Politics and the English Language

As it happens, the very next morning following my last missive, Toffee was there among the other students in my A class, and everything seemed to be back to normal. Lest many of you were vilifying me for heartlessly crushing a young woman's spirit, let me report that she was cheerful and as combative as ever. She is actually not without some utility in my teaching task. Where the other students can sometimes be too meek to bring it to my attention that something I've said makes no sense to anyone, Toffee is glad of an opportunity to challenge me.

We were discussing the right answers on a previously written test pertaining to the NY Times article, "French See a Hero in War on 'McDomination'" (October 12, 1999). One question concerns the passage:

Spotted under the golden arches, the French often behave as if they just got caught leaving an X-rated movie... "I come here only once in a great while," said one customer, Laurent Jeniez, who was getting back into his car alone. "I do it only with my children," he added, though none could be seen.

The test question was:

The contradiction here (highlighted by "though") is that: A) the customer says he likes McDonald's, but he rarely goes there; B) the customer rarely goes to McDonald's, but statistics show that the French go there often; C) the customer says he only goes with children, but he has no children with him; D) the customer does not like to bring his children to McDonald's, although the children want to come.

No one could give the answer. In my explanation, I'd stressed that two things are in conflict. On concluding the explanation, I was passing on to the next question when Toffee chirped up to insist that I'd said there are two contradictions. (The test advised that multiple choices could be true and that they had to list each.) It turned out some other students were under the same impression. What was the other contradiction, Toffee demanded. At first I didn't know what she was talking about, but then figured it out and was able to squelch the misconception.

On another question, Toffee declared my answer wrong. Perhaps some of you would agree. Quoting the article -- "[Bove] says America has no right to force its hormone-enhanced food down French throats" -- the test asked: "Are French people being forced to eat American hormone-enhanced beef?"

In a nutshell: the EU banned the beef, and the U.S. retaliated with high tariffs on luxury imported foods such as France's Roquefort cheese. While I don't believe it can be said that French people are being forced to eat something that is banned, what Bove meant was that the goal of the American retaliation was to force the EU to drop its ban. (Even then, French people would not be forced to eat the American beef, though there could be issues of identifying what beef sold in France was hormone-enhanced.) Toffee asserted that my "no" prescription was wrong, and that the correct answer was "yes." (No other student ever does this.) I answered that I'd be happy to argue with her after class anytime. This produced considerable merriment among the students.

If I can manage to keep the girl reasonably in check, our ongoing feud might actually be a worthwhile device for keeping students attentive.

In my discussion of the dead parrot test with the other group (group B), I had to eat crow as the students demonstrated ambiguity in one of the questions quoted in my previous letter to you. Folks, I'm obliged to report that you are so far not doing very well on your tests.

"Look my lad, I've had just about enough of this. That parrot is definitely deceased, and when I bought it not half an hour ago, you assured me that its total lack of movement was due to it being tired and shagged out after a long squawk."

This refers to an explanation that A) the pet shop owner gave to the customer; B) the customer gave to the owner.

This is an attempt (an effort) to explain A) a long squawk; B) the lack of movement; C) that the parrot is deceased; D) why the parrot will never squawk again.

I intended the "this" in the second question to refer to the explanation that is the subject of the first question -- making B correct. But most if not all students legitimately interpreted it as referring to the quotation provided above, which would make C the best choice. (I therefore instructed that any answer would get a point, effectively eliminating the question's effect on test scores.)

I know how this happened. I originally wrote "The explanation is an attempt (an effort) to explain ...," but that seemed patently wrong. An explanation, by definition, explains; it doesn't only attempt to explain. "The explanation seeks to account for ..." is equivalent and therefore just as illogical, though it makes the incongruity almost invisible. At the time I also briefly considered "The explanation is for A) ...," but while correct, it sounds awkward and would jar a native speaker.

The fallacy here is that, counter-intuitively, an explanation need not explain anything, as we may see in The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Third Edition. (Microsoft Bookshelf 98 fully incorporates this dictionary and enables me to summon a definition in about a second or two -- I use it continually when I write. When you also consider the crucial benefits of word processing in redrafting, anyone can see that trying to write without a computer would be futile.) The dictionary has:

explain:
ex·plain verb
ex·plained, ex·plain·ing, ex·plains verb, transitive
1. To make plain or comprehensible.
2. To define; expound: We explained our plan to the committee.
3. a. To offer reasons for or a cause of; justify: explain an error. b. To offer reasons for the actions, beliefs, or remarks of (oneself).

verb, intransitive
To make something plain or comprehensible: Let me explain.

