- Apr 2024
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We quote because we are afraid to-change words, lest there be a change in meaning.
Quotations are easier to collect than writing things out in one's own words, not only because it requires no work, but we may be afraid of changing the original meaning by changing the original words or by collapsing the context and divorcing the words from their original environment.
Perhaps some may be afraid that the words sound "right" and they have a sense of understanding of them, but they don't quite have a full grasp of the situation. Of course this may be remedied by the reader or listener not only by putting heard stories into their own words and providing additional concrete illustrative examples of the concepts. These exercises are meant to ensure that one has properly heard/read and understood a concept. Psychologists call this paraphrasing or repetition the "echo effect" (others might say parroting or mirroring) and have found that it can help to build understanding, connection, and likeability between people. Great leaders who do this will be sure to make sure that credit for the original ideas goes to the originator and not to themselves simply because they repeated it, especially in group settings where their words may have more primacy amidst their underlings.
(I can't find it at the moment, but there's a name/tag for this in my notes? looping?)
Beyond this, can one place the idea into a more clear language than the original? Add some poetry perhaps? Make the concept into a concrete meme to make it more memorable?
Journalists like to quote because it gives primacy of voice to the speaker and provides the reader with the sense that they're getting the original from which they might make up their own minds. It also provides a veneer of vérité to their reportage.
Link this back to Terrence's comedy: https://hypothes.is/a/xe15ZKPGEe6NJkeL77Ji4Q
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- Feb 2024
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In addition tobeing Readers, volunteers could help as Subeditors who received bundles ofslips for pre-sorting (chronologically and into senses of meaning
The slips for the OED were sorted alphabetically and then grouped chronologically and by sense of meanings of the words.
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- Nov 2022
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Justice Felix Frankfurter,a prolific writer as a Harvard lawprofessor before joining the SupremeCourt, was right that “[a]nything thatis written may present a problem ofmeaning” because words “seldomattain[] more than approximate preci-sion.”12
12 Felix Frankfurter, Some Reflections On the Reading of Statutes, 47 CoLUm . L. rev. 527, 528 (1947), reprinting Felix Frankfurter, Sixth Annual Benjamin N. Cardozo Lecture, 2 Rec. Bar Ass'n City of N.Y. (No. 6, 1947).
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- Nov 2021
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asiasociety.org asiasociety.org
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Huang, who has a background in paleography, warns that many characters do not function as a “signific,” a linguistic term indicating a relationship to the word’s meaning. Additionally, the meanings of numerous characters changed over time, or they were “loaned” to other words with separate meanings. Even though more than 86 percent of characters have radicals that also function as significs, Huang encourages teachers to understand some of the exceptions, saying, “It is all right for Chinese teachers not to lecture on these, but they have to know them because students may ask.”
More than 86% of characters in Chinese function as significs, a linguistic term indicating an association to the word's meaning. Sometimes these meanings can change with time and drift from original meanings.
The drift can be interesting and important from the perspective of historical linguistics as well as to give clues to changes in culture.
An example in English might be the use in computer user interfaces that include telephone handset images or old 3.5" floppy disk images used to respectively indicate "call" or "save" despite the fact that these items have either changed shape or are no longer commonly used.
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