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Aswad -> RE: Most Tragic Publishing Decision Ever? (9/2/2012 9:11:44 PM)
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Winterapple
I read Mein Kampf in college.
It should probably be mandatory reading in regard to history.
quote:
William Shirer told a story about being with a group of reporters from various countries. They were listening to Hitler on the radio give an early speech, they all understood German and knew what he was saying. The reporters who weren't German laughed at the speech. But Shirer said the German listeners didn't laugh. They were collapsed in their seats with a glazed look in their eyes. One of the first indications to those present that there was something about Hitler's rhetoric that was very powerful to his audience.
Reminiscent of the RNC and much right wing material in general. It speaks to a certain audience and builds on what is already in a lot of them, including what has been put into them over time from influences around them. To us, it is entirely uncovincing when the people in the ME region say a girl with Downs should be lit on fire because she burned some pages from a school book that may or may not have contained verses from the Qu'ran. To them, it's self evident that it should be that way.
Language, morality and culture form a single entity with three faces. English, she is spoken one way to the left, and she is spoken another to the right, and it is not just her idioms that differ, but the entire fabric of the cognitive structures of sender and receiver. As humans, we have the unique capacity to give reality to ideas that have none on their own (e.g. money), and the vast majority of what we consider human is tied down by the history of these constructs and the manner in which they guide every aspect of our being.
This is one of the reasons I'm glad I learned programming in several languages as a child (my old man saw what computers would become, and used them extensively himself, so he saw to it I had a solid foundation for the future), along with additional human languages. The former, in particular, offers a lot of constructions that make it possible to put in a few words things that you could hardly wrap up with a whole treatise in any of the human languages I have ever used. The latter, by contrast, offers a lot of opportunities for an evocative use of language. But if I speak of the thrill of going beyond suspense of disbelief to a vanilla, I will get a curious look at best and a horrified one at worst, whereas speaking of the same thing to a slave might tickle something at her very core.
You'll see the same thing with books and movies.
I'll use an example from the Wheel of Time (Robert Jordan). To someone that's never read the series, the response to this particular passage in the books will be modest at best. To someone that's read and followed them for a long time, the same passage will often bring a cold shiver to their spine (in a good way) and move them. Because it is in a frame of reference they know and can relate to, one they have been initiated into.
The passage I have in mind is the following, edited for simplicity. Mark the text between the «» signs to make it visible. It has a minor spoiler (a marriage) for anyone that hasn't read up to late in the series, although it is hardly a surprising marriage beyond book three or thereabouts.
quote:
«
My name is el'Nynaeve al'Meara ti Mandragoran.
The message I want sent is this:
my husband rides from World's End to Tarwin's Gap, toward Tarmon Gai'don.
Lan told me once that Malkier lives so long as one man wears the hadori in pledge that he will fight the Shadow,
so long as one woman wears the ki'sain in pledge that she will send her sons to fight the Shadow.
Will al'Lan Mandragoran ride to the Last Battle alone?
[...]
- He will not, my Lady.
I cannot stand surety for anyone else,
but I swear to you under the Light and by my hope of salvation and rebirth:
he will not ride alone.
»
Probably did nothing for you.
Me, I'm reaching for the Kleenex.
IWYW,
— Aswad.
EDIT: Fixed quote signs and broke up the lines closer to the books.
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