Unnecessary Redundancy (Word Usage)

Unnecessary Redundancy

For those of you who already know this one, the title of this article, "unnecessary redundancy" may strike you as a great irony; I have committed the very error that this article sets out to explain. However, since I am now explaining to you that I have done this intentionally, I hope you won't think less of me for it.

To explain what I am talking about, let me first describe how the title of this article is guilty. The noun "redundancy" refers to something extra and not needed, or in other words, unnecessary. The adjective "unnecessary," therefore, is itself completely unnecessary, because "redundancy" already carries the idea "unnecessary" as part of its meaning. So, the article could more succinctly be titled "Redundancy," because "unnecessary" adds nothing to the title at all.

The title example is perhaps the most amusing and ironic one of all, but there are many other common examples of redundancy we see in everyday conversation and writing. In the following sentence, see if you can find the redundancy and make the appropriate correction: "It was 10:00 AM in the morning, and the dog was howling while chasing the cat." In this case, the dog and cat are doing what dogs and cats do, and so there is no problem with that part of the sentence. However, the time in the sentence is written redundantly, because "AM" indicates that we are talking about ten in the morning, not ten at night. Therefore, by deleting either "AM" or the phrase "in the morning," you can remove the redundancy from the sentence.

A redundant construction you have likely heard thousands of times in your life, especially in advertising, occurs in the following example: "Order your SuperBlender now, and receive a complimentary free gift!" The noun "gift" which ends the sentence indicates something free of charge which will be granted to someone; a gift requires nothing to be given in return. Keeping this definition in mind, we turn now to the word "free" which comes just before "gift;" "free" in this case means "without cost, requiring no payment, given in exchange for nothing." So, the phrase "free gift" is redundant, since a gift is always free, and the idea of "free" is included in the definition of the word. Going further, we come to the word "complimentary," which is a near synonym of "free," and means that something is given "compliments of the house," or without charge by whoever is doing the giving. Obviously, this merely repeats the adjective "free," doing nothing to add to the definition of "gift," and so it too is redundant and can be removed. In this case, "gift" on its own would be best. Advertisers might want to make the idea of "without charge" as prominent as possible so that consumers are sure to notice they will be getting something without paying for it, but as far as good usage is concerned, the phrase is just redundant.

In order to check for redundancy, you can employ a relatively simple test to judge whether the adjectives you have used are already contained in the nouns they describe. In the example above, "free gift," consider what the opposite of a free gift would be. The term "expensive gift" or "costly gift" doesn't really make sense in this context. Would someone offer you a gift that you had to pay for? From here, you can ask yourself if there is such a thing as a gift that isn't free. Since there isn't (this would contradict the meaning of the word "gift"), you can be sure that the adjective "free" is redundant.