Plain English

OUR LANGUAGE

5. Did you ever stop to think what the world would be if we had no way of communicating, one with another? Think of Helen Keller, shut up in her prison-house of silence. Her only mode of communication with her fellows is through the sense of touch.

Every form of life that has consciousness has some way of expressing its feelings. Every animal, by the movements of its body or the tones of its voice, expresses its emotions of pain, pleasure, rage, hate, joy, hunger and the many passions that sway its life. The child knows without being taught how to express its wants. We understand its cry of hunger, its scream of pain, its laugh of delight. This is the natural language, the language of feeling. It is the universal language that needs no rules and no interpreter. Life on every plane knows and understands it.

WHEN WE BEGIN TO THINK

6. Our feelings and desires are not the only things we wish to communicate. The natural language satisfies a child for a time, but as the child grows he begins to think, then he feels the need of a more effective means of expressing himself. You can express your feelings to a certain extent by the natural language. You can make one know that you are glad by the expression of the face, the attitude of the body or the tone of the voice. But could you make anyone understand why you are glad, by these signs and gestures?

7. To express thoughts and ideas, man had to devise another sort of language. So the language of words grew up out of the need to communicate ideas to other people. As man's ability to think grew, so his language grew. At first, this language was only a spoken language. The ideas of one generation were handed down to the next by the spoken word. Gradually a crude form of writing was invented from which our written language has developed. This has made it possible to put the wisdom of the ages into books for the benefit of the world.

8.Hence, language is the means of expressing thought and feeling. It has grown out of our need for expression.

A word is a symbol of an idea. It is a sound or combination of sounds which we use to represent an idea. The use of words makes it possible for us to readily convey our thoughts to other people.

Through the medium of words we are able to communicate to others our thoughts, not only of the external world about us, but also of the mental world in which we live. We can tell of our loves, our hates, our dreams and our ideals. Animals find the natural language of looks and tones and gestures sufficient because they live almost wholly upon the physical plane. But man lives in a mental world as well as in a physical one, and must have a spoken and written language by which to express his thoughts.

Exercise 1

Select from the following sentences those which it is possible to express by a look or tone or gesture, and those which can not be expressed without words:

1. I am glad.

2. I am glad because men are struggling for freedom.

3. I am hungry.

4. I am hungry for the chance for an education.

5. Come.

6. Come, let us reason together.

7. I am afraid.

8. I am afraid that we must wait long for peace.

9. Go.

10. Go, search the world over for the truth.

11. I am disgusted.

12. I am disgusted with those who will not think for themselves.

13. I am tired.

14. I am tired of these petty squabbles among comrades.

OUR EXPRESSION

9. Our knowledge of language opens up a new world to us. We can communicate with those about us; we can open the storehouse of the knowledge of the past as recorded in books, or as two of our writers have expressed it:

Have you ever rightly considered what the mere ability to read means—that it is the key which admits to the world of thought and fancy and imagination—to the company of saint and sage, of the wisest and wittiest at their wisest and wittiest moments—that it enables us to see with the keenest eyes, hear with the finest ears and listen to the sweetest voices of all time?—Lowell.

Strip man of his books and his papers, and he becomes a mere slave, ignorant of his own resources, ignorant of his rights and opportunities. The difference between the free citizen of today and the savage of yesterday is almost entirely a thing of books. The man who dislikes books can never be entirely happy, and he who loves a good book can never be wholly miserable.—Hillis.

Have you never felt that struggle within and the sense of defeat when you have tried to make some one feel as you feel, understand as you understand, see some great truth as you see it, and could not find the words with which to express your ideas?

10. The mastery of words gives; first, the ability to understand the spoken or written thoughts of others; second, the ability to adequately express our own thoughts; and third, the ability to think clearly and to grow in our intellectual life.

A connected chain of reasoning is impossible without the knowledge of the words that express the development of the ideas and the varying shades of meaning. To gain this mastery, you must know the words of our language and their use. Words are the symbols of ideas and perform certain functions in expressing our thoughts. This, simply stated, is all that the study of English Grammar comprises—the study of English words and their use in the expression of thought and feeling.

THE THOUGHT AND THE WORD

11. We have found that the invention of words grew out of the ability to think and the need for expression. But we first thought! So, in order to express yourself clearly you must first think clearly. Any thought can be simply and clearly expressed. When you read something difficult of understanding, where the thought is buried under an avalanche of words, you can be assured the writer was not thinking clearly. He did not have the perfect mastery of his thought. On the other hand, one may have a valuable thought in mind and not be able to express it because he does not have the words at his command. In the one case, we have words and no idea; in the other, the idea and no words.

This study is intended to enable you to master words, the tools of expression. In whatever work you are engaged, it was first necessary to learn to use the tools with which you work. So, you must master the use of English words, the tools of your expression. You can in that way learn to express your thoughts clearly and exactly. You will not need to resort to slang, or to the tiresome repetition of a few words.

The best of everything is none too good for you. It is your right, your heritage, and the best in the English language will bring you into the company and comradeship of the men and women who have striven and toiled for humanity, who will talk to you of dreams and deeds worth while, who will place in your hands the key to a new world.

A COMPLETE THOUGHT

12. When we want to express a thought we use more than one word. Words are the symbols of ideas, but a thought is the expression of the relation between ideas. For example, I say man, and you get an idea or an image in your mind of a man, but I have not said anything about any man. But if I say, Man works, then I have expressed a thought. I have related the idea of a man and the idea of work and have expressed a complete thought.

So we express our thoughts by groups of words. The very smallest group of words which will express a complete thought must, therefore, contain two words. If I say men, fire, flowers, and stop, you wonder what I mean, for I have not expressed a thought. Or, I might say, work, burns, bloom, and you would still be in the dark as to my meaning; but, when I say, Men work, Fire burns, Flowers bloom, you understand, for I have told you my complete thought. I have put two words together in a way to make sense; I have formed a sentence.

13. If we say, Go or Wait, in the form of a command or entreaty, the single word seems to make complete sense and to form a sentence in itself. But this is only because you, who are to do the going or the waiting, is clearly implied. The words go or wait, by themselves, do not make sense or form a sentence unless they are uttered in the commanding or beseeching tone of voice which makes you understand that You go or You wait is the intended meaning. With the exception of words used in this way as a command or entreaty, it is always necessary to use at least two words to express a complete thought.

But will any two words make a sentence—express a complete thought?

14. Which of these combinations of words are sentences and which are not?

Busy men.

Men travel.

Snow flies.

Blue sky.

Red flag.

Rustling trees.

Workers strike.

Bees sting.