Words that Abduct your Audience

Moonbeam

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Words That Abduct Your Audience

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Gone. That’s right. Nothing says more about you than the way you speak (or write).

Here is a list of words that will turn your audience off and make them disappear into space: 

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Slang:

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1) Ain’t. This is the classic American mistake. I still remember the way my Mom reacted when I tried this one out on her during Kindergarden. If you want to sound educated, avoid this word at all costs.

2) Dude. What kind of a guy is a dude? Only movie stars can use “dude” without sounding patronizing. “Guy” is the usual American expression for an unremarkable man.

3) Booze/Boozer/Druggie. The words you choose reflect your assessment of your audience, and in particular whether or not you respect them. Respect is one of the cardinal virtues of communication; any word that conveys unfounded disrespect for audience or subject will undercut your argument. When referring to people fighting an addiction, use “alcoholic,” “has a drinking problem,” or “is struggling with substance abuse.”

4) Awesome/Mindboggling. Emotional responses have their uses, but in writing and mixed company, avoid them. Keep the emotional tone as even as possible in formal venues.

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UFOs. What are these? Do they exist?

1) Thing (when used as an initial reference): “The thing just isn’t going to work.” Get specific: which thing?

2) Concept: This is the intangible version of “thing.” Use “idea.”

3) I Feel/I Believe/I Think. All of these verbs take attention away from your argument and place it squarely on you. Deleting these phrases will help keep people focused on what you’re trying to say.

4) The Public. Does anyone speak for the public? How much of the public have you encountered so far? Use “people.”

5) Very/Really. These words have been worn down to nothing. Cut them whenever you see them.

6) Sort of/Kind of. Verbiage. Get rid of them.

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Buzz Words

1) Unique. Few things exist without another of their kind. In most instances, “unusual” is closer to the mark.

2) Creative. Shakespeare was creative; Blake was, too. How many people or ideas do you know that remind you of them? use “ingenious” or “artistic.”

3) Just: “I just want you to know…” Meant to suggest that the speaker or writer isn’t trying to do what he or she is trying to do, or that the subject of the conversation isn’t important. It is important.

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Bad Yuppie Words. The Worst of the Worst.

1) Innovative/Cutting Edge. How many innovations change the world? Use “new.”

2) Paradigm/Synergy. These words will beam folks up into space every time. Use “model” and “complement.”

3) Key: “The new building was key to our plan.” Maybe the most common BYW. Use “essential” or “critical.”

 

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Photo–Moonbeam; Author: P199; WikiCmns; Public Domain.

Policeman to the World?

Libyan Uprising

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Have we been here before? Another country recently on the edge of our attention is being torn by civil war. The head of state, installed as a result of a military coup decades ago, is the target of a large-scale uprising on the part of his own people. The government possesses unquestioned military power; the rebels, whatever forces they can cobble together. Control of one of the world’s largest reserves of oil is at stake. Should we intervene?

The situation in Libya does not parallel the circumstances of Bosnia in the 1990s or of Iraq back in 2003, but the issue of intervention is only too familiar. Are we policeman to the world?

I feel a lot more comfortable saying “yes” when the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) is involved. Now it is not just the United States, but much of the western world that must pass judgment and sacrifice blood and treasure if necessary.

But Libya is part of the Muslim community; what right do we in the secular/Christian west have to intervene? Well, as it turns out, NATO may be better suited to the job than you might think. Though the alliance is mainly composed of European countries, its membership includes Turkey, a Muslim nation. So we are on firmer ground from a religious/cultural viewpoint if NATO does intervene in Libya.

But let’s not kid ourselves: if NATO is to serve as policeman to at least much of the world, its culture and other characteristics are still unquestionably European. For instance, the alliance is providing essential service in Afganistan, but what in the world does Afghanistan have to to do with the North Atlantic?

Maybe it’s time to redefine the role and identity of NATO, which was founded after WWII to defend western Europe. Now the Soviet Union is gone, and NATO comprises 28 member nations, not the original 12. Could we possibly expand the alliance still further to include members clearly outside the bounds of Europe and North America?

Some candidates come immediately to mind: Australia, Japan, Russia. Of course, incorporating these countries would make clear to all the global nature of the alliance’s defense mission. Here are some tougher choices: Mexico, Brazil, Nigeria, South Africa–countries with histories of political strife and instability, governed by fragile democracies. On the other hand, the Baltic states, Romania, and Bulgaria (all of which have a history of political strife) are NATO members, and everything seems to be well with them so far.

