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TQP 023: Words – Beacons of Creative Power or Mere Devices of Communication Part II

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The Question PodcastA denotation is the objective, largely agreed-upon meaning of a word that can be found in the dictionary, while a connotation is the subjective, personal meaning of a word. But paradoxically, neither are necessarily correct or incorrect.

Denotation: If you’re a Scrabble or Boggle player, there’s a good chance you’ve called someone out on making up a word. And in some cases, much to your surprise, you found out that the word existed in the dictionary. You had no prior knowledge of the word, but it was there all along, so you can’t really say that it was false. Oh, and you were probably penalized in the game for accusing others of making things up.

Connotation: There’s a good chance you’ve read a sentence in an article or a book, and even though you knew that some words were used incorrectly, the meaning still came across. Nothing was missing in your understanding or interpretation of the sentence. Was the sentence structure incorrect in some way? It probably was, but it didn’t impede your ability to grasp it, so that makes it true. The author or editor may have made a mistake, but the message still took root in your mind.

In this episode of The Question podcast, you will hear highlights from David Andrew Wiebe’s presentation on “Words – Beacons of Creative Power or Mere Devices of Communication Part II”, as well as the music of Elliot Lorne Wyman.

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Love Is…

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When we’re pressed to explain our personal take on love, it’s amazing how a subject to which we devote so much attention suddenly becomes really difficult to explain.

Do We Really Understand Love?

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Has the meaning of love really become that easy to articulate, or has its meaning just become more difficult to understand? When we so readily say that we love something, are we just making an effort to be more loving in our words and relationships, or are we just bypassing the effort that’s required to know what it is to be truly loving?

Synchronicity

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A synchronicity is a unique concurrence of events that are not connected by cause but may be connected by meaning.

The reason it haunts us is that even though we can’t validate or prove the connection between the components, the cause, we often can’t escape the significance of the outcome, the meaning. It’s a challenge to shift our natural questions from the cause of something that happens, to the meaning of something that happens.

Coincidence doesn’t require a question, but synchronicity always requires a question.

In this video, presenter Frederick Tamagi explains the difference between synchronicity and coincidence.

Distorted Meaning

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The negative experience of so many female Muslims in their native countries in the areas of education, employment, law, and violence, provided presenter Frederick Tamagi with a different and controversial context for the words “tolerance” and “freedom”.

Real contronyms are embedded with their opposite meaning until their proper context is revealed. For that reason, we are compelled to wait for, or search for the proper context to know what the contronyms really mean.

Our most important words have the potential to be distorted and even wrongly applied if we are too simplistic about our symbols or careless about the context.

Context Is Essential

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Context is essential to meaning. The only way that keywords will not be useless, self-contradictory and meaningless is for us to know the context.

The more knowledge and the greater context we can bring to the words, the closer we are to their real meaning, if there is such a thing.

Contronyms give us a much needed excuse to press into the meaning of the words we use – to be intentional about what we mean and why we mean it.

In this video, presenter Frederick Tamagi goes deeper into the subject of contronyms, and how context is essential to the meanings we derive from sentences and words.

Contronym I

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What is a contronym? It’s a word that has two opposite meanings.

Some examples – as presenter Frederick Tamagi explains – are the words:

  • Apology
  • Clip
  • Dust
  • Oversight
  • Quantum
  • Sanction
  • Weather

The way we interpret sentences that contain contronyms can vary, making communication a challenging art form.

Alice In Wonderland

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We can choose to examine the faraway object in the night sky with binoculars or a telescope. Or we can examine a tiny object with a magnifying glass or a microscope.

Sometimes we don’t intentionally choose the option that will provide more clarity. Sometimes it’s easier not to.

In this video, Frederick Tamagi shares how he felt like Alice In World as he was beginning his latest exploration into truth.