Archive for the ‘Miscommunication’ Category

How things are said

Wednesday, September 2nd, 2009

how things are said … may carry more weight than what is actually being said”

Salzmann p.313

 George Orwell.  1946.  Politics and the English language.  Quoted from http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/orwell46.htm  accessed on 9/1/09.

 

“Now that I have made this catalogue of swindles and perversions, let me give another example of the kind of writing that they lead to. This time it must of its nature be an imaginary one. I am going to translate a passage of good English into modern English of the worst sort. Here is a well-known verse from Ecclesiastes:

I returned and saw under the sun, that the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favour to men of skill; but time and chance happeneth to them all.

Here it is in modern English:

Objective considerations of contemporary phenomena compel the conclusion that success or failure in competitive activities exhibits no tendency to be commensurate with innate capacity, but that a considerable element of the unpredictable must invariably be taken into account. “

(Mis)Communication in USA-South Korea Press Conference

Friday, September 7th, 2007

South Korean President Roh Moo-hyun breaks joint press conference convention, causing a ‘sour note‘. The White House states, “There was clearly something lost in translation.”