What would the mission of such an expanded NATO be? 1) To protect the territorial integrity of member nations and 2) to increase the political stability of the regions that member nations are located in.

And what about a new name for the alliance? The Global Peace and Security Organization? Pretty lame, I admit. But at the same time truer to NATO’s emerging mission.     RT

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Photo. Src: WikiCmns; Author:

	http://www.taghribnews.ir/vdcjtmet.uqehaz29fu.html;License: CC 3.0 Unported.

Build Me a Wing: The Ascent of Syntax

Studies for a Flying Machine; Leonardo da Vinci

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Grammatical adventurers, take note: We have emerged from the moist and hazy landscape of morphology onto the invigorating veldt of syntax. Here we will encounter all manner of fantastical beasts: Wh-movements lumbering about, trumpeting and flapping their huge ears while parasitic gaps crawl over their hides, carving crevasses as they go; nanosyntaxes scurrying here and there among the verbiage; modifiers (dangling or otherwise) chopping away industriously at large clusters of overripe sentences, even the endangered purple expletive, snorting and stamping and waving its fabled horn of interjection about.

Cut, cut, CUT! Folks, this is the wrong script…we need to move to Renaissance Italy, or maybe it’s classical Greece…

Ok, I admit it: I’m a ham. Here is the real deal about syntax (or at least as far as I understand it)–

1) Syntax is the study of the way that words are combined to create a sentence. One way to understand this is to say that syntax is morphology taken to the next level. The big difference here is scope: whereas morphology deals with the meaning of individual words–the combination of a word’s root meaning and the meanings created by its affixes, syntax deals with the way that words combine in a sentence to create a more complex meaning. And since there are various classes of words and a seemingly infinite number of ways to combine them, the study of syntax has generated many schools of interpretation.

2) Here, in broad strokes, are some of the principle interpretations of the way that sentences are constructed:

a) Traditional Grammar. This approach takes as its starting point the belief that language and its structure directly reflects the underlying structure and logic of thought. Because the underlying structure is universal, there must be a single best way to build a sentence.

Because TG was developed initially in classical times and maintained into the early modern era in Europe, its analysis reflects European trends in philosophy and the relatively limited sentence structures of European language.

Traditional Grammar’s standard analysis of a sentence follows: Subject + Copula + Predicate.

b) Generative Grammar. This is the first of the modern schools. GG recognizes that there are a multiplicity of ways that sentences are put together in languages around the world. Only some languages, for instance,  use the Subject-Verb-Object (SVO) order common in Europe. But, GG maintains, underneath the multitude of forms likes an inner language that all spoken languages follow. In other words, it is possible for people to understand each other, no matter what their native language might be. Noam Chomsky is the current (and longtime) champion of this school.

c) Non-Universal Grammar. OK, I’m really out on the proverbial limb here, since my understanding of this school is based on the reading of a single New Yorker article some years ago. Dan Everett, a linguist who has been living with the Piraha people in the Amazon jungle for upwards of 30 years, believe that Piraha, the language these people speak, demonstrates that language is not a uniform capability generated by all human brains. Our ability to speak (and think) is directly related to the number of concepts (i.e, words) we learn as children. That is, if you are introduced only to the numbers 1 and 2 when young, you will have difficulty understanding larger numbers as an adult. Since Chomsky has designated his approach to grammar “Universal,” Everett’s position could be called “Non-Universal.”

Gosh, golly, and gee! I began writing this post thinking that syntax is the combination and structuring of smaller units of meaning into larger “machines” that could catch the underlying currents of meaning–much in the way that a bird’s wings depend on air and its currents for flight. But it now seems to me that far from having a single, more-or-a-less universal feather-and-wing design, syntax may depend on a large variety of designs to capture meaning. Or it may be that the parts of syntax’s wings themselves generate the air and current.  Whoa!   RT

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Image: Src: Wikicommons; License: Public Domain

Dream-Dust

Fomalhaut

 

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Stars have been inspiring people for a long time, and surely one of our first impulses must have been to name them. You might think that poets, visionaries that we are, have at least some of the most beautiful names given to the night’s dream-dust committed to memory–but I have not seen many such names in poems from any period. To help remedy this dearth of dreaming, I list some of the more gorgeous stars below (I give the traditional name & its meaning, then the scientific designation):

