By Eric Le Roy
In the 21st century, people eager to don the mantel of idealism are inclined toward harsh judgments of the past. Often they are right, for who among us would shout, “Bring back slavery!!” Or “Cancel Human Rights!”? It’s even getting harder all the time to talk someone into advocating for the return of capital punishment.
As for me, I would be uncomfortable in a place … Read the rest
There’s a special kind of language that doesn’t tell you what’s happening—it tells you what to feel about it. It’s an art form, really. A performance where words pretend to inform but actually sedate. Bureaucrats, generals, and “information managers” have refined it into a linguistic ballet: graceful, bloodless, and utterly lethal to thought.
It’s called doublespeak. Or, in the more poetic tongues of the East, necro-speak—the language of the … Read the rest
By Eric Le Roy
Bruegel’s ‘Tower of Babel’
Content 18+ My Budapest-based friend and colleague Artem (I refer to him so much you might think he is just my alter-ego or imaginary friend like a teddy bear or ghost in the forest) shared the following information with me recently:
“My gym trainer told me that English is a language of idiots as it is very … Read the rest
By Eric Le Roy
Content 18+ A long time ago I had the pleasure of reading George Orwell’s essay “Politics and the English Language.” It’s still considered such a classic that it remains anthologized and I have brought it to the attention of many of my students. Orwell (author of 1984 and Animal Farm if you –I shudder to think – have never heard of him or his books) in … Read the rest
Content advisory 18+ There is a song called “The Boxer” by a once-famous duo (and deservedly so) in America known as Simon & Garfunkel. One line goes as follows: “… Still, a man sees what he wants to see and disregards the rest.” Another valuable (for me) insight is provided by William Blake: “The eye, altering, alters all” — the beautiful language of which can be a bit confusing until … Read the rest
