Television Slang, Jargon, and New Words from Double-Tongued Dictionary

Television, programming, broadcasting, etc. You can also see entries assigned to this category.

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snipe n. Networks are also experimenting with something called snipes. Similar to ABC’s icons, snipes are visual effects that take place in the lower right hand corner of the screen during a show. Shows on TNT, for example, may include a visual of Kyra Sedgwick, star of The Closer, walking under a police tape and scanning the screen with a flashlight. (Snipes are different than the network logos that pop up on screens during shows, called bugs.) [English Media Television Jargon] [full cite] (Sep. 26, 2007)

snoop cam n. Snoop cam: Small camera on the announcers’ courtside table that’s always on; let’s the director see if the announcers are ready. [English United States Entertainment Media Sports & Recreation Television] [full cite] (May. 30, 2004)

spit take n. Spit Take: Reaction to surprise news while drinking a glass of water was so perfected by one man that it will forever be known as the Danny Thomas Spit Take. At the dinner table, Danny’s reaction to any news he didn’t want to hear results in an immediate spray of whatever he was drinking. [English Entertainment Television] [full cite] (May. 1, 2007)

spit take n. Nor does he think the public can muster a chuckle for “Danny Thomas doing spit takes. We’re too jaded now.” [English Entertainment Television] [full cite] (May. 1, 2007)

spit-take n. At dinnertime, they had to bring in the “spit-take’ rule. Nobody was allowed to talk to someone else at the table if that person had food in his mouth because it more than likely they would choke to death laughing. [English Entertainment Movies Television] [full cite] (May. 1, 2007)

spit-take n. Yet, “after all I’ve done, what I’m most remembered for is the spit- take.” That’s the point in Make Room for Daddy when [Danny] Thomas would be sipping coffee, somebody would say something surprising, and he would spit it out. [English Entertainment Movies Television Jargon] [full cite] (May. 1, 2007)

stenocaptioner n. Stenocaptioners watch live programs, listening with earphones and typing on a stenographer’s keypad, which is different from a computer keyboard. The pad is connected to a software program that deciphers the keystrokes. After the computer interprets the words, telephone lines shoot the text back to TV stations with a lapse time of two to five seconds. [English Media Television] [full cite] (Sep. 11, 2005)

strip n. Turning it into a “strip” channel may be its fate. Don’t get excited: That’s not strip as in nubile women. “Strips” is industry argot for reruns of popular shows like Friends, Seinfeld and The Honeymooners. They’re still hits with viewers, and they come cheap. [English Entertainment Media Television] [full cite] (Aug. 20, 2004)

supermarionation n. A cheesy puppet show that was filmed in what was laughingly referred to as “supermarionation,” the show has mysteriously become something of a cult hit. Despite the fact that the special effects amounted largely to giant puffballs of smoke and cardboard rockets hung from string, the show has managed to remain in syndication these last forty years. [English Entertainment Television] [full cite] (Aug. 1, 2004)

sweetening n. I’m not going to claim that nothing I ever wrote or produced got juiced up in post-production. But I never had anything to do with the laugh-track process—called sweetening. I always left that to the line producer, and my instructions were to add laughs only when a joke didn’t get a fair shake in front of a live audience. [English Entertainment Television Slang] [full cite] (Jan. 9, 2008)

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