Beauty-Speak

Beauty products have a special vocabulary unique unto them. A glance at the papers can easily tell you what the language and iconography of their advertisements is aimed at achieiving: either the appearance of scientific endorsement (white-coated beauty practitioners working amid flasks and test-tubes with fantabulistic instruments to diagnose and treat all manner of aesthetic defects) or the impression of wholesome natural origins (reference to 'organic' or 'herbal' ingredients, earthy tones, and botanical imagery).

Likewise with the language used in their advertisements: scientific terms are bandied about with little or no understanding of the concepts behind their use. Let's translate some terms pulled at random from posters, flyers, and magazines:

• Pure Extract of Thermal Plankton = Pureed pond scum


• Dermabrasion = Sandpapering skin


• Collagen solution = Boiled-down bones


• Intense pulsed light therapy = Blinking lamps


• Natural herbal infusion = Garden weed tea


• Herbal collagen infusion = Bak kut teh


• Traditional Javanese massage = Bump 'n' grind


• Moisturising applicator = Damp towel


• Rejuvenating essence = Boiled infant blood

It is, indeed, worth investigating all such claims with a sceptical eye. The beauty industry thrives on easily suggestible, gullible, and insecure dupes with inadequate knowledge of science and technology, who, come to think of it, comprise a sizeable portion of the populace. They could do little better with their present advertising strategy, except perhaps to recruit Richard Gere as a celebrity spokesman.