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Description:

This video explains the importance of word choice and analyzes the word choice of authors like Jane Austen and Robert Frost and statesmen like Abraham Lincoln. Why do these writers and orators choose the words they do? How do you increase your own vocabulary?

Language:
English Language

Transcript

00:00

Thank you We speak word joyce allah shmoop there are

00:06

more than a million words in the english language and

00:09

yet with so many different words to choose from we

00:11

often fall back on the same ones over and over

00:13

again and it makes sense Some words were just so

00:16

simple understandable and university there the workhorses of our vocabulary

00:21

You know how that goes but a workhorse doesn't always

00:24

do the trick Sometimes our conversations and are writing requires

00:27

to be more selective you know creative but wise word

00:31

choice So important the language is a tool We use

00:35

words to express the ideas thoughts and emotions in our

00:37

heads to the world via the spoken word or the

00:41

written word and because we want others to fully understand

00:44

what we have to say and not misinterpret anything We

00:48

have to care about word choice And choose the appropriate

00:53

words for each situation For example max wakes up one

01:01

morning and tells his mom i feel bad Well sure

01:04

we get the gist of what max is saying but

01:06

he could be more specific if his stomach is churning

01:10

and he's fairly certain He's going to spend the next

01:12

twenty four hours in the bathroom Max should opt for

01:15

i feel ill or i feel sick over I feel

01:18

bad if he's down in the mouth about spending yet

01:22

another boring day in high school max could say i

01:25

feel depressed The football team is going to give him

01:29

a wedgie again Max could say i feel anxious There

01:34

are so many words that more accurately convey what max

01:37

feeling that plain old bad also bad isn't likely to

01:41

grant him and get out of school free pass card

01:43

from mommy Dearest there let's try another example Say we

01:47

have the sense jane ran to the pie Well the

01:51

word ran is perfectly acceptable But what if jane's movements

01:54

could be better articulated by a different word like skip

01:58

your scurry or bolton Well these words are more descriptive

02:03

than the word ran and they provide us with more

02:05

interesting visual images While we tend to not think too

02:11

hard before we speak in casual conversation Imagine the length

02:17

writers go to in order to come up with the

02:19

perfect word for something particular they want to convey Take

02:24

this line from jane austen's pride and prejudice where darcy

02:27

mentions that elizabeth has fine eyes now jane austen could've

02:31

used any number of adjectives here She might have had

02:34

darcy save it Elizabeth had lovely eyes or wide eyes

02:37

or expressive eyes but she has him describe elizabeth i's

02:41

as fine of all the words she might have chosen

02:45

Jane austen went for this one Honest or what about

02:48

this line from robert frost poem stopping by woods on

02:51

a snowy evening where the narrator says that the woods

02:55

are lovely dark and deep The words frost uses here

02:59

not only convey a certain image but they continue the

03:02

flow of his poetry is the word deep rhymes with

03:05

a final word in the next three lines of the

03:07

poem we might think that writers have a tough sweating

03:10

over a fous rs or addiction areas They search for

03:12

that perfect word but what about statesmen Take the opening

03:19

words of abraham lincoln's gettysburg address Four score and seven

03:23

years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent a

03:26

new nation conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition

03:30

that all men are created equal Okay so lincoln could

03:34

have started his speech with the less poetical eighty seven

03:37

years ago instead of kicking it old school with that

03:40

four score and seven things But lincoln was a gifted

03:43

order with a very specific goal for his speech Not

03:50

only did he want to emphasize that civil war was

03:52

a fight for the survival of the union But he

03:55

also wanted americans to understand that the civil war was

03:57

a battle for human equality Human equality set forth in

04:01

the declaration of independence Written eighty seven also known as

04:05

four score and seven years earlier in seventeen seventy six

04:13

It is said that lincoln was ill with small pox

04:15

when he gave the gettysburg address But let's be honest

04:18

We know he's probably threatened over word choice Increasing our

04:24

vocabulary So we have more choice when it comes towards

04:26

isn't difficult books A great resource is as our books

04:29

books and more books Yeah Also we can practice replacing

04:35

the workhorse words we use when we talk or write

04:38

of other vocabulary Won't max islam be surprised when he

04:45

emerges from the bathroom and shows off what he's learned 00:04:48.8 --> [endTime] about word choice

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