First Draft #35: a newsletter on public language
Trump’s F-bomb; 7/7 jargon lesson; "engaging stakeholders"; the struggle to sound human; Bayeux Tapestry; The Draft is hiring
On Trump’s F-bomb
Gasps rang out at The Draft HQ when we heard the clip. Was it an AI deepfake? No, it really was the President of the United States standing in front of reporters and proudly saying the word “f***”. Proof that even after a decade of Trumpian political transgression, the man can still shock - a remarkable fact in itself.
But while Trump’s f-bomb is as pure an example of norm-shattering as you could hope for, it also follows a tradition: that of populists and authoritarians who revel in profanity. Ahead of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Putin used a sexual idiom roughly translated as “lay back and take it”. Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte called Barack Obama a "son of a whore". Bolsonaro talked of sexually assaulting a fellow parliamentarian. Berlusconi loved a vulgar insult.
Such lurid language is often interpreted as an attempt to connect with the masses. But an even more powerful effect runs in the opposite direction. For a President who wants to be King, what better way to show you’re not subject to the same rules as everyone else than to stand in front of the world’s cameras and say the unsayable? In this sense, vulgar language doesn’t only convey gritty ordinariness; it’s also a way to sound extraordinary.
Steven Fish, political scientist at University of Berkeley, California, says Trump’s unique political gift is his mastery of political “high-dominance”. Exuberant displays of vulgarity are an expression of this. They signal that Trump operates outside the constraints of decorum, law and conventional political wisdom. In doing so they make him appear all-powerful - demoralising his opponents and invigorating his supporters.
Trump’s unfiltered language also helps him broadcast at a frequency outside the normal bandwidth of politics. Last November this helped to mobilise millions of mostly male voters who usually sit out of elections. Coarse language, black and white morality, us vs them - its politics made visceral, accessible and unignorable.
That there are sound strategic reasons for speaking this way raises one of the more intriguing questions about Trump, and one crystallised by his f-bomb: are his outbursts just that - outbursts - or is something more calculated going on? A new book about the 2024 election suggests that in lots of ways, Trump is a more shrewd operator than many realise. Calculated or not, one thing is certain: the dominance act, for now, is working. @AlexDymoke
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7/7 and a lesson in the value of plain English
The word “jargon”, as Chaucer first used it, originally referred to the inarticulate chattering of birds. In our time it has come to mean the pointless substitution of grandiose nonsense for perfectly commonplace thoughts. As a rule, jargon in the workplace is irritating, but the only harm done is to language.
Sadly, that is not always true and, if we needed a more serious reason to avoid jargon, the 20th anniversary of the 7/7 bombings in London offers one. The 7 July Review Committee of the London Assembly specifically referred to the unnecessary use of jargon as a major reason that the response from the emergency services was not as fast as it might have been.
There were two problems. First, the ambulance service and the police used different jargon terms for the same thing which meant they could not talk to one another plainly when time was pressing. Second, the public struggled to understand the messages relayed by all the emergency services because they have begun to use a needless professional vernacular. There could hardly be a better reason to be clear and plain. @PhilipJCollins1
Jargon buster: engaging stakeholders
The corporate world is addicted to “engaging stakeholders”. I can understand why. After all, there’s no better way to make not very much work sound like a lot. Had detailed discussions with 50 people? You’ve engaged stakeholders. Made three telephone calls that went straight to answerphone? Congratulations, you’ve still engaged stakeholders! And therein lies the trouble with the phrase: it’s too capacious to be of much use. Instead, be specific: which people did you engage, and how did you engage them? @AlexDymoke
Proving your humanness in the age of AI
Nick Clegg, speaking this week at the Words Matter conference in Oslo, predicted that the internet would soon be flooded with AI-generated writing. “You can’t play whack-a-mole by applying a little label to everything that is generated by AI,” he said. “How about doing the reverse? Using, for instance, blockchain technologies to verify and authenticate non-synthetic non-AI content”. This sparked a discussion in the office about how we’re already changing our writing in subtle ways to signal our humanness. Some confessed to abandoning the long dashes now synonymous with ChatGPT writing. Others said they no longer touch the “not only XXX but YYY” sentence construction that’s also a hallmark of AI prose. Christ. As if the threat of being replaced wasn’t enough, we now face the indignity of having to prove we’re human. Who’d be a writer, eh? @AlexDymoke
What the Bayeux Tapestry should really have been called
The famous Bayeux Tapestry, which depicts the Norman Conquest of England in 1066, culminating in the scenes at the Battle of Hastings, is coming to the British Museum. It will be the first time in 900 years that it has been seen in Britain. While it is here we should take the opportunity to rename it because it was not made in Bayeux and it is not a tapestry.
It was, in all probability, commissioned by Bishop Odo of Bayeux but made in Canterbury, possibly by nuns from Barking Abbey. And a tapestry, strictly speaking, is a woven textile, where the design is created by interlacing coloured weft threads with warp threads on a loom. The so-called tapestry of Bayeux is in fact an embroidery which is the art of decorating fabric with needle and thread on a cloth that sits underneath.
All that said, the Bayeux Tapestry sounds really good whereas the Barking Abbey Embroidery sounds rubbish. @PhilipJCollins1
THE DRAFT IS HIRING
Are you a brilliant writer with an interest in politics and business? We’re hiring writers to join our growing team. Full job description here.
Language and beyond
The most comprehensive article you’ll find on how to succeed professionally in an era dominated by AI - from the founder of 80,000 Hours. Video version here.
Want to get into Old English Poetry? This helpful introduction says there are easier entry points than Beowulf.
Just in time for summer, a helpful list of absorbing books to read on holiday from James Marriott: “All these books are not only ones I have enjoyed reading on holiday but which I have then recommended to others who have enjoyed them in turn. In most cases the recomendees have themselves become recommenders.”
A lovely read from The Ruffian on growing old. I especially liked the quote referenced here: “The American poet George Oppen said my favourite thing about growing old: ‘What a strange thing to happen to a little boy.’ I love how this evokes the subjectivity of a bewildered child trapped inside an aged body; a boy staring at his wizened hands and wondering what on earth is going on.”
A New Yorker Q&A with Netanyahu’s predecessor Ehud Olmert in which the former Israeli prime minister says his country is committing war crimes.
Surprisingly interesting piece on the divergent legacies of different translations of the Bible.
Steve Bannon’s recent Lunch with the FT in which the proud nationalist says he agrees with Zohran Mamdani 50% of the time.
What the left can learn from Mamdani’s victory.
New from us
Phil on 2024 - the big new book on the last US election.
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