The conjunction ergo is similar in meaning to therefore and hence. It is often avoided because it can sound pretentious or archaic. It appears fairly often in sports reporting, however, where writers seem to love words like this.
Examples
Here are two examples of ergo used well in older sources:
This priest-book par excellence opens, as is fitting, with the great inner difficulty of the priest: he faces only one great danger; ergo, “God” faces only one great danger. [H.L. Mencken, translation (1923) of The Antichrist by Nietzsche]
If ever he attempted to show the non-existence of Deity, his negation was solely directed against the gross human notions of a creative power, and ergo a succession of finite creative powers ad infinitum … [Charles Southeran, Percy Pysshe Shelley as a Philosopher and Reformer (1876)]
Even in these older contexts, ergo sounds a little too highfalutin to be taken seriously. Today, the word is almost always used ironically or to create a lighthearted tone, and it’s mostly harmless—for example:
Then, more recently, the news that one in four lap-dancers have degrees was greeted in some quarters with suggestions that lap-dancing was, ergo, a perfectly respectable career choice for intelligent young ladies. [The Guardian]
To the O.S.H.B.’s, Zinn hated injustice in America; ergo, he hated America; ergo, he was a Communist. [The Villager]
If you do use ergo, there is no need to italicize it the way we do with certain less familiar Latin loanwords. It’s been in English long enough to go unitalicized.
