I for one have never really understood the kerfuffle over
inclusion of the word ‘selfie’ in the Oxford Dictionary (MS Word underlines
this word marking it as a typographical error as I write). A successful
language is one that is capacious and elastic to accommodate such neologisms,
and English is renowned for being as such. Neologisms and borrowings have only
enriched the language.
Words are organic. They do have a life of their own—and
apparently lifetimes too. Words are born, evolve and die. There are words which
get phased out over a period of time from the corpus, and are eventually
forgotten. Some words, like some of the more flexible species of animals, adapt
and assume new meanings and connotations—sometimes complete opposite of the
original ones. Take for instance the word ‘timorous’: Shakespeare (in Othello)
used timorous to mean
fearsome/fear-inspiring; now it has come to mean fearful/trepid. Sometimes the
same word has two exactly opposite meanings and both the meanings co-exist, as
in case of the words cleave or dust (such words are called contranyms).
It’s through these changes and
adaptations that words manage to survive for long.
Changes occur not
only in terms of meanings but also parts of speech (so many words which were
strictly nouns once are freely used as verbs now) and class-associations. The
word ‘brainy’ would be scoffed at by a pedant for its slangy and lowbrow feel,
fifty years ago. Can ‘Hopefully’ be used to mean ‘it is to be hoped’ or should
it be used only to mean full of hope? Can ‘decimate’ be used to mean drastic
reduction, or should it only be used to mean a reduction of the order of
one-tenth? And other such debates have continued for many years now, and, um,
hopefully, will continue evermore.
Although usage guides thrive on such technicalities and
neologisms, and ensure that the discussions around them don’t fizzle out,
little sympathy is shown toward the words which are in the twilight of their
lifespan or which have already met with their end. While I am all for welcoming
fresh infusions in the language, I am a slightly averse to the idea of looking
down upon the usage of an archaic or refined word as an instance of
elitism.
Ernest Hemmingway disapproved of Nathaniel Hawthrone's style
of writing, for he found Hawthrone's usage of obsolete words or the "words that are not alive in the language"
annoying. If we take the formerly used animal-analogy further: doesn't it,
then, become incumbent on some of us to help the words which are becoming
extinct—just as the wildlife activists do with the endangered species. You may
argue that this seems like bit of a stretch. Whereas extinction of endangered
species could create an ecological imbalance, disappearance of a handful of
words would not have any such effect. Which is another way of saying that
unless they are of utility, it is fine for words to vanish.
But then, is the
purpose of language only utilitarian. Language, and by extension literature and
civilisation, would have been so drab. Is it inappropriate for writers to make
an attempt to help preserve 'endangered words'? Should this kind of activism be
cast off as deliberate obfuscation or undue display of verbiage?
I remember the ‘wordy’ debate the use of word
crepuscular by the Booker-prize winning
author Eleanor Catton in an article
had
kindled last year. A reader of Paris Review had alleged that the usage of the
words such as ‘crepuscular’ was an instance of exercising literary snobbery by the
author. Eleanor subsequently wrote an
essay
to vindicate herself.
Why can’t we open ourselves to the magic and beauty of
words? Why can’t we push ourselves a little when it comes to learning new
words? Why can’t we see a well placed and well used instance of a slightly
uncommon word as an opportunity of enriching our vocabulary rather than as an
undue display of verbiage by the writer/speaker. While we may embrace selfie and twerking freely, why can’t we also appreciate temerity or banausic?
There is something so tempting in the crunch of crepuscular when uttered, that is
missing in shadowy. There’s something so mouthful about surreptitious that is missing in secretive. It’s as though the word
claims your mouth and works every muscle of your mouth before plopping out of
it. Second hand
can never produce the same effect as vicarious. Mixing can never be as sonorous as mingling. Sublime is not the same as beautiful (ask Edmund Burke; poor fellow wrote an entire treatise
explaining the difference!)
Not very long ago Chetan Bhagat in one of his
columns
had mocked the usage of words such as
dexterity
and
temerity, and had suggested that
they are outdated and that they are not required in the job-market. Now, I am
not the kind who’d crinkle their nose if I find someone reading Bhagat. For
that matter, I have no bone to pick with Mr Bhagat. I don’t want to jump on to
the Bhagat-Bashing bandwagon which, in some sense, is a way of asserting your
intellectual superiority. Not everyone needs to, or has the tenacity, to deal
with the meandering plots of Rushdie. Not everyone is disposed to appreciate,
or has the patience to, endure layered and glacial narratives of the Arundhati
Roys and Anita Desais. And thus it is very well for such a person to pick up a
Bhagat and enjoy, well, a quickie. In spirit of disclosure, I must admit I
myself had read his debut novel and even enjoyed it then. There is a need and
market for all kinds.
And I think that’s
the best thing about books: they are not obtrusive. You don’t like it, you don’t
buy it or shut it. It’s as simple as that. Unlike Yo Yo Honey Singh’s songs (
the horror, the horror!), Chetan’s books
won’t haunt you from the gym to the night-club.
What bothers me to some degree, however, is the whiff of
this extremely narrow and utilitarian approach toward language that rises from
the said column: Only the portions of language which are consumable in the
job-market are worth retaining, while the rest is something that the literary
elite can go to devil with. And again, this view would have been in some ways
justified had Mr Bhagat been an investment banker that he earlier was, but
coming from a writer it sounds a bit worrying.
I hasten to add that this rant is not entirely impersonal.
As a trainer who deals with host of students and working professionals on any
given day, the most common and constant gripe I get to hear from my trainees is
about the heaps of “new and difficult” words they have to learn. With some
apprehension (I don’t wish to generalise), I also venture to add that most of
them are engineers. From what I
understand they suffer from the same what’s-the-use-of-knowing-them-when-you’re-not-gonna-use-them
syndrome: the same transactional approach. Everything, including words, has to
have use; otherwise it will be looked at as burden. I find this approach a bit
problematic. I keep explaining to them how they’re looking at the whole thing
wrong; how they ought to change the way they perceive words; how they need to
start liking and appreciating words if they want to be friends with words. Yes,
words have feelings too. If you like them, they like you back. And if you
don’t, they, too, are under no obligation to like you.
Sometimes, out of utter desperation, I have to invent and
borrow reasons which could incentivise their enriched vocabulary: I tell them
how good command over words can boost their dating prospects (this works in
some cases, I must admit). But other times I get to face a rather tepid
response from them when I am discussing new words with them. I remember once
almost losing my temper in the class when the trainees wore indifferent and
stony expressions on their respective faces as I discussed the so-called new
and difficult words. Of course I apologised to them shortly thereafter, but
when I reflected on the episode I realised that my discomfort sprung from the
different ways we perceive words. Words did not animate them the way they
animate me. A new word does not spark a frisson in them as it does in me. They
see words as a task, an onerous one at that. They see these words as a
short-term commitment and not a long-term investment. They don’t realise how
the knowledge of these words can be their doorway to great deal of knowledge.
Thriving on Buzzfeed the listicle culture, they might as well demand
replacement of words with GIFs!
Were I in their
place, I would gobble up all those new words with utmost alacrity—as I do even
now. And I am sure there are many others who have much deeper affection and
admiration for words than I may ever have. Wouldn’t branding such people as
literary snobs be a hasty judgement?
(P.S. Honest confession: I wanted to use banausic instead of drab
and logomachy instead of wordy debate,
but I refrained lest I should be frowned upon.)
