What I found fascinating recently is the reflection of language by the author Creel Froman. He reflects on the power language has. A couple of points stood out to me - Language as the creation of reality, language as a form of behaviour and the organisation of a community through words or language.
1. Language creates reality (the lack of it refutes its reality)
"Reality is the consequence of the use of certain ways of speaking and what those ways of speaking will be; hence, what reality will be languaged as at any given time is ultimately a matter of power" - p. 3, Language and Power by Creel Froman
Case study 1 - Gaslighting
Natalie and I spoke specially about this topic and very interesting insights were raised. "Gaslighting" was the most used word in 2022 as detailed by the Merriam-Webster dictionary. In the article entry, it was noted that "2022 saw a 1740% increase in lookups for gaslighting, with high interest throughout the year". Yet what was not known is that the introduction of the word came from Patrick Hamilton's 1938 British thriller play that is set in the Victorian era, Gas Light which was very plausibly popularised by the later George Cukor's 1944 American film Gaslight. The story narrates a man attempting to make his wife believe that she is going insane. Gas lights in the house start to dim as a result of his puzzling actions in the attic, but he tells his wife they aren't decreasing and that she shouldn't believe her own senses so that he can steal from her inheritance.
The word "Gaslighting" has power as before the creation of the word, there were no laws to address this specific form of mental abuse. Gaslighting was made a felony in the UK in December 2015 under Section 76 of the Serious Crime Act (2015), which defines gaslighting as the offence of controlling or coercive behaviour (CCB). Every year, there are more CCB offences that make it to a magistrate court's first hearing. Since the first full year in which CCB cases reached the Criminal Justice System in the year 2016/17 to 2017/18, numbers increased threefold from 309 to 960. The number increased by a further 23% in 2018/19, to 1,177 prosecutions and to 1,208 in 2019/20. (Source Gov.UK)
On 20th January 2022, there was a landmark judgment in the British courts, which recognised the seriousness of gaslighting in relationships as a form of hidden abuse for the first time. The judgment, which was handed down in the family courts, was the first ever to specifically mention the term “gaslighting”. In his judgment, the Honourable Mr Justice Cobb said, “Dr. Proudman’s use of the term ‘gaslighting’ in the hearing to describe this conduct was in my judgment apposite; the father's actions amounted to a subtle type of abuse meant to make the mother doubt her own mental stability, if not her sanity.
Before the creation of the word, there was no such reality recognised and hence difficulty in tracing the power of this phenomenon.
Case study 2 - Autism and Asperger's Syndrome distinction
Asperger's Syndrome is named after an Austrian psychiatrist, Johann Friedrich Karl Asperger. Developmental disorder Asperger's Syndrome is a kind of autism spectrum disorder. Young persons with Asperger's Syndrome often have inflexible, repetitive thought and behaviour patterns and have trouble relating to others socially. The terms Asperger's and autism are combined in the most recent edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM-5). The lack of well-defined boundaries between the two, as well as emerging research (at the time) equating them, resulted in the absorption of Asperger’s into the autism spectrum with the intention to avoid clinical confusion.
This means that what was once a reality has now ceased to be reality due to the absence of the language or word.
2. Behaviour as Language
"Language tells us what is behaviour and also what kinds of behaviours there are and what any particular behaviour is as a description... Not behaving, not acting in a specific way may be seen as behaving in a specific way, even a very noticeable way (resting, pausing, posing, sleeping, day-dreaming). If someone is silent and does not "behave," we are perfectly capable of talking "oxymoronically" about silent behaviour or immobility as behaviour. - p. 9, Language and Power by Creel Froman
3. Language as a way we organise and create groups
Linguistics as my first subject matter (specialty) gave me the background to understand the power there is to language and how different groups (academic, business, political, national, family or friend circles) use language or words in particular to keep the in group apart from the out group. This gave me a great deal of sensitivity towards the use of language and what words are different in what context — and what exactly motivated the choice of words.
Your membership to the group depends on your fluency in being able to speak those words well and in understanding those words well. Fluency is based on the number of words present in the group and the ability to use it in a pragmatically suitable way. The better you are at that, the greater the sense of belonging and acceptance in the group.
Words therefore hold much power that seen by the eye 👁