Looks like Sydney Trains is going to drop the jargon from its PA announcements.
Looks like Sydney Trains is going to drop the jargon from its PA announcements.
From the SMH:
"Commuters will soon be told to “get off” the train, rather than “alight”, after Sydney Trains resolved to overhaul its station announcements to favour colloquial language.
"The phrase “this train terminates here” is also being retired, due to concerns the word “terminates” is difficult to understand."
@sydneytrains #trains #sydney #nsw #transit #planning #train #UrbanPlanning
12 replies
Please gtfo from the doors, this train is going to yeet.
Feels a lot like Idiocracy doesn't it? "welcome to Sydney trains, I love you!"
Doubleplusgood news!
Seriously though, alight and terminates are not hard words to understand - particularly when given context and used in repeated announcements. It doesn't reflect well on our literacy levels if these words are now considered too difficult for the general population.
@wscholermann @Tau
Almost certainly.
That's likely at least part of the reasoning behind this change. However the majority of people learning English will simply have a lack of vocabulary rather than a lack of reasoning capacity, so should therefore be able to figure out the words mean from context and observation (or look up the meanings considering smartphones are basically ubiquitous these days).
You're right that I wouldn't recognise an unknown word/phrase, but since train announcements are operating in a limited context and I'd be seeing people respond by getting off the train at multiple stops you'd hope I'd figure it out before too long.
This is of course assuming I know some of the language and can recognise basic words such as their equivalent of passengers, going in completely blind would be a real mission (just as it would be coming here with absolutely no English).
@ajsadauskas @sydneytrains "This train terminates here" was very frightening for passengers named Sarah or John Connor.
@ajsadauskas @sydneytrains "We asked you to get off the train, not get off on the train."
https://www.pedestrian.tv/news/blow-job-wollongong-train/
@ajsadauskas @sydneytrains I was amused but not surprised on a recent trip to the US to hear the announcement on the aeroplane as “de-plane” instead of “disembark” or “alight”. I suppose you have to meet people where they are with language.
@rusl @ajsadauskas @sydneytrains Oh god I hate "deplane". Also "detrain". Can't see how disembark is difficult. Or terminate, for that matter. Or alight!
@rusl @ajsadauskas @sydneytrains You think that's bad? I was in an airport where they made passengers "deplane" to take care of a mechanical issue. When it was time to have the passengers get back on, the gate agent made an announcement asking them to "re-deplane". 😒
@rusl @ajsadauskas @sydneytrains
De-plane is kinda horrible as it implies a preceding announcement of “we are now ready to plane the aircraft, please have your boarding pass ready”.
🙃