A word on words. . .

This morning in my class, I went over a quiz with my students. One particular question on the quiz that many missed was this:

True or False When creating an emotional appeal in an audience, it is acceptable to use biased language.

MANY of my students were under the impression that the answer was TRUE. For our students who are now raised under the guise of modern news, debate, and politics, this might seem to be the case. But as one essential piece of every piece of writing is that of Ethos, the ethical standing and reliability of the writer, it's important for me to teach my students that skewering an opponent with facts and unbiased language should be far more powerful in the creation of an argument than doing so with biased language. The answer is false and today I had an excellent opportunity to show them such strategies in action.

Words are powerful. We discuss in class not only denotation (the dictionary definitions of words) but connotation as well -- the powerful emotional triggers that many words tend to carry. Right now we have two political parties beating up fervor and support for their candidates in November's election. One party associates itself with hope and change. The other, evidenced in last night's speeches, seeks to identify themselves in country first and service. Last night's speech by Sen. Fred Thompson also showed a desire to associate the party's Presidential and Vice Presidential candidates with both rebellion and honor as well.

As both parties have made clear: Words are important. They help to shape our thinking. And in this election year, they help to create our reactions to the candidates.

You can imagine, then, my disappointment when Independent Senator Joe Lieberman said this during his speech last night (emphasis mine): Sen. Barack Obama is a gifted and eloquent young man who I think can do great things for our country in the years ahead, but, my friends, eloquence is no substitute for a record, not in these tough times for America.

Lieberman attempted to make the point that others have made: that Obama, while eloquent, lacks the experience that makes him a strong Presidential candidate. I'm not going to take the time to argue with him here, though I do believe Lieberman is wrong.

What I ask my students to realize -- and what I ask others to realize -- is that how we say things is often more important than what we say. Lieberman was saying that Obama lacks experience, but in the connotations of his words, he essentially equated Barack Obama with a really talented child.

Either that or I should be relieved to know that Lieberman considers me an adequate wordsmith who happens to be a suckling child.