So before I show the essay, I want to say a couple things. Firstly, I don’t know what to call this, I think it could be an essay, so keep that in mind whilst reading. Secondly, allow this content to stand as an example of what this blog is going to become. If you have anything to say about it, do so. I am open for questions and whatever else the intertubes has in mind.

Enjoy

“I’m so meta even this acronym” Quoth Hofstadter, when asked to write a biography about himself. This 29 character self containing statement, could fit easily on to twitter. More and more, people are trying to figure out how to efficaciously use “characters” to express the most complex of human ideologies, such as an entire life.





The author of 1984, a novel encompassing dystopian life in a totalitarian government, once said that all language is leading to one word. By this compression, we lose sincerity, meaning, and passion. Language is what allows us to fully express ourselves, when language is constricted, no longer can we use vernacular as a form of expression. Instead ideas must flourish, the meaning behind a single word intensifies, and sentences are compact novellas. In our digital age when so much content is readily available, we as consumers, demand dense material that will use our time most effectively. If every second isn’t filled with meaningful ideas, we can easily switch to something else that might be more effective.





One of the oppositions to this stance though, is the mere fact that language is expanded. Each year the Webster Dictionary is adding more and more words. Humans have access to more words in which to express themselves than ever before. Language evolves, that is the definition of language: a way life expresses ideas and emotions. It might not be that our language is getting compressed, but that ideas can be conveyed more readily through our expanding arsenal that is language.





Friedrich Nietzsche, in his essay “On Truth and Lies in a Nonmoral Sense,” discusses the derivation of language, stating that it comes not from truth, but from expression.





“We speak of a ‘snake’: this designation touches only upon its ability to twist itself and could therefore also fit a worm. What arbitrary differentiations!”





All of language speaks with relation to man. Through our perception, we have created a set of metaphors containing no inherent meaning. If language were based on the way things are, instead of the way things are interpreted, there would only be one language; but since expression is subjective, we can construct complex ideological conventions within the span of 140 characters.





One of the biggest pitfalls for anyone arguing a verbose approach to expression is ostensibly, the universal thought-terminating cliche, “I love you.” Think for a moment THE most complex of all human emotions, condensed into three words. Love can easily be extrapolated, there is so much more that you can say to a person, so many more ideas attached to these words; yet, it is all that needs to be said, and all is understood. “Life’s unfair,” another thought terminating cliche, there are so many more reasons and ideas as to why bad things are happening, but it’s all expressed through two words.



Language is powerful, it is the epitome of atavistic expressive mediums and it belongs to all of us. Language is personal, it is perception without truth, so go ahead, use words however you see fit. And, as the proverb goes: Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words, the smallest element of language possible of containing meaning in isolation, cannot produce the 4,000 newtons per square centimeter required to break my bones.