Worldplay

One uses language as involuntarily and easily as one breathes. One does not usually think about the language one uses and of its power, its consequences, its meaning. Although I am not convinced with Obama as a presidential candidate, I applaud his appreciation of the beauty and eloquence that can be found in the English language.

Finally, speeches with more than just political hyperbole or the tortuousness of legislative phraseology. Finally, speeches that are a little more literary, more articulate, more moving. The American political arena depreciates his speeches as little more than pretty sentences, forgetting that they are a nation that has in recent years shunned real learning for an education promising No Child Left Behind, to the point where even the correct use of a simple semi-colon deserves significant praise from the NYTimes.

But language has the power to save, to incite, to trap, to hurt. When a blogger is imprisoned for four years for his use of language as a tool of expression, the power of language, of words, is illustrated. When a dictator is overthrown – or instated – due to a coup, it is the use of language as rhetoric that has incited people to revolt.

For change to take place, something must incite or motivate people to create it. The only way to create change is to call for it; to convince people to band together and move forward. It is language that brings people together, that pushes people away, that acts as a catalyst for change, that rouses emotion. To underestimate the power of language is to underestimate the power of the human race.