It is a stereotype that Canadians apologize for everything. We say sorry when you bump into us. We say sorry for the weather. But as we trudge through the grey days of winter, that national instinct for politeness hits a wall of fatigue.

The temptation is obvious. With a single click, Gmail’s “Help me write” or ChatGPT can draft a polite decline to an invitation or a heartfelt thank you for a holiday sweater you’ll never wear.

It’s efficient. It’s polite. It’s grammatically perfect.

It’s also a trap.

New research suggests that when we outsource our social interactions to AI, we are trading away our reputation. Using AI to manage your social life makes you seem less warm, less moral and significantly less trustworthy.

Learning a language is hard, but even native speakers get confused by pronunciation, connotations, definitions and etymology. The lexicon is constantly evolving, especially in the social media era, where new memes, catchphrases, slang, jargon and idioms are introduced at a rapid clip. Slanguage, The Conversation Canada’s new series, dives into how language shapes the way we see the world and what it reveals about culture, power and belonging. Welcome to the wild........

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