Authors Newman P. Birk and Genevieve B. Birk describe charged language as “When slanting of facts, or words, or emphasis, or any combination of the three significantly influences feelings toward, or judgments about, a subject, the language used is charged language…” They go on to say “Without charged language, life would be but half life.”
It is my opinion that what they mean by the latter statement is that if we just had facts about a subject we would not be experiencing life to the fullest. Facts are extremely important, but it is the passion that we feel about a subject that really brings it to life.
We are all subject to the charged language of others and whether we realize it or not, it influences our thoughts and opinions about a subject. The best example of this is what we hear and see through the media. We usually don’t have the opportunity to go out and learn first-hand about current events so we rely on the media to educate us on what is going on in the world. How that particular reporter presents a topic and the slant or charged language they use will more than likely sway us to have a similar opinion. Since that is usually the only information we have on the topic, we have no reason to question it. One example of this is how the media represented the attitude of the Iraqi people toward the U.S. troops. It was depicted frequently as a negative attitude and that the Iraqi people wanted our troops out of their country. This picture sent the message to our citizens that we were unwelcome and we should get out. I work with many military members who have deployed to Iraq and I have heard personal stories told in a different light. I have heard about the families who cheered when our troops reclaimed their homes and their schools for them. The children who have welcomed them as heroes in their hometowns and how even a small sense of security has been restored for these families is a different story than we usually see on the nightly news. These stories compared to what the media has reported has certainly given me a revelation of how politically slanted the media can be.
Every one of us uses charged language too. As I think about my own family and how each one of our charged languages influences one another, I gain a deeper understanding of this concept. If one of my children or grandchildren talks about how someone is mean to them and how it has made them feel, I also feel negatively toward the “bully”. The truth may be that my family member may be exaggerating about the behavior or maybe they even did something to provoke it, but because of the emotion that they relayed the information with I can’t help but feel influenced by it. On the other hand, if they present someone or something in a positive way I am probably going to have the same opinion until something happens to convince me otherwise.
If we listen carefully to the conversations around us, we will hear charged language everywhere. It can be a very good thing and it can also be a very dangerous thing such as racially charged language. It is what gives character and life to facts according to the way they are presented.
I like your take on this subject and would like to share a couple views that I have about “charged language.” I know that we all, as a good friend used to say, “Add a little coloring to the facts.” We ourselves, by means of our choice of words, try to elaborate in such a way that the story sounds as interesting to the reader/listener as the actual experience was for us to be present for. Because of this our choice of words creates a vision in someone else’s head that may not be the one in our own.
ReplyDeleteWhen we get to issues of race we enter an area that begins to blur. If you ever talk to an ethnically different person, and they talk about their family, we place a template of our own family in the place and take their descriptions of their family and kind of superimpose it onto our own. Our experiences change the ways in which we interpret words and I know, and have been guilty of, misinterpreting meanings and then making false assumptions based on those misinterpretings.
We as people need to become more aware of the vast spectrum before us. When we hear the charged language we need to be careful of our interpretation of it or we may just be making assumptions that are not only incorrect, but also hurtful. We need to learn to decipher the charged language in a way which we do not allow the things I talked about above to happen, not that they won’t ever happen, but in a way which we minimize emotional injury to others.
You made some good observations regarding charged language. It is good that you got an opportunity to hear first-hand stories that contradict the negative impression of the media regarding the Iraqis’ acceptance of U.S. troops. I think in every life situation, if we were able to hear “the other side” and slow down enough to weigh every bit of information, we would react possibly more fairly and have better understanding. Reality, though, dictates that we assess meaning and intent on the run. How do we get better at discerning the meaning behind the language? I’m not sure how better to do that other than to be intentional about listening and reading critically with a bit of a skeptic’s ear to ulterior motives. Will that be work and rob some of our hopeful innocence? Probably.
ReplyDeleteJust these last few days, a news story regarding a Palmdale cult hit the news media. Those who followed the story were told that they suspected the missing may have committed mass suicide; they called them a “cult,” which conjures up all sorts of horrible images: Manson murders, Jonestown, the Davidians. But I had to catch myself and stop from putting the people in my mental box marked “freak show.” We are not hearing their side. We are hearing conjecture from the police and details through the media from husbands, from whom at least one is divorced. If we want to condition our minds to wait for adequate information before rushing to judge, to desensitize our conscious mind from bias, we need to wait and hear all the facts and try to discern the meaning behind media language that may lead us to false conclusions. This might be a freak show, but it also might be some sincere folks who are just in need of some guidance. Regardless, lives are in the balance.
And I guess that’s my final point: Some charged and slanted language may be benign, but other times lives could be destroyed. So it is important to be always thinking, always watching to look for what is true.