Tactical pyjamas?
« previous post | next post »
For the past couple of years, internet advertising has been promoting (increasingly unexpected) things to me as "tactical": tactical shorts, tactical pants, tactical belts, tactical gloves, tactical hoodies, … These are basically imitations of military garments (to be worn in action as opposed to on parade), and I guess if my internet profile were different, I'd see more ads for imitation military firearms, not just knives and sticks and flashlights. More recently, I've seen tactical ice scrapers and tactical scissors. And most recently (and absurdly?), tactical pajamas.
Wiktionary's entry for tactical gives four senses:
- Of or relating to tactics.
- Of or relating to military operations that are smaller or more local than strategic ones.
tactical nuclear weapon - Adroit, skilful or ingenious.
- (firearms) Having a military appearance, typically with accessories such as a bipod, adjustable stock, detachable magazine or black coloration.
The use in reference to clothing, tools, etc. is presumably a generalization of the process that led to sense (4).
For the word tactics, Wiktionary's entry is less helpful than the OED's sense (1), "The art or science of deploying military or naval forces in order of battle, and of performing warlike evolutions and manœuvres", with the etymology
plural of tactic, rendering modern Latin (17th cent.) tactica plural, Greek τὰ τακτικά, lit. ‘matters pertaining to arrangement’
which connects us to syntax "The order and arrangement of words", from
συν- syn- prefix + τάξις taxis n., after συντάσσειν to put together in order.
[And let's not forget the distinction between syntaxis and parataxis…]
The business about "matters pertaining to arrangement" also underlies the OED's sense (3) for tactics
Linguistics. C. F. Hockett's term for the study of the relation and arrangement of linguistic units, esp. the study of the arrangement of morphemes.
And of course there's also phonotactics, which these days is probably used more often than morphotactics is.
But tactical pajamas have entirely escaped the orbit of Greek τάξις and τακτικά, I think, though their holsters link them figuratively to military operations.
Philip Taylor said,
March 22, 2026 @ 9:10 am
Well, things could be worse, Mark — you could have been told that the allegedly "tactical" pyjamas had landed (a term which, in my case at least, results in immediate deletion of the e-mail unless it pertains to aircraft or similar).
jhh said,
March 22, 2026 @ 9:32 am
I get the feeling that "tactical" is being used these days to describe high-tech fabrics– wicking, odor-resistant, light-weight, durable, abrasion-resistant…
Mark Liberman said,
March 22, 2026 @ 10:11 am
@Philip Taylor: Contrary to your implication, I find semantic drift interesting, not repellent.
@jff: One axis of tactical metonymy is certainly fabric type. But something else is going on with tractic flashights and tactical ice scrapers. And even with clothing, there are military connections via pockets and color patterns…
Tom Davidson said,
March 22, 2026 @ 10:12 am
Then there is Tactical Shit News on the internet
Philip Taylor said,
March 22, 2026 @ 10:46 am
There was no "implication", Mark, simply an comment on my part. If you choose to infer something from it that was never intended, then that is your choice.
Haamu said,
March 22, 2026 @ 10:56 am
I've been entertaining myself with the thought that your decision to alter the product name was a deliberate attempt not to provoke an expected reaction. Based on the comments so far, it appears to have been successful (until, of course, I draw attention to it).
I wouldn't have spoiled your effort (if it was indeed deliberate) had there not been integrated holsters, which make the other, actual spelling so much more likely.
Mark Liberman said,
March 22, 2026 @ 11:10 am
@Haamu: No effort, deliberate or otherwise — just an unconscious spelling choice, now updated to align with the common usage on this side of the Atlantic.
Haamu said,
March 22, 2026 @ 11:38 am
It did occur to me that the British spelling was more common on the East Coast of the US. Also, Ngrams indicates that the spellings are crossing the pond in both directions much more rapidly since 2000. Still, the thought that it was deliberate was amusing.
I'll make an amateur guess that the British choice of "y" was influenced by the vowel in the original Hindi/Urdu, and any such nuance was lost by the time the word filtered to America.
Coby said,
March 22, 2026 @ 1:18 pm
According to the OED (as quoted in Wikipedia), the Hindi/Urdu (and originally Persian) etymon is pāy-jāma, pā-jāma, which would indicate (to me at least) that the first syllable was meant to be pronounced like pie. But the word apparently reached England in written form first, and readers chose to reduce the vowel. (Other European languages have [i] as the vowel.)
Fernando said,
March 22, 2026 @ 2:13 pm
You know, this post made me realize that disclosing the nature of the junk mail one gets may be as revealing of as talking openly about your dreams. If I look at the spam I get, it has nothing to do with tactical anything. And I’m not telling you what it has to do with.
J.W. Brewer said,
March 22, 2026 @ 2:27 pm
The maker's website variously uses Tactical Pajamas™ and Tactical Pajamas®, but the latter is more precise because they do in fact own a currently-valid federal trademark registration for the wordmark "Tactical Pajamas" as applied to "Pajamas; t-shirts; sweat shirts; lounge pants; all of the aforementioned in the nature of sleepwear; [and] belts." https://tmsearch.uspto.gov/search/search-results/88058175
Note that they disclaim any right to the word "tactical" on a freestanding basis as applied to belts, presumably because "tactical belt(s)" is a sufficiently meaningful combination that other sellers of belts may need to use it to describe their products accurately. At some level, the granting of the trademark as to pajamas means that in the opinion of the relevant federal bureaucrats the word "tactical" as applied to pajamas is not so straightforwardly and obviously descriptive of the sort of pajamas you're talking about that competitors of the trademark owner (Tacticasual, Inc.) need to be able to describe their own pajamas as "tactical" so purchasers know what subgenre of pajamas they are.
