Aaron Kucharski: changing addiction language

To think about language in such a close and broken down way was really interesting. Of course, I thought of the obvious words that are very clearly a nasty way to refer to someone struggling with an addiction. I immediately thought of “junkie,” but I didn’t think about how other words also impacted the view of how others look at those struggling with an addiction.

The one that struck me the most was the point about saying “X years sober.” I hadn’t really thought about the fact that it’s not comprehensive and really only covers those who were struggling with alcohol. This made me realize while I was aware of offensive language, I perhaps wasn’t as aware of inclusive language when it comes to addiction and recovery. This is so important because if we aren’t careful about making sure we use inclusive language, then we could potentially be hurting that person’s recovery or undermining how hard they have worked to get where they’re at currently.

The other word that struck me was the word “clean.” Aaron Kuckarski said something along the lines of, “What’s the opposite of clean?” We all reacted with, “dirty.” This simple word then implies that those struggling and facing addiction are dirty, which was really an interesting and sad concept to think about all at the same time.

Brianna Cicero

Brianna is a senior journalism major at Temple University with a concentration on Editorial Management. She is currently a Content Strategist Intern and Editor-in-Chief for Odyssey, the Editorial Director of Temple's chapter of Spoon University and the Deputy Director of Parliament Communications for Temple Student Government. This past summer, Brianna worked for her local, hometown paper, LNP and LancasterOnline, covering events and issues important to the people of Lancaster County. She is also a 2016 alumna of The Fund For American Studies' Institute on Political Journalism where she covered the 2016 election in Washington D.C for a political startup, The Stream, as well as attended briefings at publications like The Washington Post. In addition, she has previously served as a contributor for BuzzFeed, was a staff reporter for Eastern University's newspaper, The Waltonian, and was the EditorinChief of Eastern's literary magazine, Inklings. Contact Brianna at [email protected] .