scenario

scenario

1. The pronunciation is normally si-nah-ri-oh in BrE and si-nai-r-i-oh in AmE. The plural form is scenarios.

2. The word came into English from Italian in the late 19c as a term for the outline plot of a play, ballet, novel, etc., and was extended to the world of film in the early 20c. From the 1960s a new meaning exploded into use, and the word now commonly refers to any supposed or imagined series of events, or even to a static situation:

• How then do we decide which class to assign a couple to where he is a builder and she is a secretary (not that uncommon a scenario)? —R. Symonds, 1988

• The entire education scenario is a joke —Liverpool Daily Echo, 2007.

This use of scenario is often regarded with suspicion, but it is hard to see why when so many other comparable figurative uses (such as scene) pass without comment. In its right place, when the imagined events or circumstances form a related sequence and are therefore comparable to the elements of a story-line, the word is a useful one.