May 31 2006

Example of pleonasm

Filed under: LanguageMatthew Revell at 1:58 pm

France Telecom is to rebrand all its services as Orange.

Today’s dictionary.com word of the day is pleonasm.

The BBC quotes Sanjiv Ahuja, an executive from Orange, as saying:

“What we are offering is something that is easy to use, simple to use and hassle free.”

That is a pleonasm: the use of more words than necessary to express an idea.