Today, I want to talk about those four letter words that tend to slip out of people's mouths on some manner of painful, frustrating, or really just about any other reason. A while back on my other blog I did a post about the woes of a society comfortable with belting out the f-word in an everyday situation. Though I still stand by my former post, I want to delve more into the place that profanity plays in our language.
To start off, I'll quote a highly reputable source to lend strength to my argument: Will Smith's character in I, Robot. Encountering a young, swearing Shia LaBeouf, he tells him to "stop swearing--you're not good at it." I would argue that the vast majority of Americans find themselves in the same state as young Shia's character. The strongest of words are used to suit the most minuscule of matters. This has happened to the point where these foul words have become absorbed within sayings of daily use and are used in common conversations. And, like a medicine used far too long, these words have become as meaningless as a breath exiting a mouth.
In my study of other languages, specifically those that were used in ancient times, I have learned just how scientific a language English is. English emerges from a society that holds emotion as a very private matter. Thus it comes as no surprise that much of the language that has adapted into what we use to communicate today holds much more of a mathematical efficiency to it rather than a more poetic and artful significance. Not to say that the English language is devoid of the ability to convey emotion; on the contrary, writers such as Shakespeare, Tyndale, and thousands of others have managed to make beautiful works of the English language. There is, however, a very big reason that English is called the "language of business" and the "language of technology."
In Hebrew and Greek, there oftentimes seems to be a lot more meaning behind a specific, singular word in a sentence. Some words can have as many as six different variables determining their exact meaning in Greek, while English has about four different variables maximum for a single word. Also, often you will find different words used in a redundant way that further emphasize the meaning of the sentence. The easiest instance to explain is in Hebrew: often you will find a set of words that will translate woodenly as "running he ran." This isn't done because ancient peoples were stupid, but rather because they wanted to say that this guy REALLY ran. One might say that he "%#$@ing ran." Additionally, both Hebrew and Greek use a multitude of words that translate to the same word in English. "Love" is the easiest example to go to, as Greek has four different words that are translated as such. But the meaning behind the verbs is very literally "lost in translation." Each carries a different aspect of love. The cold, calculating nature of English in some instances demands more force behind its stiff words to really put across the meaning of the speaker.
One of those instances is found in Mumford & Son's song "Little Lion Man." On my first encounter with this song, I was somewhat shocked by their use of profanity, but at the same time it struck me that it didn't carry the "dirty" feeling that comes with it most times. The writer, Marcus Mumford, was not using the word lightly--he was using the word to put across just how much he went wrong. This is one of the few instances I have heard where the coarse language was really justified in its use. Sadly, it is diluted by the flood of Call of Duty kiddies spitting words they don't understand, teenagers adapting their language to fit an undesirable profile, and adults denying failures their ego will not permit (though all of these can be interchanged amongst the ages). It is this dilution of our language that speaks a lot about the mindset of the rising generations, and it is this dilution that has me very worried.
No comments:
Post a Comment