I"m glad you are addressing language, Margaret. The language of these people is innately 'colonizing,'--too use their terminology. They have a premise and a conclusion and you have to agree or you are the enemy. This kind of language is based on the syllogism (if. . . then . . . ) which forces the listener to agree or disagree. Aristotle…
I"m glad you are addressing language, Margaret. The language of these people is innately 'colonizing,'--too use their terminology. They have a premise and a conclusion and you have to agree or you are the enemy. This kind of language is based on the syllogism (if. . . then . . . ) which forces the listener to agree or disagree. Aristotle says that Plato was the first to consciously use this method. It was about that time, c. 450 BCE, that colonizing religions first appeared.
The original speech pattern was called "phasis" ("description of the appearance of the phenomena") or "letting the thing speak for itself." This is called "explanatory" speech by Jerry Stannard (1967) in "Presocratic Speech," virtually the only treatment of the subject I have ever seen. (For those not put off by astrology, the only other treatment of this I know of is on robertschmidtastrology.com).
Explanatory speech is the way indigenous societies originally spoke--the very people these colonizing Western cultural fanatics are supposedly trying to save. As they said on the remote reservation where I learned my language skills, "too much Jesus." (Ironically, Jesus himself used explanatory speech--"the kingdom of heaven is like. . . "). The stereotypical expression, "white man speaks with forked tongue" expresses the problem with the syllogism.
Another technique the colonizers use is the repetition of nouns (and now, pronouns). Again, Aristotle says (On Grammar), nouns make the mind stop while verbs make it run on, like: bird singing, horse running, colonist speaking. . . . This is how I was taught that incantation works by an indigenous speaker. The repetition of the same nouns reinforces the brainwashing/enchantment/fantasy these people suffer under.
Thank you for your insights, Matthew. One of the reasons I focus so much on (re)framing and the coining of terms such as “philanthropath” (https://margaretannaalice.substack.com/p/anatomy-of-a-philanthropath-dreams) is because I know how effectively the propagandists use it to control our perceptions, thoughts, and behavior.
George Lakoff has aided and abetted the enemy by developing framing to define politically expedient narratives, and we must employ the same cognitive tools to shift those narratives back toward truth.
I"m glad you are addressing language, Margaret. The language of these people is innately 'colonizing,'--too use their terminology. They have a premise and a conclusion and you have to agree or you are the enemy. This kind of language is based on the syllogism (if. . . then . . . ) which forces the listener to agree or disagree. Aristotle says that Plato was the first to consciously use this method. It was about that time, c. 450 BCE, that colonizing religions first appeared.
The original speech pattern was called "phasis" ("description of the appearance of the phenomena") or "letting the thing speak for itself." This is called "explanatory" speech by Jerry Stannard (1967) in "Presocratic Speech," virtually the only treatment of the subject I have ever seen. (For those not put off by astrology, the only other treatment of this I know of is on robertschmidtastrology.com).
Explanatory speech is the way indigenous societies originally spoke--the very people these colonizing Western cultural fanatics are supposedly trying to save. As they said on the remote reservation where I learned my language skills, "too much Jesus." (Ironically, Jesus himself used explanatory speech--"the kingdom of heaven is like. . . "). The stereotypical expression, "white man speaks with forked tongue" expresses the problem with the syllogism.
Another technique the colonizers use is the repetition of nouns (and now, pronouns). Again, Aristotle says (On Grammar), nouns make the mind stop while verbs make it run on, like: bird singing, horse running, colonist speaking. . . . This is how I was taught that incantation works by an indigenous speaker. The repetition of the same nouns reinforces the brainwashing/enchantment/fantasy these people suffer under.
Thank you for your insights, Matthew. One of the reasons I focus so much on (re)framing and the coining of terms such as “philanthropath” (https://margaretannaalice.substack.com/p/anatomy-of-a-philanthropath-dreams) is because I know how effectively the propagandists use it to control our perceptions, thoughts, and behavior.
George Lakoff has aided and abetted the enemy by developing framing to define politically expedient narratives, and we must employ the same cognitive tools to shift those narratives back toward truth.
Yes, the problems are big and they are deep. . . to the roots of thought and speech.