Powerful Language

I just watched a segment on the long running CBS News Magazine, 60 Minutes about Huckleberry Finn. A publisher updated the text replacing a common racial slur with the word 'slave.' There has been great debate for a long time about the language used by Mark Twain. Many schools will not touch Twain's writing because of the language used while others believe it must be taught because of the same language.

Written and spoken language can be so powerful. We communicate ideas with language but we communicate a lot more. We put for beliefs and emotions with language. It can be very subtle or very bold. You can communicate multiple ideas with a single sentence or say nothing with several pages.

I have noticed I tend to tailor my message to my audience. My workplace is very bilingual. I see this as an asset but I also find that when I speak to people who speak French as their first language, I use a more direct simple language. The people I speak with most of the time work very well in English but I don't want the idea to get lost in translation. They are much better in English than I am in French and it will be like this for quite a while.

I don't know where I really stand on updating literature. I do thoroughly believe in free speech. I think we need to keep the ideas from the past and learn from them or be doomed to fail again. I also understand how racial slurs can make people uncomfortable. It's a type of language that may not be appropriate for all situations or scenarios. That's the hard part.

It seems the last bastion of offensive language is attached to race. There is still too much racism and people get set off very easily about race. It's understandable but we need to keep working to move beyond our current state. Only then will the power of these words be used for good and not for hate.