words really aren't interchangable

[story645]

Article that spurred this rant: Wanted: Better Words from Young Mouths

"Every time I hear a monosyllable, I can hear the framework of America crumbling with it."Every time I see a misused polysyllabic word, I anthropomorphize my thesaurus by picturing it crying. That flavor and color extolled in the essay comes from the fact that words have nuance

Comments

[kerosinkanister]

I thought it was my bedtime but then I checked my flist

[story645]

I love poetry, but I feel that poetry and prose are the only instances in which clarity can be sacrificied, and then it must be for a reason. In other words form still has to follow function.

I use shag in most forums cause it's the pg version but means the same thing, but yeah. I think "make love" is cringeworthy and "want to have sex" is awkward. The short vulgar word fits the short vulgar conversation.

[greensweaterlj]

God, what a little snot.

(See how I don't need big words?)

[story645]

Yeah my initial response was just a grrr. Then I went the articulate route, but I still feel my initial thought of "dude, you don't know what you're talking about" might have been better.

[story645]

*snort* I think he should learn a language that's very clipped and concise, one where everyword is full of meaning but the vocabulary is limited. Either you can say it with just this word or you can't really say it at all. Lots of languages like that.

[story645]

I think that I meant something different from what I said if I think about it again. In my head I was just thinking about the trouble of translating anything from one langauge to another. For every one word there are four that are almost but not quite fit but miss a little something. But you know that there really isn't even another word in the other language for the exact same thing. Concepts are the worse in this respect. Think of how much English leaves in other langauges cause it doesn't translate easily.