Critical Wisdom - Rhetoric

7 Language and Rhetoric

A critically wise person will not just want to think about issues, but also write, speak, or otherwise communicate about them. There are several reasons for this:

1. The critically wise person may have found a truth, or figured out the right thing to do, and wants the rest of the world to profit from his/her thinking.
2. Two people know more than one, so by communicating what each other knows, more progress can be made in the quest for good beliefs and actions.
3. By writing about an issue, we can bounce off ideas, arguments, objections, etc. on each other.
4. By writing about an issue, you can be a soundboard to yourself.

Notice that the first reason to communicate regards language as having a rather passive role in relation to our ideas, concepts, thoughts, beliefs, or opinions. In fact, this is how most people look at language: the role of language is merely to convey our ideas to others, after all the thinking and other hard work has already been done ‘in our head’.

However, the other reasons regard language as being much more actively involved in the shaping of our ideas or arguments. Indeed, notice that the fourth reason wouldn’t make any sense if language serves a mere passive role of conveying information to another place: if I have already figured it out myself, why should I write to express my ideas and arguments in the first place? And yet, we know that writing helps to clarify and organize our thoughts: when writing a paper, no one will first sit down and think hard for a couple of hours trying to figure everything out, and only start writing when everything has been figured out, as some kind of ‘memory dump’. Instead, we write, read what we’ve written, revise, edit, add, etc. Indeed, writing can be seen as part of a thinking process in which we dialectically engage ourselves.

Thus, many professional linguists, psychologists, and cognitive scientists will claim that language is, contrary to our initial intuitions about language as being ‘after the fact’, actually quite actively involved in the shaping of our ideas and beliefs. The linguist Benjamin Whorf is known for the ‘Whorf hypothesis’, which states that ‘thought is soundless speech’. Thus, the suggestion is that without language we would not be able to think, or at least not as well as we would without. Indeed, notice that when you think about a hard issue, you will often hear your ‘inner voice’ going over possible positions or arguments, and when the problem is real hard, we may even speak out loud. It is unlikely that these expressions are passive and unnecessary reflections of our independent thinking; it is more likely that we use them to guide our thinking.

Now, the exact relationship between language and thought will have to await a mature cognitive science. However, the point is that there is probably a much more intimate relationship between the two than we normally suppose or, for that matter, are aware of. Indeed, as the philosopher of language Ludwig Wittgenstein pointed out: just as the fish is unaware of the fact that it’s swimming in water, we are very much unaware of how much we are immersed in the ‘sea of language’ that’s everywhere around us. Thus, if language is everywhere, and if language guides our thinking, our thoughts will easily be forced to follow predetermined patterns from which it is difficult to escape.

7.1 Uses of Language

If language can have such an effect on our thinking, then as critically wise thinkers we should take a close look at language, and at some of the specific ways in which language can effect us. In particular, let us look at the various ways in which language is being used:

1. Descriptive/Informative. Example: “Elephants are big”
2. Evaluative. Example: “Abortion is wrong”
3. Interrogative. Example: “Why did you do that?”
4. Directive. Example: “Close the door!”
5. Performative. Example: “I declare you husband and wife”
6. Emotive/Expressive. Example: “Wonderful!”

Some more specific uses of language are: to explain, to define, to persuade, to entertain, etc. Please note that this very list should make it clear that there are many uses of language other than to merely reflect some thought or idea. That is, our usual conception of language is that is used merely in an informative way, but clearly language is much more active than that!

It is important to realize that in our use of language we follow many unspoken conventions and make many implicit assumptions. For example, when someone says “Well, I guess he wasn’t lying this time”, it is clear that we should assume that this person is a rather frequent liar, even though the speaker did not explicitly say so. Rhetoricians call such taking advantage of assumptions innuendo. Below are some further examples of rhetorical devices that are used to persuade, even though it looks like they have a different use:

Persuasive Question

Why is it that men prefer beauty to intelligence in women?

What are your views on the token effort made by the government to deal with this oil spill?

