Language Counts Scroll Down to See Articles in this Section
Introduction By Jay Burney
This is the first in a series of articles that I will publish occasionally about the topic of language and words. The central focus will be about how language is used to influence ideas and opinions.
Language helps us to know what we know, and to interpret and express how we feel. Language can be creative, playful, loving, flirting, supportive, truthful, seductive, and soothing. It can be controversial, pointed, exasperating, inflammatory, searing, shameless, deceptive, blasphemous, and infuriating. Language helps to nakedly shape our emotions. Language counts. That’s for sure.
Learning to use and to interpret language is a life long experience. Language is artful and seriously subjective. It is one of our most powerful human tools that we use to present and understand each other. We must learn to Occupy the Language, or it will Occupy Us.
A key concept that we will use in this column will be that of “critical thinking”. We will examine public language campaigns such as those that are constantly in the media. These campaigns are influential and transformational.
Media and the highly trained craftspeople that bring us media use carefully engineered techniques to shape our point of view. These strategies can range from truth telling to pure propaganda. The language of images, music, voices, and the overall messaging counts.
The coming weeks and months will be characterized by an intense political phase on planet earth focused on the upcoming U.S. Presidential Elections. Words will be used to convince us that certain things are so, while other things are not so. We are going to be exposed to an overwhelming carnage of words and images organized into provocative messages that are designed to shape our hearts and minds. It will often be hard to discern fact from fiction and reality from language altered perceptions. We will be told that up is down and that war is peace. Count on it.