In the spirit of Edwin Neumann, consider this language shift. The word “hey” is an interjection, one of those words usually said for emphasis, words such as “ouch!” or “oh” or “horrors!” My Uncle Bud always had trouble with this word. Whenever someone shouted, “Hey, Bud! Come over here,” he always thought they were yelling at him, when in reality the speaker was trying to get the attention of some other man. So the use of “hey” was pretty standard, as in “Hey, you. Get off my car. You might scratch it,” or “Hey, cat! Don’t you dare do that on the carpet” (as you fail to carry the cat to the litter box in time).

That has changed. My Goodness! Oh! Ouch! Heavens! Recently the word “hey” has changed from being an interjection into being a greeting. I watch CNBC more than I should. Even though the economic and market jargon drives me crazy, I continue to watch for the information I need. One of the most noticeable stylistic changes in the reporting is the way reporters and guests address each other. All, or nearly all, speaker changes require a greeting. They sound thusly:

“Let’s go to Carla now. She has breaking news on the real estate market in California. Hey, Carla.”

“Hey, Christa, that’s right…..”

All day long the speakers go back and forth with “hey.” The word has extinguished the words of greeting that we used to use, such as “good morning, “good afternoon,” good evening,” “hello,” “hi,” “good to talk to you again,” and so forth. Instead of being an attention-grabbing word or word of emphasis, it has become more a glib sign of colloquial chumminess. It becomes a throw-away word showing that you are a member of the club and can dispense with any formality–and yet serious business, people’s money, retirement, and the world economy are at risk. “Hey” is put on each morning like television makeup for the cameras.

I plead guilty to falling into the same trap of accepting this one word at the expense of word variety, appropriateness of tone, emphasis, and even precision. As a college instructor, I too began to use “hey” as a greeting for colleagues when the word began to come into vogue as a greeting. It particularly came in handy when bumping into someone in the hallway into whom I really did not want to bump! Starting a surprise conversation can be awkward, but “hey” served as an automatic safe way of acknowledging the other speaker while buying some milliseconds to put some more cogent words together.

“Hey, George, how’s it going.” In response, George (name changed) would say, “Hey, Larry,” (which was another way of saying something, anything, when he wished to send me to the outer asteroid belt and never see me again).

As is said so often, English is a living thing…that tries to kill itself and others.

Now “hey” has spread across the air waves. But, hey!