Part 3 of a four-part essay exploring language and spiritual consumerism. Read Part 1 | Part 2.
The prolonged maturation of children seems to facilitate the development of a complex communication system like language, though the speed with which toddlers learn not only the meaning of words but how to formulate sentences is staggering.
One early mnemonic device is rhyme. When a word sounds like another word, it’s easier to remember. Our brain chunks information into categories. In order to remember the meaning and context of the 50,000 or so words an adult recognizes, such as the difference between the chair of an organization and a chair to sit on, we need cognitive markers to identify meaning quickly. And so our brain creates shortcuts.
This harms us socially in the form of stereotypes, which leads to all sorts of ethnic and gender biases. In terms of memorizing meaning, though, it’s one of our brain’s most useful tools.
Before the advent of writing, language was orally transmitted. If you’re going to recite the hundred thousand shloka (roughly 200,000 verse lines) of the Mahabharata by memory, you’re going to need a mental cheat sheet. Rhyming served this purpose.
Rhyming emits musicality, as any hip-hop fan knows. You don’t even need a beat when a worthy emcee punctuates specific syllables. A good poet knows that meaning and sound are related.
Colombian neuroscientist Rodolfo Llinás considers language a logical byproduct of abstract thought. We name things in accordance with their function. For example, consider what your mouth does when saying ‘go.’ The open-ended vowel lingers as it leaves your lips, implying motion. Now compare that to ‘stop.’ The ‘p’ is definitive, the requested action accomplished by the sound of the word itself.
Intriguingly, Llinás noticed that thoughts fire motor neurons in a phenomenon he calls motricity. Your brain signals movement every time you have a thought. As thinking is predominantly (though not exclusively) performed through language, this implies that words are their own form of movement. Llinás actually believes thoughts are internalized movement, with language being the main conduit for expressing those neuronal firings inside of our heads.
Words certainly evoke feelings. The word ‘emotion’ comes from the Latin emovēre, which means ‘to remove’ or ‘displace.’ The root movēre means simply ‘to move.’ The French evolved the term with emouvoir, ‘to stir up.’ Since humans think emotionally first, the foundation of our primary communication system is rooted in movement.
Llinás points to a subcategory of language he calls ‘biological prosody’ that is especially effective at describing internal states such as feelings and emotions. Not all language is prosodic—for example, technical manuals usually don’t have a sense of flow—but emotions expressed rhythmically have a powerful impact on sensitive animals like humans.
Late medieval English prose was uttered in a style specifically designed to stir emotions called amplificatio, which the poet Robert Graves calls an “embroidering of a simple statement to the point where it almost ceased to make sense.” The rhythm of the words creates a hypnotism that appeals to our emotional sensibilities, not unlike the approach creative pop singers must use to try to sell you another love song.
This specific form of expression is important for understanding the language of spiritual consumerism. When someone wants you to buy into an idea, petitioning your emotions through targeted marketing has long proven effective.
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