A Rosoideae by Any Other Name
or
“What we’ve got here is a failure to communicate…”
Item: I once went to my doctor and old him I had pain in my
kneecap. He examined it and told me I had “chondromalacia patella.” “What does that mean,” I asked. “That
means,” he replied confidently, “that you have pain in your kneecap.”
Item: I had a friend who was incredibly proud of his infant
son saying the word “ball.” Sure enough, when I visited, the tyke was playing
with a big red one, happily giggling to us “ball… ball…” What a prodigy! Of course, he also used
the word “ball” to describe a shoe, a hat, a cookie, and the cat. Perhaps you can imagine how pleased the
cat was to be included.
*****
”I propose that the fundamental purpose of language is to
communicate. By communicate, I mean that what the message receiver hears is
what the message sender meant. It doesn’t always go down that way. Maybe you’ve
noticed.
Part of this failure to communicate is because about 90%
(your mileage may vary) of communication has nothing to do with the text, that
is, communication isn’t limited to the actual words you say. The largest part of the meaning in the
message is non-verbal: posture, gesture, facial expression. Another chunk is
para-verbal: volume, pitch, tone, pace, inflection. Actors
do an exercise in which they play a scene, say, a couple breaking up, but
instead of dialogue, they just say the alphabet. They focus on the non-verbal
and para-verbal elements, stemming from what actors like to call the
“sub-text.” As in, “What’s my motivation in this scene?” That’s why you can understand
what’s going on in an opera sung in Italian, even when you have no idea of what
words they’re singing. It’s also why email is such a lousy method of
communication. But to be fair, ANY print medium deprives the message senders
and receivers of the para-verbal and non-verbal dimensions of communication,
emoticons, notwithstanding.
Another part of the communication problem is that not
everyone uses language to clarify, elucidate, and illuminate. Some people use
language to confuse, obfuscate, complicate and confound. Yes, Virginia, some
people are liars. But also language can serve to identify who’s in with the
in-crowd, who’s hip and who’s a drip. That’s why teenage slang is always
changing; once adults get hip to it, it’s not cool anymore, that is, it’s no
longer a reliable identifier of US as opposed to THEM. Criminal slang changes when the cops
get hip to it. When the enemy
knows the password, you change it.
Some people use language as a power trip, to denigrate, ridicule
or disenfranchise others who don’t know the right secret words. For example in a recent online
(there’s two strikes against communication, right there) discussion of the
longsword, I mentioned that I had had the opportunity to learn something of
this weapon from a mentor many years ago, about a decade prior to the other
party’s involvement in it. The
other party –who for some reason believes that the longsword had been dead and
forgotten until he and his pals discovered it--- then, rather rudely demanded
to know what “sources” (texts) I had used. He further demanded to know if I
knew this or that medieval German longsword term. This gentleman’s position was 1) that I could not possibly
learn longsword from an actual teacher, without meticulously scrutinizing some
ancient book and 2) that I could not possibly know anything about the longsword
if I did not use the same arcane pet-names for it that he did himself. The
gentleman’s underlying error here is learning domain confusion. He’s likely
very good at the cognitive domain, but it leads him to believe that the truth,
the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, can be found exclusively in and
through his sacred text.
But a book no more contains truth than a clock contains
time.
Well. I don’t speak German, that’s a fact. And neither does
a longsword. It has no idea whether you are speaking German, French or
Venusian, and it doesn’t care. Whichever language you choose to describe it is
irrelevant to how the weapon is used. Fighting-form follows function. When
fighting-form follows fashion, you’re toast.
“The beginning of wisdom is to call things by their right
names.
--- K’ung Fu-Tse
(Confucious)
A third part of the problem is that context often defines
the meaning of a word, for example when used in a court of law. Many words that
are commonly used with broad latitude of meaning have more specific, narrow and particular meanings as terms
of art, the jargon of a particular field.
Therein lies the hub of the rub.
For example, the word “attack” is used by most people to
indicate any forceful aggressive action intended to injure or destroy. As in: “He attacked her in the alley.”
“The bombers attacked the city.” “They
attacked his character.”
You might also “attack the problem head on.” Or you could say,
“He attacked the steak with gusto.” “He attacked the problem head-on.” It can mean an incident of something “an attack of hunger,
an attack of loneliness or anxiety – or an attack of silliness.
However, as a term of art in music, “attack” has a
particular meaning and refers to the manner in which a tone is begun.
Likewise, in hoplology, “attack” refers to the initial
offensive action in a phrase comprising more than one offensive action.
Good science requires that you define your terms as narrowly
as possible, and use them in accordance with those definitions. Avoid using two
different terms to describe the same thing, and avoid using the same term to
describe two unlike things.
"Tell us...in your own words." Do you have
your own words? Personally, I'm using the ones everybody else has been using.
Next time they tell you to say something in your own words, say, "Nigflot
blorny quando floon." -George
Carlin
I believe the lexicon of a particular discipline should
facilitate understanding and communication. It should be as precisely definitive as possible. The use of foreign language terms, for
any other reason, is merely as an obstacle.
Many languages have a word that means, “cut.” If your
language is German, then it makes perfect sense for you to use the German terms.
If your language is French, what’s the point of adopting the German term? Is it
somehow more precisely descriptive of a “cut” than the equivalent French
word? It’s possible.
Take for example the fencing term “deceive,” as in “to
deceive the blade.” To deceive the
blade means that your opponent intends to make some blade contact, to touch your
blade with his own. When you avoid that blade contact, that is to “deceive” his
blade.