Persuasive Definition

abortion: murder of an unborn, innocent, child

abortion: a safe and established surgical procedure whereby a women is relieved of an unwanted burden.

Persuasive Comparison (also called Rhetorical Analogy)

Disney is about as friendly to children as Hitler was to the Jews

7.2 Cognitive Meaning and Emotive Meaning

Many words don’t just describe things, but also come with certain emotional connotations. That what a word refers to we call its denotation, and any kind of emotional associations we make with regard to the word its connotation.

The emotive force of language can be substantial, and over many millennia of language use, humans have become masters at picking and choosing exactly those words that will hopefully sway the listener one way or the other (of course, lawyers, advertisers, and politicians are the rhetorical grandmasters). Indeed, we often speak or write to impress, rather than to express. One of the main things we have to be aware of as critical thinkers is to make sure that we are not being swayed by rhetorical rather than rational persuasion. Below are a few different classes of words or phrases that can be used to persuade, without giving any actual reason:

Euphemism

A euphemism is a word or phrase that makes something sound better than it is.

“ethically challenged” – corrupt
“revenue enhancement” – tax
“extended viewing fee” – late fee (Blockbuster)
“correctional facility” – prison
“public servant” – government official
“freedom fighter” – guerrilla
“custodian” – janitor
“downsizing” – firing employees
“right-sizing” - downsizing
“wardrobe malfunction” – Justin Timberlake ripping part off Janet Jackson’s bodice

Dysphemism

A dysphemism is a word or phrase that makes something sound worse than it is.

“bureaucrat” – government official
“terrorist” - guerrilla

Minimizer/Downplayer

A minimizer or downplayer is used to minimize or downplay the importance of something

“Oh, I was merely trying to ….”

I wasn't lying! I was just stretching the truth a little bit.

Hyperbole

Opposite of the minimizer: things are being exaggerated now

Every human being in the greater Philadelphia area in need of ten, fifteen, or twenty items, was standing with me in the optimistically named express lane.

Weaselers

Weaselers are ways to suggest something without saying it exactly

can provide up to 8 hours of relief
saves as much as….one gallon of gas.
may help prevent cavities
like new
virtually effortless

Proof Surrogates

A proof surrogate is any expression that is used to make the listener believe that something should be obvious, even if it isn’t and no other reason is being given

“Needless to say…”
“Obviously…”
“It goes without saying that….”
“Clearly…”

7.3 Further Features of Language

Language does not only work through meaning, but also in more subtle ways. Below are some more things to think about when it comes to language:

Style and Emphasis

Language comes in many forms and styles. We can change those styles to accomplish certain purposes. Depending on those purposes, in certain cases it is perfectly appropriate to use a certain tone. However, just by using certain kinds of tones, language can be perceived to be more or less persuasive: while words can sometimes speak louder than actions, loud words speak even louder!
In linguistic expressions we can also emphasize and deemphasize things. As with tone, there is nothing inherently wrong with this, but again it can be abused: Does the fine print really contain only relatively unimportant details? As critical thinkers, we have to be on the lookout for such abuses.

Tone

The tone of a piece of writing or speaking can also have a big impact on how we perceive what is being said: If the speaker sound very upset about something, then probably we should be upset about it too! Ridicule, sarcasm, or downright scoffing can be very effective too in making the reader believe that something is bad, whether there are reasons for it being given or not.

Vagueness and Ambiguity

Language is highly efficient, but it comes at a price: vagueness and ambiguity. Vagueness is when an expression has one, but rather fuzzy meaning. Ambiguity is when an expression can be interpreted in more than one distinct way. Thus, ‘tall’ is a rather vague term, and ‘bank’ is ambiguous (though none of its meanings are very vague).

Again, there is nothing inherently wrong with language being vague and ambiguous. However, this feature can once again be abused. For example, when a company advertises that you can send their product back for a “prompt and a full refund”, does this mean that you get two refunds, one prompt, and the other full (but not so prompt!)? Or, when a product is “better than ever”, what exactly does that really mean?