1. Aldebaran/”the follower”/Alpha Tauri

2. Al Kalb al Rai/”the shepherd’s dog”/Rho-2 Cephei

3. Arneb/”the rabbit”/Alpha Leoporis

4. Betelguese/Alpha Orionis

5. Electra/17 Tauri

6. Fomalhaut/”mouth of the whale”/Alpha Piscis Austrinus

7. Kraz/perhaps Latin “tomorrow” thru Arabic/Beta Corvi

8. Kullat Nunu/Eta Piscium

9. Maia/20 Tauri

10. Menkib al Nesr/”the vulture’s shoulder”/Gamma Aquilae

10. Mintaka/Delta Orionis

11. Okul/”eye”/Pi Capricorni

12. Rigel/Beta Orionis

13. Spica/Alpha Virginis

14. Sualocin/Alpha Delphini

15. Tseen Kee/”star chart”/Phi Velorum

16. Unuk/”the serpent(‘s neck)”/Alpha Serpentis

17. Vega/Alpha Lyrae

18. Yildun/”the star”/Delta Ursae Minoris

19. Zaurak/”the boat”/Gamma Eridani

and one that’ll really wow ‘em:

20. Shurnarkabti-sha-shutu/”the bull in the star towards the south”/Zeta Tauri

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Image src: WikiCmns; license: Public Domain

the word is dead; long live the word!

src: brockhaus&efron; wikicommons

word invention, one of those engines of language creation, seems to be out of fashion. It says weird, why don’t you fit in, normalize your vocabulary. Well, i think english could use some new bells and whistles. So I’ll offer some of the words I’ve made up over the years:

1) Zumi: a bridge

2) Azhoka: one of the languages spoken by centaurs

3) Panat: literally, a fifth; one of the divisions that the city Orrenea is divided into

4) Orrenea: a city of canals lying at the mouth of the Kirruri River. Seat of the Council of Kings and the Safarbin

5) Fire-pearl: a fresh-water pearl harvested from oysters in the silk-grass steppes

6) Zochi: the Dreamer, who made the moon

7) Aruna: the Singer, who made the sun

8) Asmeva: a centaur, what the centaurs call themselves

9) the Hisanzh: the island of the centaurs in Orrenea

10) the Magnaura: the building in Orrenea where the Council of King meets

all of these words from my novel about centaurs, which may eventually take wings and fly…    RT

Learning Alphabets

Part 3, The Alphabet and Redefining Intelligence

This is the latest installment concerning my off-and-on enthusiasm for reforming the English alphabet and possibly creating a global alphabet.

That our current alphabet confounds many adults and more students is no secret…and in my last installment in the series I looked at spelling reform briefly. Now things start to get a bit more complex…we’ll look at some alphabets that actually add new letters to the existing one.

1. The Pitman Initial Teaching Alphabet

Designed by the grandson of the man who invented Pitman Shorthand, this system was adopted on an experimental basis in some schools in the U.K., the U.S., and Australia during the 60s. But the mainstream educational system did not adopt it, partly because of complaints that while the kids indeed  found the Pittman ITA easy to learn, they found the transition from the ITA to the regular alphabet difficult….whether because they had already imprinted the ITA onto their brains or because the English alphabet is just plain hard to learn, is unclear. Still, the ITA does seem to suggest that a revised alphabet would be easier to learn than the one we have. That is probably due to the fact that the ITA follows the one-sound, one-letter principle, offering many new letters for the vowel sounds. For those who want to learn more about the ITA, go to omniglot at http://www.omniglot.com/writing/ita.htm.

The real problem with teaching alphabets, of course, is that they are meant to be a bridge to the English alphabet when they are in many ways superior to it. If children find the Pitman ITA easier to learn, then why not let them use it as adults?

