk revivalism crossed with ska."
Native
Aping: (page 172)
Pretending
to be a native when visiting a foreign destination.
Now
Denial: (page 41)
To tell oneself
that the only time worth living in is the past and that the only
time that may ever be interesting again is the future.
Nutritional
Slumming: (page 120)
Food whose
enjoyment stems not from flavor but from a complex mixture of
class connotations, nostalgia signals, and packaging semiotics:
"Katie and I bought this tub of Multi-Whip instead of real
whip cream because thought petroleum d istillate whip topping
seemed like the sort of food that air force wives stationed in
Pensacola back in the early sixties would feed their husband to
celebrate a career promotion."
Obscurism:
(page 165)
The practice
of peppering daily life with obscure references (forgotten films,
dead TV stars, unpopular book, defunct countries, etc.) as a subliminal
means of showcasing one's education and one's wish to disassociate
from the world of mass culture.
Occupational
Slumming: (page 113)
Taking a
job beneath one's skills or education level as a means of retreat
from adult responsibilities and/or avoiding possible failure in
one's true occupation.
O'Propriation:
(page 107)
The inclusion
of advertising, packaging, and entertainment jargon from earlier
eras in everyday speech for ironic and/or comic effect: "Kathleen's
Favorite dead Celebrity party was tons o' fun" or "Dave
really think s of himself as a zany, nutty, wacky, and madcap
guy, doesn't he?"
Option
Paralysis: (page 139)
The tendency,
when given unlimited choices, to make none.
Overboarding:
(page 26)
Overcompensating
for fears about the future by plunging headlong into a job or
life-style seemingly unrelated to one's previous interests; i.e.,
Amway sales, aerobics, the Republican Party, a career in law,
cults, McJobs....
Ozmosis:
(page 25)
The inability
of one's job to live up to one's self-image.
Paper
Rabies: (page 127)
Hypersensitivity
to littering.
Personal
Tabu: (page 74)
A small rule
for living, bordering on superstition, that allows one to cope
with everyday life in the absence of cultural or religious dictums.
Personality
Tithe: (page 143)
A price paid
for becoming a couple; previously amusing human beings become
boring: "Thanks for inviting us, but Noreen and I are going
to look at flatware catalogs tonight. Afterward we're going to
watch the travel channel."
Platonic
Shadow: (page 62)
A nonsexual
friendship with a member of the opposite sex.
Poor
Buoyancy: (page 82)
The realization that one was a better person when one had less
money.
Poorochondria:
(page 74)
Hypochondria
derived from not having medical insurance.
Poverty
Jet Set: (page 6)
A group of
people given to chronic traveling at the expense of long-term
job stability or a permanent residence. Tend to have doomed and
extremely expensive phone call relationships with people names
Serge or Ilyana. Tend to discuss frequent-flyer programs at parties.
Poverty
Lurks: (137)
Financial
paranoia instilled in offspring by depression-era parents.
Power
Mist: (page 25)
The tendency
of hierarchies in office environments to be diffuse and preclude
crisp articulation.
Pull-the-Plug,
Slice the Pie: (page 137)
A fantasy
in which an offspring mentally tallies up the net worth of his
parents.
QFD:
(page 120)
Quelle fucking
drag. "Jamie got stuck in the Rome airport for thirty-six
hours and it was, like, QFD."
QFM:
(page 120)
Quelle fashion
mistake. "It was really QFM. I mean, painter pants? That's
1979 beyond belief."
Rebellion
Postponement: (page 106)
The tendency
in one's youth to avoid traditionally youthful activities and
artistic experiences in order to obtain serious career goals.
Sometimes results in the mourning for lost youth at about age
thirty, followed by silly haircuts and joke- inducing wardrobes.
Recreational
Slumming: (page 113)
The practice
of participating in recreational activities of a class one perceives
as lower than one's own: "Karen! Donald! Let's go bowling
tonight! An don't worry about shoes... apparently you can rent
them."
Recurving:
(page 24)
Leaving one
job to take another that pays less but places one back on the
learning curve.
Safety
Net-ism: (page 34)
The belief
that there will always be a financial and emotional safety net
to buffer life's hurts. Usually parents.
Sick
Building Migration:
(page 24)
The tendency
of younger workers to leave or avoid jobs in unhealthy office
environments or workplaces affected by Sick Building Syndrome.
Spectacularism:
(page 50)
A fascination
with extreme situations.
Squires:
(page 135)
The most
common X generation subgroup and the only subgroup given to breeding.
Squires exist almost exclusively in couples and are recognizable
by their frantic attempts to recreate a semblance of Eisenhower-era
plenitude and their daily lives in the face of exorbitant housing
prices and two-job life-styles. Squires tend to be continually
exhausted from voraciously acquisitive pursuit of furniture and
knickknacks.
Squirming:
(page 112)
Discomfort
inflicted upon young people by old people who see no irony in
their gestures. Karen died a thousand deaths as her father made
a big show of tasting a recently manufactured bottle of wine before
allowing it to be poured as the family sat in Steak Hut.
Status
Substitution: (page 54)
Using an
object with intellectual or fashionable cachet to substitute for
an object that is merely pricey: "Brian, you left your copy
of Camus in your brother's BMW."
Strangelove
Reproduction: (page 135)
Having children
to make up for the fact that one no longer believes in the future.
Successophobia:
(page 30)
The fear
that if one is successful, then one's personal needs will be forgotten
and one will no longer have one's childish needs catered to.
Survivulousness:
(page 62)
The tendency
to visualize oneself enjoying being the last person on earth.
"I'd take a helicopter up and throw microwave ovens down
on the Taco Bell."
Tele-Parablizing:
(page 120)
Morals used
in everyday life that derive from TV sitcom plots: "That's
just like the episode where Jan lost her glasses."
Terminal
Wanderlust: (page 171)
A condition
common to people of transient middle-class upbringings. Unable
to feel rooted in any one environment, the move continually in
hopes of finding an idealized sense of community in the next location.
Ultra
Short Term Nostalgia: (page 96)
Homesickness
for the extremely recent past: "God, things seemed so much
better in the world last week."
Underdogging:
(page 137)
The tendency
to almost invariably side with the underdog in a given situation.
The consumer expression of the this trait is the purchasing of
less successful, "sad," or failing products: "I
know these Vienna franks are heart failure in a stick, but they
were so sad looking up against all the other yuppie food items
that I just had to buy them."
Vaccinated
Time Travel: (page 11)
To fantasize
about traveling backward in time, but only with proper vaccinations.
Veal-Fattening
Pen: (page 20)
Small, cramped
office workstations built of fabric-covered disassemblable wall
partitions and inhabited by junior staff members. Named for the
pre-slaughter cubicles used by the cattle industry.
Virgin
Runway: (page 172)
A travel
destination chosen in the hopes that no one else has ever chosen
it.
Voter's
Block: (page 80)
The attempt,
however futile, to register dissent with the current political
system by simply not voting.
Yuppie
Wannabe's: (page 91)
An X generation
subgroup that believes the myth of a yuppie life-style being both
satisfying and viable. Tend to be high in debt, involved in some
form of substance abuse, and show a willingness to talk about
Armageddon after three dr inks.
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