Fair enough.
But suppose there are two very tactical different situations.
In the first, the opponent’s attempt at blade contact has an
offensive character, that is, it’s an attempt at preparation (engagement, beat,
press, etc) to facilitate a
subsequent attack.
In the second situation, you are making an attack, and the
opponent’s attempt at blade contact is defensive in character, That is, your
opponent is attempting to parry your attack.
In English, the word “deceive” is used to describe both
situations.
But in French, there are two words “tromper” and
derober. Derober can mean to slip
away or shy away from or to hide from.
Tromper can mean to cheat, swindle, tease, trick, fool, falsify or hoax.
If the opponent’s attempt at blade contact has an offensive
character, then when you avoid or “deceive” his blade contact, you are slipping
away, shying away, or hiding from it.
If the opponent’s attempt at blade contact is defensive, in
response to your particular attack, then when you avoid or “deceive” his blade
contact and continue your attack in some other line, to some other target, you
have tricked, fooled, teased, cheated or swindled him – having appeared to be
doing one thing, but actually doing quite another thing.
I submit that the French terms derober to describe your
“deception” in the first situation, and tromper to describe your “deception” in
the second situation, are more accurate and precise than using “deceive” for
both situations. Therefore, in the
interest of clarity, I would favor using the French terms derober and tromper over the single English
term “deceive.”
Let’s consider another example.
In fencing, there are various trajectories (called “lines”) that
a blow, whether cut or thrust, can take to reach the target. The trajectory can
be above or below the opponent’s swordhand. In English we refer to that above
the hand as being in the “high” line. That below the swordhand we call the
“low” line.
In French, the two words are dessus (on top of) for the high
line, and dessous (under, beneath or below) for the low line. Despite their similar spellings, and,
to the untrained ear, similar pronunciation, these words mean opposite things.
Further, these words have no special meaning that the English words do not
have. That is, they do not define the high and low lines any more precisely or
accurately than the English words do.
I would submit that, for an English-speaker, the lack of any greater
clarity with the French terms, combined with the high likelihood of confusion
and error in using the French terms, suggests that the best choice would be to
use the English terms “high and “low, and not the French terms “dessus and
dessous.
"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said, in rather
a scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor
less."
"The question is," said Alice, "whether you can make words mean
so many different things."
"The question is," said Humpty Dumpty, "which is to be
master—that's all." - Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking-Glass (1872)
The reason that selecting appropriate terms is important is
that the way you talk about something strongly influences the way you think
about something. And how you think about something strongly influences how you
behave in regard to that thing.
This is important to understand, because, as already noted,
terms are not always used to improve understanding and facilitate accurate
communication.
For example, let’s consider the word “terrorism.”
Back when I was first learning about such things,
“terrorism” had a very narrow, specific and precise meaning. It described a very particular type of
coercion. In the law, “coercion” defines the use of force or the threat of
force to compel a person to do something that they have a legal right NOT to
do, or to prevent someone from doing something that they have a legal right TO
do.
Terrorism is the use of force or the threat of force to
coerce a given population to do or not do something in order for the coercing
party to achieve some political end. The political component is a sine qua non.
Using coercion so you can rob a bank is not “terrorism.” Further, not only must the end be
political, but with “terrorism”
the coercion must target the innocent, non-combatants – especially children,
and be characterized by extreme depravity, brutality or cruelty (the
unnecessary infliction of unnecessary pain) that one could say “shocks the
conscience.”
Given this history of “terrorism,” it is no wonder that in
the popular consciousness a “terrorist” is considered to be a vicious, and
sadistic person, lacking in compassion, decency, fairness, courage – indeed
lacking ANY respectable human qualities at all. A bully and a coward. Such a person is typically regarded with
an immediate negative emotional response,
disdain, contempt, outrage,
and hatred.
Savvy political propagandists, however, have no interest in
maintaining the once-narrow definition of terrorism. On the contrary, their interest is in expanding the term to
include anyone and everyone who opposes them or might oppose them. Indeed, they
have spent the last couple of decades broadening the definition of terrorism to include --- well,
practically everything. People who
have the gall to resist a foreign army invading their country and killing their
friends and families, are all most certainly “terrorists.” People trying to
protect the environment from wholesale pollution and destruction by parasitic
mega-corporations are now “eco-terrorists.” People who want to save animals from living lives of
unimaginable horror on factory farms are now “agri-terrorists.” Peaceful
protestors, people who esteem the bill of rights, Muslims, Christians, Gays and
Feminists have all been described as some form of “ domestic terrorist.” Once there were jaywalkers; now they
are pedestrian terrorists. It
is the hope of the political propagandist that by dubbing someone a “terrorist”
other people will respond emotionally, automatically condemning the “terrorist”
based on those characteristics that they associate with someone who is, in
fact, a true terrorist, according to the narrow, accurate and precise
definition of that word. To the propagandist, eliciting that emotional response
is important because they know that their audience cannot respond emotionally
and rationally at the same time. And “rationally” would give the lie to their
use of the word. But to the extent that they can keep you emotionally aroused
with some combination of fear, anger and hatred, they can be sure that you will
remain incapable of the critical thinking that would almost certainly conclude
that the propagandists, themselves, are liars, thieves and murderers.
Truth-seeking is contingent upon rational analysis and
critical thinking. It can be greatly facilitated --- or substantially
obstructed --- by the use of language.
That’s a good lesson. Courtesy of the Sword.
aac
