Words Both Reveal and Conceal

"... the hall-mark of the born psychologist -- listening with minute attention to every single utterance and taking literally and seriously every word." -- Norman N. Holland, Department of English, University of Florida

In a certain sense , each one of us speaks his or her own language. Here's a chance to become more conscious about the way you speak. You might be surprised at how much is revealed by your choice of words but also by the structure of your personal language which is your grammar. We don't mean this in the fussy Grammar Lady way but as the way you embellish your speech or connect your thoughts together in speaking and writing.

An understanding of the relationship between language and the subconscious can aid in relating to others, interpreting charts and experiencing a more fulfilled sense of self expression. You will begin to understand yourself and others better by listening for speech patterns or, as Norman H. Holland, a professor at the University of Florida, says, "listening with minute attention to every single utterance and taking literally and seriously every word" like a great psychologist does.

I grew up in the suburbs of Chicago, New York and Washington, D. C. but spent every summer at my grandmother's house in central Texas where I was born. I found the Ya'll form helpful in Texas [short for "you all", the plural form of you] but it was a no joke if I slipped and said it in Winnetka where the appropriate term was, "You guys". I was teased for my "accent" in both places. This began my interest in speech patterns The girls in Texas wore black suede loafers and white bobbie sox with long skirts and crinoline (a stiff petticoat that made the skirt flare ... I couldn't find how to spell this word from the dark ages!). The girls in Winnetka wore black Capezzio flats with nylons and straight wool blend skirts with matching dyed cashmere sweaters. Why wouldn't their speech differ as much as their cultures?

Neurolinguistics is a branch of healing based on our use of language but even with a little increased self awareness, you can heal yourself.

This article underscores my belief that this is not only possible, but often a critical step in personal growth, learning self reliance and discovering the healer within. Not everyone can afford therapy. Many have been hurt by others, including people in authority, and would rather trust their healing process to books and tapes and their relationship with the Higher Power.

Carl Jung believed by the end of his life (in his eighties) that it was time for some information about the subconscious mind to reach the "general public " ... that's you and me. He had a dream that encouraged him to write the foreward to Richard Wilhelm's translation of the I Ching, for example . This was a shocking act at the time (c. 1950).

Since then, many have written books about Jung's work that are intended for the average person. One of my favorite books for beginners, a book that will stay with you a lifetime, is Joseph Murphy's The Power of Your Subconscious Mind.

One of the most powerful self help books ever written, this small, easy to read book can change your life.

This article will hopefully stimulate you to be more conscious of the choices you are making in speaking and writing. Then you can change them if you want to. If you consciously change the way you speak, you will change something deep within. Let's give it a try!

A recent article in STAR IQ has something interesting to say about the kind of communicating that goes on in some families (Neptunian type families):

There are four facets to communication: writing, speaking, listening and reading. Most people would like to improve in some areas. Communication, like good manner, greases the skids of human commerce. But this article isn't about self improvement, it's about consciousness raising. Simply by becoming more aware, you can experience dramatic and transforming change in all areas of your life. Consciousness raising isn't self improvement, ground gained inch by tortured inch! Consciousness is light. When you turn on the light, the darkness disappears. It's that simple and that profound, so read on .. to enlightenment.

This article asks you to become conscious of the grammar you choose. Grammar has had a bad name for many years but was one of my favorite subjects in school. I later took a course in Noam Chomsky's transformational grammar which was one of the most exciting experiences of my formal academic career.

We're not talking about the grammar that you don't have to use in email -- we're asking you to become aware that there are choices in language and in the forms underlying language.

I know a man in Detroit who came from a disadvantaged background. His mother was determined to get her children ahead. She gave them dictionaries to read. It would have been better if she'd given them the simplest book.

This man memorized many words and has a large vocabulary. But he didn't learn how to speak. We can only do this by listening to others or reading books. The culture in which this man learned all these long latinate words was impoverished so he uses erudite words, often strange erudite words, in simple sentence context which sounds grotesque. Many first generation children of immigrants put the same emphasis on vocabulary but the person who also improves the context of his or her speech by reading great writers or listening to tapes by great speakers will sound very different.

