Words!

RHYS BOWEN:  Our society is losing many things: civility, culture, empathy but above all WORDS. The young generation communicates with texts. LOL  WTF etc. During Covid my rather shy granddaughter was confined to her room and not doing well.  I suggested she call some friends to chat.  Nobody chats, Nana, she said.

I saw an interview on TV with a juvenile offender. When he spoke he sounded angry all the time and every third sentence was "Know what I mean? Know what I mean?"  The problem was we didn't know what he meant because he lacked the words to  express it.

My grandmother and great aunt had huge vocabularies. They spoke in complete sentences. They read extensively.  Maybe the Victorian era was in some ways the high point of civilization. So many inventions, good literature, a relatively peaceful world.  of course we won't mention colonial domination, awful slums, child labor... but I feel we have gone downhill from there. Two world wars, the rise of technology and, worst of all for us writers, the drop in reading. We are now writing for an elite few, most of them in the older generation. When they are gone will there be anyone else who wants to read as an escape?

My daughter teaches at a fabulous Montessori school, K-8. Their library is open during lunch hour and my daughter says it is always full of kids sprawled on couches and bean bags reading their favorite books. They also have a period every day called DEAR.  Drop Everything And Read. 

If only more schools were like that. But I feel we are all to blame. I notice my own vocabulary is limited these days. "Where did we put that thing? That whatsit?  How are you?  I'm good.  Not I'm well, which is correct.  I am trying to keep or recover some sort of vocabulary.  I subscribe to something called Word Genius that sends me a new word every day. Some days I feel smug because I already know it. Other days it's like today: 

No, I have never used that word in my life! I probably never will, but there are some words I think I know but I don't really. When John was saying that something was the most ridiculous thing he'd ever heard I commented that he should stop resorting to hyperbole.  That felt good.

But I saw this list the other day. I think I know all of these words.  Do you? And how do you think we can stop this horrible erosion of culture?

So who got a perfect score?

And do you have any suggestions about how we can improve our vocabularies and get kids to read? Harry Potter was amazing as it hooked a whole generation. Maybe we should stop writing for adults and write some more arresting children's lit.