The Language Perfectionist: Reject Redundancies

by Don Hauptman (06/28/2008)

A common type of misuse is redundancy, also known as tautology or pleonasm. Here are some examples, drawn from print and online sources:

  • "I hope that your advance planning has brought you the sense of security and peace of mind that comes with knowing that everything is as it should be." (The word planning presupposes that it is done in advance.)
  • "What appears in Wikipedia is not always necessarily a true fact." (By definition, a fact is always true. Thus, avoid saying false fact, too.)
  • "Before long, emoticons had accomplished what Esperanto never could: establish a universal lingua franca." (The term lingua franca means universal language.)
  • "The track proceeds past a rock shelter on the left to the open summit… from whence there are excellent views." (The word whence means "from where.")
  • "Don’t you think Germans were sitting around having this exact same conversation about their country during Hitler’s rise to power?" (The word same means identical.)

Argumentative readers might dispute my interpretations by citing liberal dictionary definitions or by claiming that certain phrases were not redundant centuries ago. They may have a case, but these locutions are still best avoided. They add more words than necessary. They’re awkward, clunky, and cliched. Finally, some people are irritated by such linguistic tics as "tiny little" and "screaming and yelling."

Of course, we copywriters are not immune to criticism on this point, especially for the frequent use of the marketing promise "free gift."

[Ed Note: For more than three decades, Don Hauptman was an award-winning independent direct-response copywriter and creative consultant. He is author of The Versatile Freelancer, an e-book forthcoming from AWAI, that shows writers and other creative professionals how to diversify their careers into critiquing, consulting, training, and speaking.]

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