Newman and Genevieve Birk stress how it is human nature to use charged words in communication; in writing or in speaking, we all have our individual interpretations of things. Without intention we express the facts based on our point of view, that is how and what events took place the way it was personally seen, and then misleading the reader/listener. An example would be about a mother and a daughter. As a completely unbiased narrator, the story would be of a common mother-daughter misunderstanding. The daughter, required to stay after school because of an unfinished group work, forget to phone home.
After the academic related hours with friends, she decides there is no harm on getting something to eat before heading home. Then from eating, it became getting coffee, dessert and finally hanging out at the mall. This is very common for everybody, unexpected events. On the other hand, her mother’s at home relentlessly trying to get a hold of her cell phone. Unfortunately, the daughter’s cell phone is ignored (as she had kept it silent the entire time in school) or maybe the phone loses its battery life. To the daughter she is completely innocent and had no bad intentions against her mother; like any teenager, she simply forgot to call home. What about the mother’s point of view?
In the opposite side of the grass, it so happened that a mother had important errands to meet and no one was to stay home with her 5 year old son but her 16 year old daughter. Thinking that she may have stayed afterschool, the mom went to the high school and found her daughter out of sight. It was close to 8 and still her daughter was of no reach. From upset and angry because of missing 2 important meetings, she suddenly becomes worried. She was last seen with friends around 4:30 but was heard to be heading home. After calling all her daughter’s contacts one finally answered, the best friend. As a mother, she in frantic and excited to know where her daughter is but glad she was safe, also she demands her home immediately.
From this point on, the mother and the daughter would have their own opinion of what happened. The daughter would probably accuse her mother of being dramatic, exaggerated and overprotective. The mother, furious, would take her daughter as inconsiderate, selfish, and immature (irresponsible). Nevertheless, to get a full account of what happened, it is necessary to hear of both sides. Having our own responses is natural, and how the story is passed on depends on the reader/listener’s past, personality, moral beliefs, etc. Would he/she sympathize with the mother or the daughter; which negative reactions would be emphasized?
Charged words, though often unbalanced, shape or allows the speaker to express their ideas and feelings entirely; if not entirely, to its extent. That is the point of communicating, getting intentions to others. Without charged words, we limit ourselves; a very familiar thing to many writing pupils. A writer is all about opinions and feelings, with these factors the reader can understand and maybe share the same feelings as the writer. A book or a novel’s tone depends entirely on the writer’s stance in life. If he/she is completely uncharged in writing, the reader would get a completely trite material.
Life is all about opinions and speaking out. Uncharged words do not exist except in the dreariest encyclopedia, which includes of no attitude. “Without charged language, life would be but half life”, (Birk & Birk 139). When a writer/speaker tries to be balanced in words, information is being kept hidden because people do not always know of balanced information. Listeners always know more of the negative or the positive side of the information, never of both equally. Some things are just more familiar to others; that is why we must live with charged language. Lastly, charged words advocate our personality and character. It tells other people more than a story but OUR PERSONAL story.
The last paragraph speaks nothing but the truth. There is nothing more correct than saying that, "life is all about opinions and speaking out." We all need to be outspoken. Speaking our minds is what life is about, having the capacity to say what you need to say, at the time you need to say it, couldn't possibly be any lovelier.
ReplyDeleteWhat I am most interested in was the "charged" words. Basically what charged and uncharged words are either spoken or unspoken words that have a full thought in them. I believe there can be uncharged words though, because even though sometimes we want to be outspoken and blunt there's always something that holds us back, people have common sense of what's appropriate for the moment and what isn't, so I think there might just be such a thing as uncharged words, but that's just my personal opinion.