Let's get clear about "latinate" words versus the vernacular. Latinate words are derived from Latin which was the lingua franca (common language) of all educated Europeans for many centuries until recently replaced by English. Other words found their way into English through French and German and other languages used by peasants and travelers. These words are more down to earth and appropriate for daily usage. If someone uses too many latinate words, they will fall into one of the categories listed later in the article.

Linguistics and grammar inform reality. Some people think the opposite is true, grammar comes from or is derived from a group's metaphysical reality. It's like which came first, the chicken or the egg?

The normal grammatical pattern in English is 1. noun, 2. verb, 3. object. [I hit the ball.] In German there are many times when the correct order is 1. noun, 2. object, 3. verb. [I the ball hit.]

The effect of the German form is that you must sit and wait until the very end to know the speaker's full intent. This says something about the German culture. Here's an example if it were in English. "Yesterday I, in spite of all difficulties and notwithstanding my lack of interest, before dawn and in the middle of nowhere, faster than a speeding bullet, my teeth brushed." Were you hanging on the edge of your chair to see where I was going with this? Were you disappointed? (ha!)

The Arabs are noted for the fiery hyperbole of their language ... a grammar that got writ large in the skies over New York City on September 11. Does their language make them inclined toward explosive and exaggerated visual and symbolic communication (public decapitation and targets that were symbols of American culture, the Twin Towers, as well as strategic targets such as the Pentagon)? If so, where did their language come from? Did it evolve from their nature or did their nature evolve from their language?

How does American English differ from British English and what does this say about the evolution of the cultures over the past three hundred years?

A Verdi opera is different from The Tales of Hoffmann because of the cultural differences between Italy and Germany but also because of the requirements of each language. Italian, a Romance language like French, has many elisions, where one word slides or glides into another. For example in French this string of letters, qu'est-ce que c'est que la is pronounced keskasekla. Words collapse into one another. There are many vowels and soft consonants like "L" that help this happen.

German by contrast has strident plosives, "p", "t", "d" -- you spit air when you say them. Words have more consonants and end abruptly. They never blend into the next one. That is a strict rule in learning German pronunciation. (There are many strict rules :-) The music must reflect this quality for the singers' voices. Italian music sounds like a warm weather love song, German music, like a march. People seem to correspond to dramatic elements of their geography and their language conforms as well.

For example, a basic tenet of the I Ching and Chinese philosophy is this: "All things are always changing to their opposites." This is the Tao or "the way". All early civilizations formed along rivers. The main river in Chinese history has been the Yangtze River which floods eratically and has had devastating effects on the cultivation of nearby fields. One of the primary "duties" of the Chinese Emperor throughout time has been to work on this problem. Should it surprise us that their philosophy accepts the reality of change? The only question then becomes, what shall we do to position ourselves wisely in regard to change? Geography would dictate this approach to reality. Their letters are pictures.

Contrast this with the static culture of ancient Egypt where dynasties remained for centuries. The flooding of the Nile, Egypt's great river, was as predictable as the terrible twos.

Is the Italian language soft because of the Mediterranean climate and the hot-blooded nature of the Italians? Is the German language militant because of the harsh climate and warlike nature attributed to them since the time of Caesar? What is the relationship between language and human nature?

Russian speakers make little use of the verb "to be". Instead of saying, "I am Tatiana," she would say, "I -- Tatiana." Instead of saying, "I'm an astrologer," she'd say, "I -- astrologer. You -- potential client." What information does this give us about Russians? And about us in America ... why do we capitalize the word "I"?

