Using Language Efficiently III

Choose Words That Build Credibility

- Use language that is appropriate, accurate, assertive and respectful.

1. Use Words Appropriately

- Uphold conventional rules of grammar and usage

- Code-switching: Selective use of dialect

- Key is to ensure your meaning is clear and your use is appropriate for your audience.

2. Use Words Accurately

- Beware of malapropisms: the inadvertent, incorrect uses of a word or phrase in place of one that sounds like it.

   (It's a strange receptacle > It's a strange spectacle)

3. Use The Active Voice

- Active voice is clear and assertive

- Passive voice is indirect and weak

- Voice: Feature of verbs that indicates the subject's relationship to the action

Passive: A test was announced by Ms. Carlos for Tuesday.

           A president is elected by the voters every four years.

Active: Ms. Carlos announced a test for Tuesday.

         The voters elect a president every four years.

4. Use Culturally Sensitive and Gender-Neutral Language

- Eliminate unfounded assumptions, negative descriptions, or stereotypes

- Colloquial expressions: Sayings specific to a certain region or group of people

- Avoid third person generic masculine pronouns (his, he)

     mankind > humankind       policeman > police officer

Choose Words That Create A Lasting Impression

1. Denotative vs. Connotative Meaning

- Denotative: Literal, dictionary meaning, definition of a word

- Connotative: The special association to it

      "slender" not 'skinny'

      "thrifty"  not 'cheap'

2. Use Repetition To Create Rhythm

- Anaphora: In this form of repetition, speaker repeats a word or phrase at the beginning of successive phrases, clauses or sentences

For example, Martin Luther King repeated, "I have a dream" many times.

3. Use Alliteration For A Poetic Quality

- Alliteration: Repetition of the same sounds, usually initial consonants, in two or more neighboring words or syllables

    

          "Down with dope, up with hope", "Nattering nabobs of negativism"

4. Experiment With Parallelism

- The arrangement of words, phrases, or sentences in a similar form

- Creates a sense of steady or building rhythm

    ~Orally numbering points ("first", "second", "third")

    ~Grouping speech concepts or ideas into three parallel grammatical elements or triads ("Of the people, By the people, and For the people")

    ~Setting off two strongly contrasting ideas in balanced (parallel) opposition (the device of antithesis, for example, "One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind")

    ~Repeating key word or phrase that emphasizes central/recurring idea of the speech

:)CLN