General Advice
Most fundamentally, it is necessary to know the correct meaning of words and
use the right one for your purpose. This advice applies to all words, but has
special relevance for technical terms. These may simply be special terms,
special terms with synonyms or terms in ordinary usage that are used in a
discipline in a special way. To handle these it is necessary to use a good
reference book. It may be a general dictionary, a law dictionary, a dictionary
for the relevant discipline, or a thesaurus.
It is also necessary to be sensitive to three facts. First, some dictionaries are
badly written. Second, not all entries in a dictionary fully capture the use and
meaning of a term. Third, terms move around and end up with a range of
meanings, even if these meanings are connected. In this regard, be aware that
words have at least three sources of meaning –
origin, derivation and usage.
Logically, origin and derivation should determine their meaning but meaning is
not always a matter of logic. Sometimes usage, even usage contrary to the
logic, determines meaning in a manner similar to the operation of the legal
maxim communis error facit lex. (This means that common mistakes make law
–
if enough people accept an erroneous view of the law it is considered right).
A good illustration is the word “decimate”. It comes from the Latin word
decim
meaning ten (logic at work). When first used it referred to the practice
of the ancient Romans to punish a rebellious army
by executing one in ten
soldiers (origin at work). Now in common speech its meaning has dramatically
shifted to mean to destroy almost completely (usage at work).
Obscurantist Words
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Some words or phrases tend more to obscure than enlighten, or at least they
provide far less clear information to the reader than is needed. This is prone to
happen with terms that are constructs or are by nature abstract, fluid,
amorphous or ambiguous. These are dangerous to use in serious academic
discussion unless they are accompanied by a careful explanation of the sense
in which the writer is deploying the term. All too easily language that beguiles
in these ways allows a writer to become lost which in turn loses the reader.
Even in the best case it obfuscates. In a worse case the writer slides between
the various meanings of the term, implicitly changing the chosen meaning to
suit the argument. In other words, when their argument is shot down, they
change horses in midstream and ride towards their conclusion as they bestride
another meaning of the term.
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Dr Samuel Johnson
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