Irony Becomes Her

Linguistic Jolt

When this blog entry was suggested to me, I joked that I would have to "get up the inspiration" for said venture. It was a joke because, to me, inspiration is something over which I have no control; to be in-spired is to be visited by a spirit not already my own. It was brought to my attention that inspiration also means something else: simple breathing. In essence, by being alive, I am inspired, and I can indeed write if I have something to say.

So here is a blog written on the fuel of discipline rather than a high-and-mighty prophetic feeling. This is a subject that interests me, and so I will attempt to explain my thoughts on the matter.

"If you wish to argue with me, you must first define your terms." This quote from Voltaire resonated with me and helped me put my finger on what I don't like about arguments. Even beyond my naturally irenic leanings, I simply hate to hear arguments between people or entities that seem intent on misunderstanding one another's language; in fact, this misunderstanding seems to be the cause of the disagreement, not usually any essential conflict of desires. My question when I am caught up in these sorts of discussions is usually, "What exactly do you mean by ____?"

The difficulty with this, as any linguist would tell you, is that our words have little objective ground of meaning. If you look up the definition in, say, Webster's, you will find that a word definition is composed of words. Looking up those words, I will only find other definitions composed of words, perhaps even using the word for which I originally sought the meaning. This truth came to me very young when my inquisitive mind drove me to the entry for "and" in a concise dictionary. You might be able to guess which word appeared in that definition.*

When we view words as objects meaning the same thing to every person who uses them, we ignore the vast construction that supports them. The only reason we know any meaning for the words is because we observed over many years (most effectively as children) what other people do when we use them. We had to put together many simple pieces of information to understand even the concept of meaningful language; we cannot expect that process to be the same in others as it is in ourselves for every word. I know "red" because of my mom pointing to an apple; you know it because your mom pointed to bricks. Our conception of what is "red" is similar, but not absolute and objective. Literally, there are "shades" of meaning to the word.

The things we tend to argue about are usually much more complex than a primary color; how we came to understand the terms we are using is much harder to describe. When we talk about "justice," we will be drawing on many of our images and experiences to flesh out what we mean by the word. But the person we're talking to doesn't own the same images and experiences. We must do our best to define terms together. Sometimes it is necessary to explain with a story, perhaps a parable, before arguing over terms.

Jesus did this with a scribe in the gospel of Luke. When the scribe asked for a word definition ("Who is my neighbor?"), Jesus established some common ground by telling a story. Once they shared a common piece of information--the parable--they could talk about what a neighbor was. By that point, it was pretty evident. The scribe could agree or disagree with Jesus's definition, and thus continue or end the argument. What the scribe did is what I would call a "linguistic jolt." He demanded a reconsideration of a term that had become rather dead from overusage. He did so, reportedly, to "justify himself," but it still resulted in a clarification that has helped millions in the past two millennia.

If politicians really wanted reconciliation, I believe a few linguistic jolts could do wonders. Debates could involve honest discussion of the terms by which they frame their opponents, much like Jesus and the scribe. Opponents and advocates of abortion "rights" could create common parables of what "rights," "fetuses," and "life" are. Perhaps a bit uncomfortable at first, but the result would be, I believe, beneficial to real communication and cooperation. Much as the public likes conflict and spectacle, however, we don't like to be jolted. We really would prefer to villainize the other side because they do not embrace our definitions.

I believe that there are essential philosophical differences that are not linguistic. But we should do our best to cut linguistic folly when we get into those. That is how we can seek to understand one another--a huge step toward the love we are mandated to show.
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*Yes: "and."

posted by Lynn @ 12:13 PM