Another in a series of posts of notes from a book by a college professor of mine at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. I took the class “General Semantics” from Kenneth G. Johnson in the early 1980s, and found it to be the most enlightening class I ever took. I hope you get something out of it, too.
XIX.
The degree to which communication occurs depends on the degree to which the worlds of the speaker (writer) represent similar experiences to the listener (reader).
Strictly speaking, words don’t “mean,” people “mean.” Don’t ask what a word means, ask what the person means when they say the word. Communication involves translation, but we’re not really translating word for word, but experience for experience.
Words have no one true meaning. For the 500 most used words in the English language, the Oxford Dictionary lists 14,070 meanings. Words mean different things to different people; they mean different things at different times; they mean different things in different contexts.
Take the word “beat” for example: He beat (hit) the dog with a stick. He beat (defeated) Joe at chess. This reporter has the mayor on his beat (area to cover). Beat’s me (don’t know)!
Some words can be used as verbs as well as nouns, giving them different meaning depending on how they are used. For example: I love love.
Perhaps we should consider words variables (such as x in mathematics); their range of meanings is limited by the context in which they appear.
Definitions tell you the relationships between words; descriptions tell you the relationships between words and things. Descriptions or examples are usually more useful in problem solving than definitions.
A dictionary should be considered a book of history, not a book of law.
Much misunderstanding is caused by ignoring contexts: I hate policemen who abuse their powers” vs. “He says he hates policemen.”
XX.
Some words do not inform.
Some words are sounds that convey emotional feeling. Growl words: “Jones is a dirty, lousy S.O.B.” Purr words: “It is a beautiful day.” In these instances, the speaker is projecting himself into the words. He is telling you he doesn’t like Jones without really giving you any specific information about Jones. His “beautiful” day could mean any number of things. All you know is that he feels positive about some aspect to this day.
Ritual language: hymn words, college yells, etc. These are often uninformative, but have emotional reasons for existing. They tend to form bonds of common reactions to verbal stimuli.
People often make noise for noise’s sake. For example, lyrics of songs sometimes do not make sense. And expressions such as “How are you” or “What’s up” are not requests for information; they are simply the response society expects in certain situations.
We are often satisfied with words that tell us nothing. “It’s just politics,” someone says. Does that really give us any information?
Colorful words and catch phrases often influence us, yet they have little or no relationship to the territory: “You’ve come a long way, baby.” “The establishment.” “Is it true blondes have more fun?” “Creeping socialism.” “Liberal media.”
