Topic Tuesday #74 2013/12/17 - "Language"
If you look around the world, there are anywhere from 7,000 to 10,000 languages exist. About 35 languages fade into obscurity every year. We speak a miss mash of fallen languages that have merged into one another from neighboring tribes. Slave speech flowed into the slavers, the slavers speech fell to the slaves. We listen to accents and naturally judge where someone if from, what their class level is, and what kind of education and intelligence they wield their words with. Do their words whip like lashes? Do they drip like honey? Do they say one thing and simply mean the opposite? Can you tell?Sticks and Stones May Break My Bones But Words... They can kill you from the inside out - or not.
Words have meaning and by their usage and mastery they can invoke magic. They can call forth grand vistas, ugly smells, faces of such astonishing beauty that they could never actually exist. They can make you warm, make you blush, make you lie or make you tell the truth. You can be urged to hate and love. These words are thoughts. They are someone else's thoughts, being poured into you and you have to digest them, like it, or not...
Words can suffer over usage; they lose their power and become meaningless and flaccid. Obcinities are nothing but words that evoke strong feelings. By themselves, they are just words with basic definitions. It is their context that provides them power and their intent revealed. Words are nothing without the person composing them. They describe the character of the speaker. They provide a measure of the writer.
Pay close attention to the language you are exposed to for it is not always meant for you. Think carefully about how you use your own language. Seek to understand where it comes from. Try to be clear, but never boring. Try to be kind, if not forgiving.