Language - it can build and it can destroy. It creates a map of where we've been and a plan for where we're going. Since September 11th, a heavy weight has been brought down upon words and they've often seemed inadequate to describe the events of that day.
The reasons are many: overwhelming emotion, our lack of information, our tendency to be swayed by rhetoric of politicians and the media, and our inclination to hammer old words into new meanings. The word "war" alone creates a myriad of images - few of which apply to now.
The search for meaning can be a desperate one. George Orwell counseled us to slow down when he wrote, in the last century, "What is above all needed is to let the meaning choose the word, and not the other way around."
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Beverly Wall, specialist in political rhetoric and media at Trinity College