There are a whole bunch of other U.S. trademarks including "tactical" as one word in a multi-word wordmark, and trawling through them might tell you something meaningful about the range of products (or services?) where "tactical" is currently thought a good word for marketing purposes.
Y said,
March 22, 2026 @ 3:46 pm
"Tactical Pajamas®, Torsaga® and Tacticasual® are Registered Trademarks of Tacticasual, Inc."
davep said,
March 22, 2026 @ 3:49 pm
It’s not that complicated. “Tactical” is (not limited to) a fashion choice. AKA “tacticool”.
Mai Kuha said,
March 22, 2026 @ 3:49 pm
"Tactical" sounds like a gendered marketing strategy. I'm reminded of these items Colbert reports on from 00:35
https://youtu.be/PDkW2hcQeFc?t=35
Yves Rehbein said,
March 22, 2026 @ 3:50 pm
I would guess that y /i/ aligned with a /ə/ in unstressed syllables, e.g. prefixes y-, a- < OE ġe- (yclept, aware) under the influence of palatals. This is born out by complete deletion of the first syllable.
As for tactic, it has the ring of an ideophone, but I am not sure. I am pretty sure that there is no semantic "drift" but a leap by a room full off dopamine addicted marketing agents with the help of weapon grade word embeddings to find a name: Jumping the gun, shoot me, what doesn't kill me makes me stronger. I intend no harm though I could do without it.
As for jammies, I should consider it on a rainy sunday to brush up on the satem branch of PIE, yet it is spring for the time being. Time to whip out the Schnellfickerhosen and get that springcleaning over with.
Brett said,
March 23, 2026 @ 7:40 am
xkcd 1833 (part of the Code Quality series*) includes this description of poorly-written code:
* This series is about the quality of Cueball's code. Ponytail usually looks at the source code Cueball has written, while he warns her that he is self-taught, so his code probably won't be cleanly written. In spite of Ponytail's initial (polite) optimism, she always comments in a parade of vivid similes to convey the incomprehensible nature of his code.
David Marjanović said,
March 23, 2026 @ 12:25 pm
It's much simpler: we're looking at the abbot-rabbit merger.
And no, ME a- is not from OE ġe-, but from on.
… … …This is a family blog, sir. Or what are you talking about? I don't feel like googling that.
Minimally four branches: Indo-Slavic + Armenian, Albanian ( + Dacian, Thracian, whatever?), Phrygian apparently, and Luwian.
Andrew Szmelter said,
March 24, 2026 @ 5:55 am
Being of a certain age, I like pyjamas to be practical not tactical
davep said,
March 24, 2026 @ 8:45 am
@jhh: fabric is more often “technical”. “Tactical” is more used for “military like” usage.
davep said,
March 24, 2026 @ 8:56 am
@Mark Lieberman: “One axis of tactical metonymy is certainly fabric type…”
@jff: One axis of tactical metonymy is certainly fabric type. But something else is going on with tractic flashights and tactical ice scrapers. And even with clothing, there are military connections via pockets and color patterns…”
“Tactical” isn’t really being used to describe fabric in the way jhh is saying. It seems like he’s confusing the commonly-used “technical”. Usually, it’s used as a synonym for “synthetic” (which has undesirable connotations for marketing).
“Tactical” has been used for “military like usage” for a long while. Like much of marketing, it might be being overused.
davep said,
March 24, 2026 @ 9:03 am
“Tactical” has an association with “guns”. The pajamas in question are “tactical” mostly because they have a holster (and to sell stuff).
davep said,
March 24, 2026 @ 9:08 am
@Mai Kuha: "Tactical" sounds like a gendered marketing strategy.”
Some females are interested in it but it’s more of a male thing.
It’s certainly a “marketing strategy”. And a fairly-old one at that.
(It seems like it’s new to a few people here.)
David B Solnit said,
March 24, 2026 @ 2:53 pm
I can't help thinking of E. B. White's "Dusk in Fierce Pajamas"
Yves Rehbein said,
March 25, 2026 @ 1:07 pm
@ DM, thank you for asking. They are just a jammies kind of pants and I was, of course, intending to compare the f-syllable to pyjamas.
That is not indicated by the standing etymology, but the other f-word (s.v. Futteral and compare the v-word) from *peh2- (compare Persian pâyidan) is comparable. So if *yem- ("to hold") holds up, it could suggest that Schnellfickerhosen are quick tie (cf. Sanskrit yantrá, “fastening”). On the other hand, the Germanic etymology may be vulnerable. That's semantic drift for you.
And no, aware is comparable to German gewahr, actually, in terms of morphotactics.
Victor Mair said,
April 1, 2026 @ 9:14 pm
Having developed s serious rash in the nether regions of my body while staying in a hospital for the past week, I have pretty much made up my mind to follow the advice of the medical staff here to change my pants from constricting fabrics and stiff textiles to soft, cotton jammies and linen trousers. They assured me that I would not look out of place in today's world.