Mistaking words for language is a common mistake. From early childhood we’re trained to mistake the two, by parents, preachers & teachers, school, university, the internet, social media, and last but not least by your smartphone. Despite all this, that doesn’t make the mistake right.
Word is already taken by word, and language by language. Mistaking one for the other only prevents you from knowing the first thing about either. There is no advantage to be gained. You can’t win with a losing hand.
Word (4 letters) and language (8 letters) don’t even look the same.
Language is based on the French langue, meaning tongue. Therefore, had language been translated from the French, it would now be tonguage in English.
Tonguage, imagine that!
But those are facts, and facts have never changed anything, with the possible exception of minor murder cases. But for the worst murder cases the world has ever witnessed, all the facts add up to one big lie.
As it is, here’s what your parents, schools, universities, internet, social media, and smartphones say about word.
- “Word: There still remains no consensus about the proper definition of word.” – Wikipedia, the world’s most-read reference work with 2.5 billion unique visitors a month
- “Word: A speech sound or series of speech sounds that symbolizes and communicates a meaning usually without being divisible into smaller units capable of independent use.” – The Merriam-Webster Dictionary
- “Word: A single unit of language that means something and can be spoken or written.” – The Oxford Learner’s Dictionary
- “Word: Speech, talk, utterance, sentence, statement, news, report, word.” – Etymology Online
- “Enter a sentence with the word word to see examples in context.” – thesaurus.com
- “An addicting languages-supported anagram game.” – Wordmaster https://octokatherine.github.io/word-master/
- “An upbeat and lively public radio show and podcast about language as well as new words, old sayings, slang, family expressions, word histories, etymology, linguistics, regional dialects, word games, grammar, books, literature, writing, and more.” – A Way with Words https://www.waywordradio.org/
- “Each guess must be a valid 5 letter word.” – Wordle https://wordlewebsite.com/
- “A modern dictionary for a modern world that represents language visually.” – VISUWORDS™ https://visuwords.com/
Makes you wonder if our schools, universities, and our internet are run by 6-year olds high on drugs.
Should you mistake your friends for your enemies, your friends would tell you. But unlike you and your friends, words don’t possess the organs required to tell you anything. When you mistake a word for another, you must tell yourself. There’s no other way. When it’s about words, it’s all up to you.
Words are NOT language!
There exist many wordless languages, also known as non-verbal languages, including body, hand, music, sound, color, smell, mime, and sign language, to name a few.
Wordless communication, for example by sound, is common not only among the plants and animals, but also among word-users in North Africa, Spain, and Turkey, and probably at other locations, too.
“Do not the most moving moments of our lives find us without words?” – Marcel Marceau
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