But there is a further problem with the ITA, or any reform that attempts to improve or perfect the latin letters we currently use: the latin letters were designed to be carved into marble monuments or on plaques that listed Imperial laws and achievements. We, on the other hand, are brought up to write onto paper by hand. The shapes of the current letters slow down our writing. Have any alphabets been designed that depart from latin letters in form, so that the act of writing is easier? Tune in next time, folks, for the answer.

yours once again, RT

Spelling Reform

Part 2, The Alphabet and Redefining Intelligence

In Part 1 of this series (see below), I noted at least two major problems with any reform in English orthography: 1) the difficulty of getting people to agree on a plan and 2) the practical difficulties in keyboards over to the new system. The best answer to these objections is the principle of simplicity. Any proposed changes should be as simple as possible.

So let’s take a look at one of the simplest and oldest approaches to solving the problems of the English alphabet: Spelling Reform.

Starting with Benjamin Franklin and Noah Webster in the United States, and with Samuel Johnson (and before) in the U.K., important people have been championing the idea of a simplified, uniform spelling system. Spelling Reform does not add new letters to the alphabet; it discards unnecessary letters from spelling, advocates the consistent use of a letter to represent a sound, and the adoption of digraphs (or two letters used as a unit to represent a sound) for sounds that currently share a letter with another sound. Suggestions for change include: catalog for catalogue; frend for friend; aamenable for amenable; iice for ice; and wriitgg for writing.

Simple means easy, and as catalog demonstrates, the spelling reformers have had some success in changing the way that people actually write. After all, no keyboards have to be changed, and in at least some cases, clarity of meaning and ease of instruction, as well as speed of composition, is improved.

There are still organizations working to improve and simplify spelling: check out http://www.spellingsociety.org/ for one group that has helpful suggestions.

No reform is perfect, of course, and in the case of spelling reform, aamenable poses a problem. Some folks pronounce the word with the a of age, others with ah of alternative. Which sound does the aa represent?

Since there are other such instances, and particularly between speakers of different dialects, it looks like spelling reform, while certainly helpful and simple, may not be comprehensive reform.

Which leads us to teaching alphabets, the subject of Part III, another post not too far in the future.

as always, RT

the alphabet & redefining intelligence

Part I

the alphabet may be the key to uniting humanity.

No really, I’m serious. Writing is the fundamental magic that created urban life, that cemented the walls that made people safe (at least for a while). the ancients who began inventing the first writing system, cuneiform, about 3200 BC, knew this, and included a god of writing in their cosmology, but it seems that we have forgotten how important (and difficult) writing–and even learning the alphabet–can be.

Some people, of course, are lucky. The English alphabet? Twenty-six letters? Piece of cake! I always read way ahead of my grade level!

But then the problems start: our alphabet wasn’t designed for writing English. The earliest forms of the latin alphabet, on which our letters are based, goes back to the 6th Century BC, and the alphabet was bequeathed to us by the Romans, for whom the proto-English were a bunch of barbarians on the wrong side of the frontier.

So where does that leave us? There are thirteen vowel sounds & seven dipthongs (at least according to the Wikipedia article; check it out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_language#Phonology).

But at last count there were only five vowels in our alphabet; not the best news for English orthographers, aspiring or otherwise.

And then there are the common sounds in the language: “th” and “ing,” for instance. Why aren’t there single letters to represent these sounds?

Plenty of other examples exist, but I think it’s fair to say just on the basis of the problems already mentioned that our common alphabet isn’t the most efficient or effective way of writing down English. That isn’t to say that there aren’t some powerful arguments for continuing to use the current alphabet, but certainly one of them isn’t ease of teaching. Especially if a student is struggling with one of the learning disabilities that can make learning the alphabet devilishly hard.

I’ll close this opening volley by noting one of the biggest reasons for not improving the alphabet: the difficulty of changing over keyboards to the new system. (The biggest reason is probably getting everyone to agree on a new system.)

Puzzled & Perplexed, I remain, RT

definition

Hi, folks!

a rag tree is a tree that has been covered with rags and other pieces of clothing. the trees, usually found in celtic countries, are almost always hawthorns and located near holy wells. the custom, which is ancient, is to wash at the holy well, and then hang a piece of clothing from a person who is ill or sick on the tree, in the belief that as the piece of clothing rots, the person will get better.

the custom developed from earlier practice in ancient, pre-christian ireland; at that time, a warrior would wash in the well, then hang the head of his enemy on the tree as a means of placating the enemy’s spirit. (pagan ireland was a headhunter culture)

i have chosen to name the blog after rag trees not only because they are a symbol of healing, but also it is an example of transforming a violent custom into one which focuses on peace and healing.