I've been told I have a way of putting things into words. Let's take a look at what it means to "put something into words". The rest of this article quotes from Norman N. Holland's online esssay The Barge She Sat In. Holland is an English professor at the University of Florida and the barge belongs to Cleopatra. The line is from Shakespeare's Anthony and Cleopatra. Antony's lieutenant, Enobarbus, is describing to some visiting Romans how Cleopatra first appeared to them. Holland analyzes Shakespeare's words to show how they reveal his sexuality. Here is the passage:

The barge she sat in, like a burnish'd throne,
Burnt on the water. The poop was beaten gold,
Purple the sails, and so perfumed that
The winds were love-sick with them; the oars were silver
Which to the tune of flutes kept stroke, and made
The water which they beat to follow faster,
As amorous of their strokes. For her own person,
It beggar'd all description: she did lie
In her pavilion -- cloth of gold, of tissue --
O'er picturing that Venus where we see
The fancy outwork of nature. On each side her
Stood pretty dimpled boys, like smiling Cupids,
With divers-color'd fans, whose wind did seem
To [glow] the delicate cheeks which they did cool,
And what they undid did.

Please read the entire Holland article >>> if interested in exploring this further. It is not necessary to read the article to continue with my discussion here.

Holland uses psychoanalytic and linguistic analysis to interpret literature. We can use the same techniques to understand our own use of language and we can understand important others better, too. In other words, this can give you greater insight into your husband, wife, boss or colleague.

The hallmark of the "born psychologist", says Holland, is "listening with minute attention to every single utterance and ... taking literally and seriously every word."

This is our goal. This is what we call active listening. We mustn't just sit and wait for our turn to speak, planning in our mind what we will say next. We must set our own thoughts aside and be fully present for the other speaker.

When someone else is talking and we need to understand them, we become quieter and more alert. Not small talk, such as "how's the weather?" or "nice outfit you're wearing" but a conversation which is intended to be understood at the deepest level of which the hearer is capable. I also believe that to be fully present in this situation, as listener or speaker, is one of the places close to heaven. When we speak to someone who really listens, we feel validated and whole. Not that they agree with everything we say but rather they are fully present for us as a person as we experience ourselves speaking. Supposedly it was like this to be in the personal presence of Sigmund Freud.

Can we do this with everyone we interact with? Can we do this with ourselves? We owe this to our efforts at communicating. To begin to do this is to transform ourselves and our relationships.

Ella Freeman Sharpe, who wrote between 1927 and 1947, was the first to explicitly develop the relation between diction and the unconscious. I took the title of this article from a statement she made, "Words both reveal and conceal thought and emotion."

First, let's define the words hysterical, obsessional and paranoid. These are clinical definitions from psychiatry. They are extremes which can nevertheless be seen in small ways in the everyday behavior of normal people like you or me and this is very informative indeed!

HYSTERICAL - a psychiatric condition variously characterized by emotional excitability, excessive anxiety, sensory and motor disturbances, and the simulation of organic disorders. [source]

OBSESSIONAL - A persistent, repetitive, and unwanted thought. Cannot be eliminated by logic or reasoning. [source]

PARANOID - When a person feels distrustful of others. He may believe someone is out to get him or hurt him in some way. [source]

In Norman N. Holland's article, The Barge She Sat On, the following descriptions are used from a 1973 paper by David Forrest. Forrest related "language traits" to diagnostic categories. He made these generalizations:

Since none of us are mentally ill, these are extremes but they help us to see the direction of the language we choose. You can check to see what your tendency is and what it might be saying about you.

John Schimel, also quoted by Holland in his article, elaborates by categorizing the speech of obsessive-compulsive patients " ... a world of description, never action or emotion.... One might call obsessionalism a disease of adjectives, contrasted with the hysteric who suffers a disease of adverbs. He gives some examples ... "The hysteric is `horribly' upset, `abysmally' depressed, `completely' exhausted, `fantastically' interested" and so on, "pointing to a preoccupation with a world of affect."

"The obsessional separates himself from his own statement by qualifiers like 'I think that' or 'I almost think that' or 'I seem to think that' or 'In part, on some level, I think that.'"

The obsessional also qualifies and can be preoccupied with contradictions. Schimel tells of an obsessional patient who was startled to realize that his customary way of agreeing with statements the analyst made was, "No, you're right".

The obsessional often speaks in the subjunctive mode. To see some examples of the subjunctive, click here. Finney, who styles himself El Subjunctivor Triste, gives some examples of what he calls the formulaic subjunctive:

Personally, I like to think of Shakespeare's, "If wishes were horses, beggars would ride." The subjunctive is a world of idle wishes. In consciousness raising we used to challenge each other against this by saying, "If the Queen were King, she'd have balls." You can appreciate this absurdity and see that it is idle wishing..

