My thoughts about words and vocabulary (this sounds really boring but I promise, it's more interesting than it sounds)

            I’ve always been obsessed with words. I love how people can use words to tell a story, convey their thoughts, feelings, and ideas, and change the world. I especially love crazy words though that nobody has probably ever heard of before, but that sum up a feeling or idea perfectly. Plus, a lot of them are fun to say. Here are some examples of some of my favorite ‘crazy words’:

·         Gumusservi—noun, Turkish, moonlight shining on water

 

 

·         Galeanthropy—noun, the belief that you are a cat

·         Brumous—adjective, French, of grey skies and winter days; filled with heavy clouds or fog; relating to winter or cold, sunless weather

·         Nefelibata—noun, Portuguese, ‘cloud walker’; one who lives in the clouds of their own imagination or dreams, or one who does not obey the conventions of society, literature, or art

·         Toska—noun, Russian, a dull ache of the soul, a sick pining, a spiritual anguish

·         Orphic—adjective, mysterious and entrancing; beyond ordinary understanding

·         Nemophilist—noun, a haunter of the woods; one who loves the forest and its beauty and solitude

·         Psithurism—noun, Greek, the sound of wind through trees

·         Drapetomania—noun, an overwhelming urge to run away

I love how these words describe ideas or feelings that one often wishes to describe but it’s hard to find the words to do so. For example, I’ve read many stories where authors try to describe the sound of the wind blowing through the trees, but it could be more accurate and efficient to use the word “psithurism” instead. I think that if people try to expand their vocabulary then we could all be much better communicators.

      Another thought I’ve had about words lately is words from different languages. If you take a look at the list above, many of those weird words come from different languages: Turkish, French, Portuguese, Russian, Greek…there are so many different languages in the world and they all have different words that may not be found in other languages. Not only could people become better communicators by expanding their vocabulary, but they can become better communicators by learning other languages as well. If you aren’t limited to one language, you can find more ways to express yourself and your feelings. I found the perfect example of this once when I was on Facebook incidentally. There’s this Facebook page called Humans of New York, which is a photo-blog formed by a man named Brandon Stanton. Every day, Stanton roams the streets of New York City, and looks for people that interest him. When he finds one of these interesting people, he goes up to them and asks if he can take their photograph, and then captions the photograph with something the individual said during an interview-like conversation from the 5-minute photo shoot. I remember scrolling on Facebook one day and coming across a HONY post. The picture was of a man, and the caption basically said that he spoke both English and Spanish. The man said he spoke English to explain technical stuff, and Spanish to explain his feelings. He said Latinos have a lot of feelings. The point is, is that different cultures place importance on different values and ways of thinking. By learning different languages, you can express your feelings more efficiently because somebody has already coined the words to explain how you feel. Words are one of our greatest tools, and in my opinion, if we expand our vocabulary, we expand our tool belt and can accomplish so much more