Writing for Meaning

Writing is a long-time form of communication between people. No matter the language, writing is an efficient process for expressing emotions, sharing discoveries, and telling stories of reality and fantasy. We write letters to people that live far away from us. We write cover letters to impress employers for jobs. We write in our private diaries to express our inner deepest feelings and thoughts. And we write to persuade people to believe in a specific philosophy or phenomenon.

Each word that we write has its own meaning and purpose. When I write I love you to my family, I use the word ‘love’ to express a strong emotional affect that is reserved for the people I am closest to. When I write about someone that I hate, the word ‘hate’ indicates an immense or intense dislike for that person. These words even change in different languages. Love in Spanish translates to ‘amar’, but there’s a little twist. ‘Amar’ is the infinitive verb form of love in spanish. When we say “I love you” in spanish, we say “Te amo”. For “I love her”, “La amo.” “I love myself.” “Me quiero a mi misma.” Notice how saying that I love myself translates into a different word entirely.

Each form of writing uses words, which is a simple thing. But each word has its own meaning and pronunciation. They have hundreds of pronunciations in fact. Because the amount of human languages is endless, one word can be called two or more different things in another language. And that is the beauty of writing for meaning. Words can carry dual-meanings and create dual-meanings in entire phrases. The more different the sentence, the more the words will transform.


Comments

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *