Friday 30 October 2015

Confounding the Average Man

*Fade in*

A small dark room with a lone light bulb hanging in the center of a clustered small group...


Me:"Hello, My name is E and I'm a word-aholic*."


PRESENT DAY REAL LIFE....


I had a particularly interesting though tiresome conversation with my colleagues at work today.
It was enlightening too.

I have a thing for new words. Big words preferably.

New big words make me giggle.

They make me want to use them in everyday conversations to test my proficiency (can't remember the actual word I want to use here) in English Language.

Now their arguments were as follows (they used baser words so I'll try not to detract from what they said) : -

1) Using bigger words often can make you forget simpler words that can be used instead
2) You make your audience laugh (at you)
3) You would most probably not be able to explain some words you use.
4) You forget that some words which are basic to you are actually big words

Now, 1 and 3 are similar, I know. We actually put it to the test.

They asked me to define gibberish. 

Now, I know what gibberish means. You know how sometimes you know what you want to say but you don't know how to put it into words? Well, that's what happened to me. I couldn't for the life of me figure out a word to use to explain gibberish.

Guess what word I could have used (that they supplied me with)?

NONSENSENONSENSE!

Suffice it to say that I felt a bit silly.

Sooo, I have an assignment to watch a Wole Soyinka video/interview. I was informed that though he may use "big words" in written word. But in spoken word (lol, I hope that's a thing) he uses simple words.

*cues video and pauses for it to buffer..... Nigeria, after all*


Anyway, what are your thoughts?

Do you like using big words or do you hate people using it?

How does it make you feel when you see or learn new 'big words'?

Also, how many big words did you note that I used here? (I don't think I used that many, if any at all, but hey, I could be wrong.  Lol.


PS: This could actually be part of the reason I haven't put up a post in a while. I'll most probably write about the other reasons in the course of time.

* The word is Logophile. :-)