Schizophrenics use switch words and hendiadys grammatical forms which allow them to split off in two different directions or run their thoughts along parallel tracks. Many great thinkers do this as well, such as Shakespeare. Switch-words have double meanings that can start two unrelated trains of thought. "Mark," for example, might refer to an old German coin or a line made by a pen. "Mark" is a switch-word.

Hendiadys is a grammatical use related to switch words where two nouns are used to express a single idea such as, "He came despite the rain and weather." [source] instead of "He came despite the rainy weather."

This form can indicate a split in the speaker's mind. Shakespeare used this frequently, for example, "the sound and fury" or "the whips and scorns of time".

Holland comments, "[The common use of hendiadys] ... may also say something about creative writers in general. I am thinking of F. Scott Fitzgerald's famous dictum, 'The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function.'"

Holland continues, "Shakespeare's splittings may parallel the schizophrenic's use of language, the 'word salad' [jumble of incoherent speech as sometimes heard in schizophrenia] as it is called. At least one author decodes that language by finding switch-words that lead the schizophrenic into another train of thought, which leads to another switch-word, to another train of thought, and so on (Maher 1968)."

This is an example Holland gives of how Ella Freeman Sharpe used her diagnostic ability to understand what words conceal. You can do this, too. Sharpe had a patient who came in, saying, "I have not read the paper this week. I don't know what has been happening. I haven't looked at the paper at all." It turned out that she was menstruating. The word read was a switch-word for the color red. Not to have "read," not to know what was going on in the world, was a way of denying her menstruation (Sharpe 1978, 33).

The only way we can have this kind of perceptivity is to listen very carefully to every word the other person says. [ The Narrative Perspective in Dynamic Psychiatry, Douglas Ingram, Presentation to the Society of Medical Psychoanalysts, February 25, 1997.]

Ingram gives a vivid example of this. "Not long ago, a woman phoned for an appointment. Speaking tiredly, she said she had forgotten my name from a former patient and 'wanted to talk to someone.' We arranged to meet in consultation."

Ingram continues, "Over the past few years, I had become interested in how to better appreciate what people say in the clinical setting.... Whatever other clinical issues might emerge in my upcoming consultation, for example, wanting to talk to someone, which I had heard countless times before [and never considered very important] now seemed to constitute a legitimate chief complaint. Who this someone would be was for me to decipher.

Nancy's note: This is to be taken quite literally. The analyst's job will be to find out who the "someone" is that this woman wants to (needs to) talk to. When that is known, she will be healed. She doesn't know who the someone is, not consciously . But unconsciously she does and that is the role of language to reveal this from the subconscious. This "someone" could be her third grade teacher who put such thoughts into her head, her mother who poisoned her against men or the fiance who stood her up at the altar. Perhaps it is her deceased father who she never got to say goodbye to. You see, these things are a mystery to be unraveled. We must really listen to the exact words the person says.

Metonymy is the use of a part for the whole. We say "the crown" meaning the Queen of England or "the pen is mightier than the sword."

Jean-Francois Lyotard, a recently deceased French philosopher coined the term "differend" for a dispute resulting from the fact that one party cannot voice her complaints (or points) because the other insists on speaking within a different language game or genre of discourse (such as one person speaking within narration and the other within speculation). Also some things just can't be put into words!

Differends can be avoided by saying these popular beginnings that I first began to hear in churches about a decade ago. "I wonder if..." or "I was thinking that ..." The common feeling when these words are used is either that the thing has been defused or that you're being badly patronized.

Another means to avoid differends is through the use of transvaluation, which is a means for replacing the
person's potentially self-devaluing term with another. Someone told me he was "obviously really needy". I replied, "I don't think so. I think you're just a very expressive and feeling person."

Rhetorical tropes were first recognized by the ancient Greeks such as Aristotle and Cicero. Today they join with other words to make up "parts of speech" which, when used properly, can help enhance a person's style of writing.

