Thursday, 27 September 2007

Quotable quote

From the jungle of words out there, an argument agains post-modern hyper criticism:

"Language is collaborative: words mean what most of us think they mean."
- Barbara Wallraff Your Own Words

Of course, when we are reading works written in another historical age, another language, or within another culture, we need to factor this into our thinking. As the OED attests, our words have held very different meanings in onther times and places.

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