The Laziness of Our Modern LanguageAug 21 '03 Write an essay on this topic.The Bottom Line "When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said, "it means just what I choose it to mean -- neither more nor less." Whether reading the newspaper or listening to one of the myriad broadcast news outlets, I am struck by the inanity that spews forth. With the need to maintain non-stop coverage of the day's events, journalists no longer have an opportunity to evaluate the events or to scrutinize the jargon-filled double-speak of public figures. Instead, journalists are reduced to parrots who repeat what was just said. If we are lucky, they might even add a few words of their own. I cannot speak for the media coverage throughout the world. When I lived abroad, most of my news came from the BBC, CNN or the Herald Examiner. While useful for "keeping in touch," I cannot claim that these media sources are representative of the whole world's media sources. I can confidently speak, however, about the state of the media in the United States today. George Orwell once wrote an essay called "Politics and the English Language" in which he commented that language "becomes ugly and inaccurate because our thoughts are foolish, but the slovenliness of our language makes it easier for us to have foolish thoughts." I wonder what Orwell would have to say about the incessant blather that has become our nation's news today. In the same essay, Orwell further comments on samples of political writing of his own day that, "The writer either has a meaning and cannot express it, or he inadvertently says something else, or he is almost indifferent as to whether his words mean anything or not." Certainly our modern need to have our journalists present news in a non-stop fashion forces them into the position of speaking without the opportunity to evaluate if what they say has meaning, or the meaning they intend. Orwell goes on to say, "This mixture of vagueness and sheer incompetence is the most marked characteristic of modern English prose, and especially of any kind of political writing. As soon as certain topics are raised, the concrete melts into the abstract...." We see this all too often from our politicians whose only purpose in speaking at hearings is to be put on the record as having spoken. Orwell spoke out against metaphors that lost their spark from overuse, complicated phrases that replaced one-word verbs, foreign words used to add elegance, scientific jargon used to offer credibility to opinions and empty words which add length but not substance to comments. It is with these ideas in mind that I invoke the spirit of Orwell to look at some of the political rhetoric I hear when I turn on the news. Defense Budget It's not clear to me (or to many others) what the defense budget is meant to defend. Too often it has nothing to do with defense. By giving it the name defense, however, it sounds as though we are only reactive to evil that threatens us. Our military is important, but it is not only about defense. Lets drop the euphamism and call it a military budget. Reform: When Martin Luther nailed his 95 theses to the church door in Wittenberg, he proposed the Catholic Church reform. Reform once was used to describe the act of changing with an ultimate goal of removing corruption or privilege. Politicians today have tweaked the word to indicate that a change should be seen favorable and foreward thinking. Too often, however, today's reforms are nothing more than window dressing. Bipartisan Here is a word that should be encouraging. It implies that the two major political parties have united to accomplish something for the greater good of our nation or our world. Why then is there a feeling that when one hears the term bipartisan bantered about, one thinks more often of back room deals and decision making behind closed-doors? Special Interests How words can turn! At one time, special interests seemed to apply to those with enough money to buy their way into the presence of legislators to argue for a pet project. Today, however, the word often is used to negatively comment on the down trodden who have organized - single mothers, gays, feminists, racial and religious minorities, etc. The comment is usually levelled as a perjorative at those who previously lacked the money or organization to vote in numbers that might sway those in power. Centrist I was always told that the only things that one should consistently find in the middle of the road were a yellow stripe or a dead oppossum. Centrist, however, has become a positive label for someone who squats him/herself down firmly in the middle of the road - even when there is a truck ready to squash them. Sources are the anonymous folks who work for the people in power who are paid to provide soundbites that will put the proper spin on the day's events. We don't know who said it, but if it's repeated by Dan Rather then it must be true. Experts are the non-anonymous folks who work for the people in power who are paid to provide soundbites that will put the proper spin on the day's events. Remember, however, that to every PhD there is an equal and opposite PhD. There are still folks out there who claim to have scientific proof that man never walked on the moon, and that the Earth is flat. Senior Government Officials or Top U.S. Officials are granted a status of bigger than life experts. By being "senior" or "top," they take on an aura of authority that they may or may not have. They speak for that elusive entity that is "the government" and thus take on the spector of political prophets who cry out in the night. National Security is one of our great necessities, but has become a rallying cry for doing whatever our nation pleases. Phone taps, secret subpoenas of library records, and so on are all done in the name of national security. I think Ben Franklin said it best when he said, "They who would give up an essential liberty for temporary security, deserve neither liberty or security." The West is recognized by the press as the good guys. We are modern thinkers with the only right point of view on how countries should run. Western Diplomats are representatives of this great good in the world. We send them to talk to the more primitive and childlike people in the world so that they can eventually grow to be more like us. The patience of these diplomats is unending. Constitutional Right is a privilege granted by Constitution provided it meets with no public outcry that might change the judicial interpretation of it. It can also be effectively rescinded by those who wish to utilize the journalistic community for purposes of propaganda. Fight to bring Democracy A remnant of America's imperial days. Then, we came to stay and rule (or to instill rulers). Now we come to destroy the status quo and then leave the locals to make it all work. Words take on a life of their own. Repeat an idea often enough and people begin to think it's true. The list of words that have altered or lost meaning over time is huge. We never notice the slow changes of our language, but they are there. As the words change, so do our thoughts. The United States offers its citizens the opportunity to participate in national dialogue and debate. These are essential tools to keep the democratic processes working. When the words in our lexicon become hazy and inexact, however, our arguements lose their vitality. With the loss of precision and the growth of ambiguity in ideas expressed by our politicians and our media, the citizenry becomes disconnected and disenfranchised. While denotations may not change over time, connotations do. Words and phrases will always have a certain problem with ambiguity. We all may know what a chair is, but each of us may have a slightly different image of the word. We find ideas and events labeled by familiar words like "chair," and because the words are familiar, we think we can all agree upon their meaning; we think we all understand what is being said. By this labeling of ideas, we find it becomes easy to shirk the responsibility of exploring the ideas. Euphamism is not anything new. No doubt, Alexander the Great had someone spreading the word about his success in ways that would please the folks back at home. In Vietnam, the government had "pacification programs." Today, we describe civilians who end up dying when we hit a military target as "collateral damage." George Orwell wrote his essay about Politics and the English Language in 1946, four years before he passed away. His ideas, however, are as vibrant today as they were then. We need to educate ourselves to dig beneath the printed word and beyond the 7/24 news-blather. We need to get past the common words we think we understand, and to explore what, if anything, they really mean.  |
| Read all comments (8)|Write your own comment |