And:

explanation:
ex·pla·na·tion noun
1. The act or process of explaining: launched into a detailed explanation.
2. Something that explains: That was supposedly the explanation for their misdeeds.
3. A mutual clarification of misunderstandings; a reconciliation.

Thus, an explanation (definition 1 or 2, with the verb "explain" in the definition understood in sense #3a) does not necessarily explain (sense #1) anything. So even though it sounds all wrong, my initial "The explanation is an attempt to explain ..." was basically fine. I should have used the equivalent "The explanation seeks to account for ..." after all.

This is fascinating stuff, isn't it? Hey, where is everybody?

This business recalls MIT psychology professor Steven Pinker's comment, in his NYT article on W.'s malapropisms ("Bushisms"), about the process of comprehending language. Pinker writes that it is "a forgiving mental process that seldom takes things literally.... [E]ven careful listeners have trouble figuring out what is wrong with the sentence 'This study fills a much-needed gap.'"

Though the article focusses on Bush, a speaker exceptionally in need of "forgiveness," in fact any speaker depends on plenty of goodwill and contextual insight on the part of listeners. While intended meaning may be clear for good speakers, the rules of natural language are too inexact to preclude perverse interpretations. Which, speaking of Bush, calls to mind the U.S. election system. When it's a close call, Tuesday's election highlights how this system too fails to preclude perverse interpretations. Which could be a serious problem, since people are capable of being perverse when losing is the alternative.

Columnist William Safire opines (November 9):

Should today's loser -- whoever he is -- encourage further investigation of "irregularities"? Nixon's most unselfish hour was when he refused to contest the excruciatingly close results. Former President Herbert Hoover called him to say that Joe Kennedy wanted to set up a meeting with his son, the president-elect. After meeting with J.F.K., Nixon told us that court challenges would be "disruptive." He refused to undermine the legitimacy of the election.

This suggests that what we keep hearing is the most powerful and technologically advanced nation on earth, as well as the oldest democracy, depends on "unselfishness" in its transfers of political power. What kind of system is that? It's a recipe for trouble, just like when Z and I both think we're in charge of my classroom.

The frailty of this system and its looming dangers are reflected in a couple of recent NY Times editorials:

This is a time for both presidential candidates, their advisers and their parties to proceed with extreme caution -- a caution merited by the danger that events could lurch suddenly toward political or constitutional crisis.... Both men should resist hot-headed advisers who will be pressing them to try to wriggle out of the constitutional process if one man wins the Electoral College and the other the popular vote. Attempts to get electors, both pledged and unpledged, to change their votes would be especially damaging as a precedent for the future. Voters have a right to see their electors vote for the party and candidate they represent. There will be some disgruntlement with a split between the popular and electoral outcomes if Mr. Bush wins Florida, but a free-for-all struggle to get electors to break their political loyalties would do greater damage to the two-party system, the nation's historically orderly transition process and to constitutional tradition.

[November 9]

And the next day:

It is doubly worrying that some Gore associates are using the language of constitutional crisis and talking of efforts to block or cloud the vote of the Electoral College on Dec. 18 and of dragging out the legal battle into January. The CNN political commentator Bill Schneider picked apt language when he spoke of the "treacherous path" that would-be leaders choose when they talk of unraveling the finality of elections.

[November 10]

Why don't these overwrought commentators focus more on how to fix the fundamental problem -- the flawed and vulnerable system that permits this degree of ambiguity? Not to mention the stupendous incompetence displayed in many precincts in the actual recording of constituent votes? (In some, even Ph.D. holders reportedly could not figure out which holes to punch to designate their preferred candidates. Elsewhere, "New Yorkers encountered familiar frustrations in the exercise of their civic obligations on Tuesday. Some fidgeted and fumed in long lines that ended at broken voting machines. Some were given the wrong instructions, even the wrong ballots. Others found their names missing from the rolls, including those who had registered when they got their driver's licenses.... [But New York City's] main problem is its clunky equipment. New Yorkers still cast their ballots on machines that appear to be patterned on a 19th-century cotton gin...." --NYT editorial, November 9.)

Incidentally, it's instructive at this point to recall the tiresome, seemingly never-ending quarrel over that Cuban kid. While many felt Gore sold out on principle by declaring that the boy should stay in the U.S., he may quite possibly have lost the election because he did not oppose the boy's return to Cuba more vigorously. What kid is worth the presidency? Safire writes:

Why isn't Gore now ahead in Florida? More history rooted in the 1960's: Though he publicly disagreed with his administration's decision to return Elian Gonzalez to Castro's Cuba -- thereby taking flak for "pandering" -- Gore suffered for Bill Clinton's action, and for Janet Reno's dark-of-night assault. Florida's Cuban-Americans delivered about 60,000 more votes to George Bush this year than to Bob Dole in 1996.