By John Stonestreet and Maria Baer
Our Way with Words
In a recent and unintentionally poignant episode 1 of
National Public Radio ’ s “ On the Media ” podcast , an entire conversation debating free speech hinged on the definition of a word that was never established . “ Free speech absolutism ,” reporters claimed , is an old-fashioned concept because some speech causes harm . Never defined in the conversation ( and rarely defined in decades of debate about free speech and first amendment rights ) was the word “ harm .”
Most English language dictionaries are updated every quarter . The latest update to the Oxford English Dictionary , released in June [ 2021 ], contained 700 new words added since the previous March . 2 One thousand existing definitions were revised .
The process is neither straightforward nor is it worldview-neutral . In the ongoing debate in academic circles about the process , two sides have emerged . The descriptivists argue language has no “ rules .” If enough people use a particular word in a certain way , that is its definition . The prescriptivists argue that specific immovable rules are necessary for language to work . For example , “ book ” has to mean a collection of pages bound between two covers . It can never mean a four-legged animal with fur . Communication , prescriptivists argue , requires these kinds of rules .
This debate has consequences for areas like law and public policy and medicine , and also for the way we organize our lives together . If the meaning of the word “ harm ” evolves from meaning ‘ something that causes or demonstrates real pain or damage ,’ to meaning mere discomfort , such as , “ I must not hear a perspective I don ’ t like ,” then the role and purpose of law fundamentally changes . And the meaning of the doctor ’ s oath to “ do no harm ” changes as well .
The whole thing brings to mind the conversation between Humpty Dumpty and Alice in Lewis Carroll ’ s 1871 novel Through the Looking Glass . 3
“‘ When I use a word ,’ Humpty Dumpty said in a rather scornful tone , ‘ it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less .’
‘ The question is ,’ said Alice , ‘ whether you can make words mean so many different things .’”
That fanciful conversation , set by Lewis Carroll in a bizarre and absurd upside-down world , is taking place in our world . At the time the book was published , Humpty Dumpty ’ s descriptivism would have been understood as illogical and unsustainable . But around the same time , some , most notably Friedrich Nietzsche , 4 began to suggest , in different words , that maybe Humpty was right and language is malleable . From there , it was a short step for others , such as Jacques Derrida 5 and Ludwig Wittgenstein , 6 to suggest that not just language but reality itself is malleable . If everything is a text , as Derrida suggested , then nothing remains but interpretation .
This shift in our understanding of language and meaning can also be traced through art . When Leonardo da Vinci painted The Mona Lisa , he was portraying reality . Assumed in the style and delivered in the final image was the idea that there was , indeed , a real-world and that the real world could be , in fact , communicated . Later , impressionists such as Vincent Van Gogh reflected a different view . Starry Night existed in reality , but Van Gogh ’ s piece offered only his interpretation of it .
In contrast , much of postmodern art looks nothing like reality at all . In fact , rather than even attempt
18 THE RENEWANATION REVIEW