Quotes About Language

Deference also had a reciprocal posture called condescension—a word which has radically changed its meaning

In the late twentieth century, national television broad-casters are trained to use the accent of Salt Lake City—the American equivalent of BBC English.

Long voyages under sail with crews that spoke many tongues made a ship into a language school.

Some of these words appear in metropolitan French, but a person of Saintonge who speaks the parlanjhe of the region is uniquely called a goulebenèze, literally, a happy mouth.

Alis grave nil. May language release you from its lies.

Most politicians use language to conceal what they think. Or to conceal the fact that they don't think. Many are trained as lawyers and use language to win support rather than to define the truth. Being blunt hasn't hurt me so far.

As long as we are engaged in this orgy of unnecessary terminology and notation…

When experience flies into realms that language cannot touch, honesty demands beyond-language.

Your strange!" she gushed. (She meant "You're," but Peter felt absolutely certain that she was one of those people who spell it "Your.")

This man obviously contained some sort of catalytic converter that rendered the filth of his language as natural and inoffensive as dirt in a garden.

but Mama was so mad at the insurance company that even though he used words like "flaming assholes" she didn't realize till later that he was cussing: she said she thought he was quoting the Psalms.

Prayer is about real-world concerns, spoken in real-world language. God does not want us to shift into a stained-glass prayer voice to address Him.

The Arabic knowledge of cryptography was fully set forth in the section on cryptology in the Subh al-a 'sha, an enormous, 14-volume encyclopedia

Also of great importance in the discovery of linguistic phenomena that led to cryptanalysis was the development of lexicography.

Ernest Hemingway, much like the Artisan hero in his novel, A Farewell to Arms, wanted to avoid figurative language (the language of inference and interpretation, of metaphor and symbol), trusting only descriptive words to present his perceptions as sensually and realistically as possible.

there's no word in the Tibetan language for "creativity" or "being creative." The closest translation is "natural.

John Carmack was a late talker. His parents were concerned until one day in 1971, when the fifteen-month-old boy waddled into the living room holding a sponge and uttered not just a single word but a complete sentence: "Here's your loofah, Daddy." It was as if he didn't want to mince words until he had something sensible to say.

Photography is light-writing, the language of images. Less abstract than written or spoken language, it selects images from the existing world of appearances and arranges them in patterns. The camera-eye doesn't think, it recognizes. It shows us what we already know, but don't know that we know.

We are so used to releasing words, we don't know what to do with them if they stay. No matter how many times we let them go, they come back. The words that matter always stay.

You have to trust the words. They do not create anything more than themselves.

A sound waiting to be a word.

You can give words, but you can't take them. And when words are given and received, that is when they are shared. We remember what that was like. Words so real they were almost tangible. There are conversations you remember, for certain. But more than that, there is the sensation of conversation. You will remember that, even when the precise words begin to blur.

If there wasn't a word for it, would we realize our masochism as much?

Maybe language is kind, giving us these double meanings. Maybe it's trying to teach us a lesson, that we can always be two things at once.