Let Me Put All This Stuff Into Words

Recently, I asked a visiting Englishman for his impressions of America. He said he found the United States to be a “linguistically impoverished society.”

“Yo,” I said. “Ditto to that.”

Then, to forcefully hammer home my point, I followed up with, “For sure. I hear ya.” That British guy was right. Americans border on the pathetic in their ability to use language. In fact, most Americans would agree that we are linguistically impoverished, except that most Americans believe “linguistically impoverished” is a pasta dish.

Ever since I talked to this man, I’ve been observing how my fellow Americans speak in normal conversation. I’ve noticed that we prefer not to use big complex words (“vegetables”) when the word “stuff” is available for all-around use.

For instance, the American way to describe the complexity of matter in the universe would be to say, “The universe is made up of space ‘n’ stuff.”

I’ve also noticed we utilize certain stock cliches for 90 percent of our conversation. Here’s a typical American conversation:

“Didja see that thing on TV last night?”

“The election deal? Yeah.”

“What was that, anyway? I mean, what was the deal?”

“I know what you mean. I’m hearing you.”

“Was that, like, the worst?”

“No doubt. The part I liked was when that guy, you know, kind of lost it.”

“No kidding. What was he thinking?”

“Yeah, well, that’s what I don’t get. He was acting all, weird and stuff.”

“You got to admit, it was kind of interesting.”

“No kidding.”

“I mean, if we can’t come up with anybody better than that, we’re pretty much, you know, screwed.”

“There you go.”

“You got that right.”

“There you go.”

Is this any way for adult human beings to communicate? I’ve thought about this question deeply, and my only answer is: “No way.”

In fact, I would go so far as to say, “No way, Jose.”

The truth is actually worse than I portrayed it, because I cannot print the obscenities ‘90s Americans routinely substitute for every noun, verb and adjective that isn’t already an obscenity. When I said Americans use the word “stuff” a lot, I actually meant they use another word that begins with “s.”

The English language is the richest in the world in terms of nuance and variety, yet we Americans are wary of using any word that sounds like something an English teacher would use. For instance, the English language provides us with dozens of ways to convey the concept “big,” such as enormous, prodigious, colossal and immense. Yet we Americans prefer to stick with “big” unless it is something really big, in which case it is “honking big.”

However, I’ve been listening carefully to the conversations of the British lately, and those people are not exactly guilt-free. Maybe they don’t say “like” or “you know” as much as we do, but they have a big problem with “sort of,” a honking big problem.

Here’s a typical British sentence: “They were sort of sent away to Yorkshire, where they sort of toddled about the countryside, just sort of shooting and riding and guzzling port and that sort of thing.”

The solution for us all, British and Americans, is to strive to be more eloquent in our daily speech. Let’s lose all of our “kind ofs” and “sort ofs” and “likes” and “you knows.” Instead of calling something “okay,” call it “meritorious.” Instead of calling something “crummy,” call it “wretched.” Instead of calling our society “all messed up and stuff,” call it “linguistically impoverished.”

At least people will know precisely what you’re talking about, although they might think it comes with anchovies.

, DataTimes MEMO: To leave a message on Jim Kershner’s voice-mail, call 459-5493. Or send e-mail to jimk@spokesman.com, or regular mail to Spokesman-Review, P.O. Box 2160, Spokane, WA 99210.

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