Cat 5
posted in General |CAT 5
Not long ago, I took course in the History of the English language. In all candor, it was not as interesting or exciting as I thought it might be, but it had its value in explainng how modern day English (British and American) evolved from the Celtic, Norman, Viking, German, Anglo-Saxon, Roman, Greek, etc. languages. Of particular interest to me was how small special phrases came into existence and became a part of the English language. In most cases, such phrases came about through common usage (street language) and then were “formalized” over time. That practice continues right up to the present.
Hurricane Katrina has had a devastating effect on the Gulf States in the USA. It was a Category 5 Hurricane based on meteorolical measurements. For a long time, hurricanes were hurricanes, but nowadays they are named and ranked by severity. Category 5 is at the top of the severity rankings. It may be that Hurricane Katrina will make a contribution to the english language – a “Cat 5″.
There are a lot of conceptions or thoughts that are encapsulated in very brief terms. Some examples are “Deep-six”, “Catch 22″, “Perfect 10″, “Ground zero”. and now “Cat 5″. Each one of these terms — letters and a number(s) — have a distinct meaning and are generally recognized as part of our language. Now we have “Cat 5″, meaning the biggest, strongest force there is. Already you can see the term “Cat 5″ on news items that have no relationship to the now historic Hurricane. “He went off tackle like a Cat5″ – “that homer flew out of here on a Cat 5 wind”, “Pretty awesome but not a Cat 5″ — “It was a Cat 5 day on Wall Street for buyers”. And on and on.
Cat5 will likely be the legacy of Katrina, but years from now, people will use the term without any memory of the storm that destroyed so much in lives and property. Watch for it — Cat5.