Tropes got their name from chants introduced at certain moments in the liturgy of Christmas and Epiphany masses during the Middle ages to make them livelier and more understandable for the faithful. Tropes make language livelier.

If you'd like to improve your effectiveness as a speaker, try using some of these forms. The best way to learn them, of course, is to read great writers who use them until the rhythm of their speech becomes a part of you.

Allegory
Greek: "speaking otherwise than one seems to speak"
... a long story or tale which seems to be about something else.
Examples: Animal Farm , and Moby Dick

Antanaclasis
Greek: "reflection, bending back"
... a repetition of words in the same sentence, with the words having different definitions.
Example: "If we don't hang together, we'll hang separately." —Benjamin Franklin

Anthimeria
Greek: "one part for another"
... can be described as substituting one part of speech with another.
Example: "I am going in search of the great perhaps." -- Rabelais

Apostrophe
Greek: "turning away"
... addressing someone who isn't present or something abstract like justice.
Example: "Oh, Death, be not proud." -- John Donne

Hyperbole
Greek: "excess, exaggeration"
... an exaggeration used to make a point, not intended to be taken literally.
Example: "When hell freezes over!"

Irony
Greek: "feigned ignorance"
... the use of a word to convey an opposite meaning of the literal definition. The new meaning is usually contradictory to the literal.
Example: "For Brutus is an honorable man; So are they all, honorable men." --Shakespeare

Litotes
Greek: "plainness, simplicity"
... deliberate understatement to make a point.
Example: "The food wasn't bad."

Metaphor
Greek: "transference"
... compares two unlike objects without using "like" or "as." If those words are used, it's a simile ["My love is like a red red rose" is a simile.]
Example: [source] "Life's a yo yo. It's a series of ups and downs."

Onomatopoeia
Greek: "the making of words"
... making up words that sound like their meaning.
Example: aaach, hssss

Oxymoron
Greek: "pointedly foolish" ?? "sharp" ??
... using two words whose meanings are contradictory to convey one meaning.
Example: humanitarian invasion, Microsoft Works, Catholic University

Paradox
Greek: "contrary to opinion or expectation"
... a self-contradictory and not necessarily true statement.
Example: "We know too much for one man to know." --J. Robert Oppenheimer

Paralipsis
Greek: " disregard, omission"
... an emphasis by obvious omission.
Example: "Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain." -- Wizard of Oz

Personification
... giving human characteristics to something inanimate. to inanimate or not human.
Examples: "The heavens cried that night as they beheld her pitiful sorrow."

Rhetorical Question
... asking a question "to the audience", not expecting an answer.
Example: "I ask you ... what difference could it possible make?"

Synecdoche
Greek: "understanding one thing with another"
... where a part stands for a whole such as a genus for a species.
Example: "Romans, Countrymen. Lend me your ears." -- Shakespeare

Zeugma
Greek: "yoking"
... one verb governs several words, or clauses, each in a different sense. Example: “Dost sometimes counsel take--and sometimes tea." -- Alexander Pope, The Rape of the Lock

Related articles by Nancy R. Fenn:
On communication among introverts, please click HERE.
Handwriting Analysis - your handwriting is also your communication
Body Language - an oft forgotten form of communication

2.08.2007 astounding insights! ok - i just used an adjective that expressed my deep gratification of what I have just read.

I am currently doing INner Child work on my own with the help of one or two friends whom I trust; one more than the other, actually. so one I need to be careful of what I say as certain things can trigger her own emotional confusion/content and suddenly I feel I am hearing her own "story" not mine. The other LISTENS very well and I have learned to trust his observations and learned I do NOT have to believe what he believes about absolutes to trust that he might be able to point out things about myself that I need to know in order to address /direct my self-help actions and focus. something like that. hmm. That last phrase I have used often...as while I am a writer and have communicated basically through writing all my life, i suddenly feel confused as i never really knew quite what it was i wanted to write -- that is to say -- that is to communicate.

i am working on this. i cannot afford professional help as i have no money; indeed just lost a wonderful job that i felt i needed because it provided me some stability and some outlet for relationships once again because I had run away from people. ok that's all for now. keep on doing your good work. you're doing a good job.